Course Title: Creative Laboratories

Part A: Course Overview

Course Title: Creative Laboratories

Credit Points: 12


Course Code

Campus

Career

School

Learning Mode

Teaching Period(s)

TCHE2165

Bundoora Campus

Undergraduate

360H Education

Face-to-Face

 Sem 1 2006

Course Coordinator: Dr Mary Hanrahan

Course Coordinator Phone: +61 3 9925 7859

Course Coordinator Email:mary.hanrahan@rmit.edu.au

Course Coordinator Location: 220.3.13


Pre-requisite Courses and Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities

None


Course Description

This is a 12- point course in semester mode which is designed for 3rd and 4th year students in the Bachelor of Education (primary) course.

The middle years science education course, Creative Laboratories will be unique and innovative. It will be based on a model of ‘productive pedagogies’ and “rich tasks” (cf. Education Queensland, 2001). Through this model of learning students are immersed in a scientific topic over an extended time frame with a focus on depth rather than breadth of content and with learning in science and technology taking place in relation to a larger socioculturally meaningful question or issue, likely to engage and challenge learners in the middle years of schooling. This style of learning addresses relevant contemporary curriculum policies, for example, the four science capabilities proposed in the Victorian Essential Learning Standards for Science, which means it not only addresses intellectual quality but also relevance to students’ worlds and their engaging with and valuing science within a supportive learning community. A problem-based approach to this immersion means students will be presented with personally or socially meaningful practical, real or hypothetical problems to solve as the focus of their investigations.

Through Creative Laboratories students will be introduced to a learning environment where immersion, revisitation and engagement in real life phenomena are integral to students’ scientific understanding. Driven by the realities of globalisation, sustainable futures, technological innovation and changing work practices it is a style of science learning that has at its centre a goal of preparing young people for personal, social, vocational and global futures where the premium is on young people’s skills and capacity to generate new knowledge and apply skills across a variety of scenarios.


Objectives/Learning Outcomes/Capability Development

1. to provide the opportunity for students to immerse themselves in a area of science so as to experience a depth of understanding in a contemporary science issue,
2. to engage students collaboratively in an immersive pedagogy through the investigation of a socioscientific issue over a period of a semester; and
3. for students to read a significant or contemporary essay on the impact of humans on the environment and to submit a critical commentary in the form of a critical essay.


1. to provide the opportunity for students to immerse themselves in a area of science so as to experience a depth of understanding in a contemporary science issue,
2. to engage students collaboratively in an immersive pedagogy through the investigation of a socioscientific issue over a period of a semester; and
3. for students to read a significant or contemporary essay on the impact of humans on the environment and to submit a critical commentary in the form of a critical essay.


Overview of Learning Activities

Focus topics/activities: Middle years, immersive pedagogy, rich tasks; science associated with a socioscientific issue relevant to the VELS curriculum

Weekly 3-hour classes will consist of range of activities consistent with middle years pedagogy, including lecturer presentations, negotiation of focus topic, peer group discussions, individual reflection, an excursion to a work or research site, and activities related to assessment activities as detailed on the Learning Hub.

Students will be also expected to: 

  • read a range of texts related to learning and pedagogy in the middle years and relevant scientific literature
  • plan and implement individual research on the science relevant to the identified /negotiated socioscientific issues 
  • actively participate in learning experiences in the weekly workshops 
  • critically reflect on their experiences in relation to TCHE2165 
  • join in on-line discussions 
  • competently complete requirements of assessment tasks.


Overview of Learning Resources

A variety of materials and resources will be available to students throughout the course, including resources on the Hub course website. Because of the investigative nature of the assessment tasks some of the research data collected will need to be tested out of class times either off campus or in the on-campus science laboratory.

There may be a prescribed text for this course, but this may vary according to the particular course offering and coordinating lecturer. Various readings will be assigned during the course. Students will need to regularly access the materials and resources on the course area of the Learning Hub and library. Students will also be expected to read a substantial text relating to the socioscientific issue under study.


Overview of Assessment

Assignment 1: Essay: The relationship between science and culture: The interrelationship between the development of science and human issues in a specific socioscientific context.

Assignment 2: Research report: Researching science in the context of a socioscientific issue in a collaborative setting.