I wan to make a request to #Science #Teachers: When you design labs please design some (most) without step-by-step instructions. The chances of your students needing pipette skills in 10 years is remote. What will serve most student better will be the ability to identify a problem, design and experiment that might explain that problem, setup and run that experiment, then interpret the results. Perhaps followed up by design a second experiment if the first didn't help.
Save the "follow the recipe" skills for home ec. The most important thing you can teach your student at any level is experimental design.
#rant #edutooter #education #scienceEducation #Teaching #teacher @academicchatter
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Im a bit confused as to what your suggesting, and before I formed an opinion I wanted some clarity.
So are you suggesting to leave out the step by step instructions because you want them to solve the problem on themselves and figure it out with less instruction so they learn more through trial and error?
Or are you suggesting pippette skills and similar skills, since they wont be needed in 10 years, should be skipped entierly, and you are suggesting this because the other skills are important, so more time should be focused on those?
So let me give an example. A chemistry class had done a unit on ways to identify Sodium salts and for homework had turned in a report detailing a proposed process to identify an unknown salt. However when students got to the lab, they were presented with a step by step guide instead of using the process they had developed themselves. Why?
Well, we know why. The powers that be did not trust students to use their own process because it might be wrong. It was just easier and less messy to hand out detailed instructions. But the real world is messy and doesn't come with instruction. In my opinion, the students were denied the chance to see the results of their own work and learn how to improve it.
