Children Doing Science: Essential Idiosyncrasy and the Challenges of Assessment

January 1st, 2015 | RESEARCH

To this volume on out-of-school STEM learning, we contribute an example of science. Our charge is to discuss what it means for children to be doing science and how educators can assess it. To that end, we’ve chosen an especially clear case. It happens to have taken place in school, but that shouldn’t matter for our purpose here; it’s the substance of the children’s reasoning that we’re assessing as the beginnings of science. We open with the case. We then articulate how it is an example of science, in particular of science as a pursuit. Finally we discuss what this view means for science education, in particular with respect to assessment, whether out of school or in.

Document

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Team Members

David Hammer, Author, Tufts University
Jennifer Radoff, Author, Tufts University

Related URLs

Full Text
Successful Out-of-School STEM Learning: A Consensus Study

Tags

Audience: Educators | Teachers | Elementary School Children (6-10) | Museum | ISE Professionals
Discipline: Education and learning science | General STEM | Physics | Technology
Resource Type: Reference Materials | Report
Environment Type: Informal | Formal Connections | K-12 Programs