Current Events No.3
Miha Lee
Classroom Use of Multimedia-Supported Predict–Observe–Explain
Tasks in a Social Constructivist Learning Environment
By Matthew Kearney
From Research in Science Education 34: 427–453, 2004.
This research paper talks about the effectiveness of using multimedia-supported
POE tasks to facilitate small group learning conversations at the physics class. The
collaborative students’ discussion is focused on to provide a peer learning opportunity
for students. So the research is a kind of interpretive study adopting a social
constructivist perspective to analyze and interpret the students’ conversations. The
researcher investigated students’ articulation and justification of their own science
conceptions, clarification of and critical reflection on their partners’ views, and
negotiation of new, shared meanings. He made a conclusion that the computer-based
POE tasks supported students’ peer learning conversations, particularly during the
prediction, reasoning and observation stages of the POE strategy.
The POE method is a teaching-learning strategy proposed by White and Gunstone
(1992), which includes three stages: Prediction, Observation, and Explanation. At the
Predication stage students make predictions and justifications about the expected
results of experiment that are supposed to do in the next stage. And then they observe
attentively the scientific phenomena doing or watching experiments at the phase of
Observation. In the third stage they have to compare the their observations with
predictions, and they explain the observations with their own knowledge. The most
powerful strength of using the POE method is that if it is used as a diagnostic tool to
elicit students’ pre-instructional knowledge and conceptions, it helps teachers design
the next teaching for the purpose of meeting students’ levels. Furthermore, if active
discussions among students are used properly at the stage where students are trying to
explain any discrepancies between predictions and observations, the POE process can
be an effective teaching strategy to facilitate students’ understanding of concepts.
This paper is a part of series that the author’s doctoral study in which he
investigated the design and classroom use of computer-mediated POE tasks. So I feel
like that he put a lot of efforts and time into this study. He employed various methods to
collect rich quality data from the conversations of students and teacher interviews,
which makes this research valuable in science education. In this paper students were
learning about force and motion focusing on projectile motion, and the POE strategy
was used to structure the students’ engagement with the digital video clips. Although
the author didn’t focus on the conceptual changes of students, I have learned the
strength of the POE process in teaching science from this paper. For example, when
students make their predictions of the results, they need to retrieve their prior
knowledge relating to the experiments. So this phase offers students the opportunity to
think about their readiness of learning. And in the observation phage, they may find out
their predictions wrong. To explain any discrepancies between the predictions and the
observations, they seek other ideas and can revise their ideas.
Moreover, the discussion with peers through the three phases of the POE tasks
affords the students the valuable learning experiences. Students need to articulate their
ideas to talk with peers and evaluate the peer’s ideas to make a meaningful response. In
this process, they can learn something from listening to their partner’s view. If they are
just by themselves, they do not have an opportunity to make them think about the
findings a lot more. Actually, this collaborative decision making process encountered
during the computer-based the POE tasks is the focal point of this research paper.
Students participating in this study obviously valued each other’s ideas and used them
to reflect on the viability of their own conceptions.
On the other hand, using computer-based digital video clips instead of real
experiments provides students with many advantages in learning science. In Kearney’s
other paper (Kearny, Treagust, Yeo, & Zadnik, 2001), he found three principal
affordances of multimedia-based POE tasks. First, the computer environment affords
student control over the pacing of the POE tasks and also facilitates student control
over the presentation of the video-based demonstrations. Second, using digital videobased demonstrations in the observation phase of the POE strategy offers students a
refined tool to make detailed and clinical observations of physical phenomena and hence
enhances the quality of feedback on their earlier predictions. Third, the real-life
physical settings depicted in the video-clips provide interesting and relevant contexts
for the students.
To be specific, I have found some advantages of using computer-based video clips
as follows. First, students can go back to the previous step as many times as they want
at the prediction stage to change their predications as they came to reach new
agreement through their discussion. Second, they are able to observe experiments as
many times and closely as they want because digital video clips have many useful
functions which help students have control over the play. Third, the digital video clips
give students more accurate results of the experiments. Usually, students don’t have
well enough experimental skills to get accurate results, but video clips produced by
experts show quality results. In addition, the real-life video clips, not laboratory
situation, served as a particularly effective ‘backdrop’ for the reflective discussions
during the observation phase of the POE tasks.
Overall, this paper gave me a lot of useful information regarding teaching science
with the computer based POE tasks. However, because I don’t have enough knowledge
about the Constructivism, it’s difficult to fully appreciate this qualitative research of
analyzing students’ conversations and gestures. Frankly speaking, I wonder what the
role of teachers is in this research. Only designing the POE tasks and providing learning
experience from the discussion with peers are not sufficient for acting as a teacher
because some explains generated by students in this paper were scientifically wrong.
What should we teachers do to correct these wrong ideas? From the social
constructivists’ perspective, learners construct (rather than acquire) their own
knowledge, strongly influenced by what they already know (Driver & Easley, 1978).
Consequently, students are considered to learn science through a process of
constructing, interpreting and modifying their own representations of reality based on
their own experiences. So I think we teachers need to ponder about how to provide
students meaningful experiences to challenge their false or alternative conceptions. In
sum, the POE strategy is a useful kind of teaching method in science education, but
teachers should make an effort to design the POE tasks that fit in the content and the
goal of class. Therefore, I am designing the POE tasks for my project to teach my
school students about the properties of metal.
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