Evolving Minds: Promoting Causal-Explanatory Teaching and Learning of Biological Evolution in Elementary School

不断进化的思维：促进小学生物进化的因果解释教学

• 批准号: 2009176
• 负责人: Deborah Kelemen
• 金额: $ 299.43万
• 依托单位: Trustees of Boston University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-06-01 至 2025-05-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2009176&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Evolving; Minds; Promoting; Causal; Explanatory

Natural selection is a fundamental mechanism of evolution, the unifying principle of biology. It is central to understanding the functional specialization of living things, the origin of species diversity and the inherent unity of biological life. Despite the early emergence of tendencies that can make evolution increasingly challenging to learn over time, natural selection is currently not taught until middle or high school. This is long after patterns of misunderstanding are likely to have become more entrenched. The current research responds to this situation. It targets elementary school as the time to initiate comprehensive instruction on biological evolution. Adopting a teaching and curricular approach that will be novel in its integration of custom explanatory storybook materials with hands-on investigations, it seeks to promote third grade students’ understanding of small- and large-scale evolution by natural selection. By studying students across multiple school districts, this research will shed light on the benefits to diverse students of instruction that focuses on supporting children’s capacities to cogently explain aspects of the biological world rather than learn disparate facts about it. It will also illuminate the value of simple tools, like explanatory storybooks, for elementary school teachers who are often expected to teach counterintuitive topics such as natural selection while not feeling confident in their own understanding. This project will investigate changes in Grade 3 students’ learning and reasoning about living things during implementation of a guided inquiry curriculum unit on evolution by natural selection that emphasizes causal-mechanistic explanation. Classroom inquiry activities and investigations into a range of real-world phenomena will be framed by engagement with a sequence of innovative custom causal-explanatory storybook, animation and writing prompt materials that were developed under prior NSF support to promote transferable, scientifically accurate theory- and evidence-based reasoning about natural selection. In response to the distinctive challenges of life science and evolution learning, the project will integrate and thematically unify currently disparate Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) content and practice standards to create a comprehensive unit that addresses all three NGSS dimensions and is accompanied by evidence-based approaches to teacher professional development (PD). Using a design based research approach, and informed by cognitive developmental findings, this 4-year project will engage at least 700 students and their teachers and include partners from at least four school districts, Boston University, and TERC. The Discovery Research K-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) by preK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of innovative resources, models, and tools. Projects in the DRK-12 program build on fundamental research in STEM education and prior research and development efforts that provide theoretical and empirical justification for proposed projects.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

自然选择是进化的基本机制，也是生物学的统一原则。它对于理解生物的功能专门化、物种多样性的起源和生物生命的内在统一性至关重要。尽管早期出现的趋势会使进化随着时间的推移而变得越来越难学，但目前自然选择直到初中或高中才开始教授。这是在误解模式可能变得更加根深蒂固之后很久才出现的。当前的研究回应了这种情况。它以小学为目标，作为开始生物进化综合教学的时间。它采用了一种新颖的教学和课程方法，将定制的说明性故事书材料与实践调查相结合，试图通过自然选择促进三年级学生对小规模和大规模进化的理解。通过对多个学区的学生进行研究，这项研究将阐明教学对不同学生的好处，这种教学侧重于支持儿童有力地解释生物世界的各个方面的能力，而不是学习关于生物世界的不同事实。它还将向小学教师阐明说明性故事书等简单工具的价值，这些教师经常被期望教授自然选择等违反直觉的话题，但对自己的理解没有信心。本项目将调查三年级学生在实施自然选择进化论的引导式探究课程单元期间对生物学习和推理的变化，该单元强调因果-机械解释。课堂探究活动和对一系列真实世界现象的调查将通过参与一系列创新的定制因果解释故事书、动画和写作提示材料来框架，这些材料是在之前的NSF支持下开发的，以促进关于自然选择的可转移的、科学准确的理论和基于证据的推理。为了应对生命科学和进化学习的独特挑战，该项目将整合和主题统一目前不同的下一代科学标准(NGSS)内容和实践标准，以创建一个综合单元，解决所有三个NGSS方面的问题，并伴随着以证据为基础的教师专业发展(PD)方法。使用基于设计的研究方法，并了解认知发展的结果，这个为期4年的项目将吸引至少700名学生和他们的老师，并包括来自至少四个学区、波士顿大学和TERC的合作伙伴。探索研究K-12计划(DRK-12)旨在通过研究和开发创新资源、模式和工具，显著提高K-12学龄前学生和教师在科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)方面的学习和教学。DRK-12计划中的项目建立在STEM教育的基础研究和先前的研究和开发工作的基础上，为拟议的项目提供了理论和经验上的证明。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。