EXP: Transforming High School Science via Remote Online Labs

PI试图更好地了解如何使在线远程实验室在高中科学课上有效运行，特别是关注教师在促进围绕这些实验室进行调查时的角色，以及如何支持教师的角色。所解决的重大研究问题是如何理解远程实验室何时以及为什么能够促进有效的学习和教学。该项目团队正在将高中辐射实验室用于几个不同的目的来解决这个问题。他们在项目过程中提炼学生和教师的材料，以便他们可以作为其他虚拟实验室体验的模型。正在完善的实验室日记被设计为包括在在线远程实验室中进行调查的脚手架，这将普遍适用于实验室环境。研究表明，当学生无法接触到物理现象的第一手经验时，访问远程实验室有助于学生更好地掌握他们研究体验的现实，而当学生使用远程实验室进行实验时，学生体验到的现象比使用模拟进行相同实验时更真实。这表明，对于没有实验室设备的学校，以及调查过于危险或复杂而无法在课堂上进行的情况，在线远程实验室可以在促进内容学习和科学素养方面发挥强大的作用。如果我们真的希望我们所有的人都具备科学素养，那么让每一个青少年都有机会参与有意义的实验室体验，让他们体验科学家所做的事情以及科学家如何推理，这是必不可少的。但有许多高中没有允许这种情况发生的设备。该项目为围绕远程实验室创造如此有意义的体验奠定了基础。一些这样的实验室拥有复杂的设备，这在学校是不合适的；一些实验室拥有更简单的设备，许多学校根本负担不起。远程实验室由个人或学生团队使用适合学员发展的用户界面访问，该界面允许学员运行、改进和重新运行实验，并在真实设备执行其指令时远程观看。要让远程实验室在课堂上很好地工作，需要为教师提供各种工具，使他们能够促进调查活动，并在课堂上在线和远程进行调查时监控课堂上个人和群体的进展。该项目的重点是一个特定的远程在线实验室(盖革计数器)，为该实验室周围的高中生创造有意义的体验，并确定教师需要哪些类型的工具来有效地促进这种体验。所学内容将适用于创建其他有意义的远程实验体验，并以类似的方式使用其他远程实验设施。

The PIs seek to understand better how online remote labs can be made to function effectively in high-school science classes, especially focusing on the roles of teachers as they facilitate investigations around those labs and how to support teachers in their roles. The big research issue addressed is coming to understand both when and why remote labs promote effective learning and teaching. The project team is addressing this question in the context of using a high-school radiation lab for several different purposes. They are refining student and teacher materials over the course of the project so they can serve as models for other virtual lab experiences. The lab journal that is being refined is designed to include scaffolding for carrying out investigations in online remote labs that will be generally applicable across laboratory contexts. Research shows that access to remote labs helps students better grasp the reality of their investigative experience than do simulations when students do not have access to first-hand experience with physical phenomena; students experience phenomena as more real when carrying out experiments using remote labs than when using simulations to carry out the same experiments. This suggests that for schools without lab equipment and for situations where investigations are too dangerous or sophisticated to be carried out in a classroom, online remote labs can play a powerful role in promoting both content learning and science literacy.If we truly want our full population to be scientifically literate, then giving every teen the opportunity to participate in meaningful laboratory experiences that allow them to experience what scientists do and how scientists reason is essential. But there are many high schools without the equipment to allow this to happen. This project lays the groundwork for creating such meaningful experiences around remote labs. Some such labs have sophisticated equipment that would be inappropriate in a school; some have simpler equipment that many schools simply cannot afford. Remote labs are accessed by individuals or student teams using a user interface that is developmentally appropriate for the learners and that allows them to run and refine and rerun experiments and watch from afar as real equipment carries out their instructions. Making remote labs work well in classrooms requires having the kinds of tools for teachers that will allow teachers to facilitate investigation activities and monitor the progress of individuals and groups in the class as they do their investigations online and remotely. This project's focus is on one particular remote online lab (a Geiger counter), creating meaningful experiences for high schoolers around that lab, and identifying the kinds of tools teachers need to facilitate such experiences effectively. What will be learned will be applicable to creating other meaningful remote lab experiences and using other remote lab facilities in similar ways.