Spark curiosity, provide fundamental background information that will spark questions among your students, but vary the way you present that information. 

 You can start the class by:

Structured or guided inquiry activities can lend themselves to topics that students typically struggle to grasp, allowing them to process content in different ways.  Initiate an inquiry activity when you feel it is appropriate, but it must use a guiding question that:

Allotting time for class-wide reflection lets students discuss challenges and discoveries, filling knowledge gaps and supplementing findings.

-       registration of research results;

-       analysis of the obtained results (statistical, graphical and analytical data analysis), comparison consequences of the experiment with the forecast of research results and substantiation conclusions;

-       writing conclusions and results;

-       presentation of research results.
Stages:

I stage – a theoretical and experimental research in the lesson;

II stage – a partly-search research;

III stage - searching research activity;

ІV stage - Scientific research activity;

Stages of Student Research:

The selection of themes is based on the realities of life. Everything that is studied by the students is personally significant, increases their interest and level of knowledge. After all, research should cause a desire to work, and not to repulse its complexity and obscurity.

The organic combination of theoretical knowledge and experimental skills has a great importance for the practical orientation of the research.

Collective studies of any problem that everyone plays in their role are effective. This form of work contributes to the formation of student’s skills communication, the division of responsibilities in the group, purposefulness in achieving the goal.

 

 

·         I choose a subject that my students desire to learn, on which they are curious. In this way they should be more involved.

·         I ask them to write a guideline document about how to work in a group because they have had only few experiences about group work. In this way work in group should be easier.

In my experience the formation of the groups requires sometime teachers’ interference in the organization: if necessary I choose some students who will be not the leader but simply the representatives of each group (this is to avoid that either the most brilliant pupils or those who are easily distracted work all together).

Because of the little time Italian science teachers have for classes, we can do discussion during the class, while the presentation of the project should be done at home by the students. 

Regarding the strategies I’d underline the following:

- choose something to arouse students’ curiosity, formulate the question with them, bearing in mind the 7 requests (how, where, what for, …) (to involve students in the research, to propose substantial questions)

- keep always in mind and remind students the driving question (not to get lost!)

- organize time and work space (research is time and space consuming)

- devote more time to draft conclusions of each group before the class conclusion (to have a more fruitful debate)

- consider what could be done to achieve the initial goal if it hasn’t be reached (to evaluate the project)

- recognize students’ work (often, I don’t do this, to spare time) 

One issue that came up in the video, and that often comes up when discussing the use of IBSE activities in class is the time factor. At times we feel that there isn’t enough time for these activities. To minimise this problem, when we work on projects we can try to work on topics that are related to the syllabus anyway so that we will be using the project work to tick off some topics that we would have had to tackle in class anyway.

I would choose the exerimental project, because I feel most proficient to guide the students in this area. 

It is important to clearly define the initial question to make the students feel curious about it, using the 7 key questions. 

2.     Organization of the class: 

The students should make a priority list on the blackboard so that they organize themselves. 

I would let the students choose one of several projects to increase their interest and motivation and form the groups by themselves to facilitate their interaction in the groups. 

3.     Coaching the students: 

The students should make a brainstorming in their groups to pool all their ideas and work together. 

It is important to ask the students to state their observations independently from their analyses. 

I would ask the students to make a control experiment, to vary only one factor at once and keep the others constant and to reproduce their data so that they understand the concept of reliable data and can draw clear conclusions later. 

The students should prepare parts of their posters as homework so that they have time to define their own conclusions before discussing them together. 

Students should be asked to compare their results with their hypothesis and to summrize their results to come to conclusions. 
It is important to circulate among the groups to be available and reassure them. 

4.     Presenting the projects: 

I would let the students summarize their projects on posters structured in abstract, introduction, results, discussion so that they have a good overview. 

It is important to sumarize all findings and to come to a final onclusion together. 

It is important to recognize and highlight the students’ efforts to build their confidence. 

I would emphasize that even if their initial hypotheses turned out to be wrong, they still learned something and can now think of an alternative hypothesis and future experiments. 

Teacher acts as facilitator/guidance

Organize schedule to make the most out of the available time.

Ask pupils to write down their ideas alone first and to compile them as a group afterwards.

Groups made of pupils who know each other and work well together (preferably).

Ask questions along the process and accept all answers.

Gather information that leads to divergent outcomes and then work through these to achieve convergence that leads to the acceptance of the best solution.

Second, I propose to solve the problem.

Third, I form groups for work. The principle I apply for shaping groups is different for different classes.  Sometimes the choice of a group is according to the student's will.

Fourth, I point to sources (literature, websites) to be used. Or, at the students' suggestion, I can invite a specialist for a consultation.
Fifth, we supply the laboratory with the necessary equipment. This is at the suggestion of the students. The equipment and the materials must be available.

Sixth, the students conduct the experimental research. The results are shaped and conclusions are drawn.

Seventh, each group presents a presentation with conclusions from the experiment and with the solution of the problem.

The students organized in teams will use the principles of buoyancy to investigate how mass, gravity,
volume and density is related to the buoyant force of an solid object floating in liquids. They will perform lab activities which investigates the fundamental physics behind pressure in fluids, buoyancy forces, and Archimedes’ principle.

Prepared timetable and a set of questions that may encourage action.
It is important that the topic is of interest to students

 

Some questions my students might ask are …

On a sunny day, why is the sand hot, but the ocean water cold?

Why is it always windy at the beach?

What can you cook using the sun?

 

Students would also have the opportunity to design and implement a project to answer their question and present their results. (Projects might be subject, experimental, or design.)

 

My students already work in small groups during science activities so we’re all set there!