This week's assigned reading was Chapter 11 in our course text which was focused on generating and testing hypotheses. The book states that "When students generate and test hypotheses, they are engaging in complex mental processes, applying content knowledge, and enhancing their overall understanding of the content" (Lever-Duffy & McDonald, 2008). This is very important for students as it requires them to use higher order thinking skills while allowing them to "construct" learning through testing different hypotheses. This is what the constructionist theory is all about.
Chapter 11 shows how to use interactive spreadsheets with students so that they can organize data while testing different hypotheses. This is a technology application that allows students to create a plan and compare their predictions. It saves students time and also reduces the amount of error in the hypotheses. Through using these interactive probes students are constructing their own learning and not relying on a teacher to give them all of the information. The chapter goes on to discuss data collection tools and digital probes which I was not familiar with. I have not used probeware with my third grade students so I was a little unsure of how those work. I was able to gather that digital probes are another way of students collecting data and creating a digital representation of the data, again aligning with the constructionist theory of learning.
Students are typically more engaged when participating in project-based learning and chapter 11 gives some excellent ideas on how to implement more project-based learning into your curriculum through the use of generating and testing hypotheses.
References
Lever-Duffy, J. & McDonald, J. (2008). Theoretical Foundations (Laureate Education, Inc., custom ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.
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