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Huziak-Clark
_____________________________________________________________________
IMPROVING TEACHER QUAITY STATE GRANTS PROGRAM- OHIO BOARD OF
REGENTS FISCAL YEAR 2009
(check one)
Interim Report _
INTERIM/FINAL REPORT
(Due Date 9/1/11)
PART II-Project Operation
Final Report _XX_
(Due Date 8/1/12)
______________________________________________________________________
1. General Information
Date Submitted 8/1/12
a. Grant Number 10-05
b. Name of Institution Bowling Green State University
c. Mailing Address 121 Life Science Building. Bowling Green State
University. Bowling Green, OH 43403
d. Project Title STAMPS
e. Project Director(s) Tracy Huziak-Clark
Title(s) Associate Professor
Phone 419-372-7363
2. Project Staff
List all professional personnel involved in conducting the project and related data.
Use a separate sheet if necessary.
Staff
Title and Disciplines
Responsibility
Tracy HuziakClark
Associate Professor,
Science Education
John Laird
Professor,
Physics and
Astronomy
Co-planning, Coteaching, material
purchasing, data
collection and fall
institute
Co-planning and
Co-teaching lessons
at summer institute
Mary Kate
Hafeman
Teacher ConsultantOttawa High School
Co-teaching lessons
Nate Ash
Teacher ConsultantPerrysburgh High
School
Co-teaching lessons
% of Persons Time
on Project
Spring 11- 20%
Summer 11- 40%
Fall 11- 20%
Spring 12- 40%
Spring 11- 20%
Summer 11- 40%
Fall 11- 20%
Spring 12- 20%
Summer 11- 80
hours
Fall 11- 9 contact
hours
Spring 12- 12
contact hours
Summer 11- 80
hours
Fall 11- 9 contact
hours
Spring 12- 12
Contact hours
`
Natasha
Gallagher
Graduate Student
Joe Cartensen
Graduate Student
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
Recruitment,
Summer 2011- 150
Material prep,
hours
Workshop
assistance
Material prep, Data Fall 11- 160 hours
Collection, Teacher Spring 12- 160
observations, Data
hours
Analysis
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3. Project Operation- PLEASE SUBMIT 3a - 3f WITH BOTH THE INTERIM
AND FINAL REPORTS. Use additional sheets with the headings provided below.
Please include the Project Number, Institution and Project Director(s) name at the top of
each page.
a.
Describe the major accomplishments
We are pleased with the progress of Project STAMPS for high school teachers.
With each new ITQ grant we work on we continue to be impressed by the questions and
willingness of the teachers to extend their thinking and improve their teaching and
content understanding. We had more than 30 teachers from Northwest Ohio interested in
our program, and 24 participated in the summer institute at BGSU. The teachers were
selected by first admitting teachers from our high need partner district, Sandusky City
Schools, then we selected those who applied as pairs or groups of teachers from the same
school or district. This completed our registration. The summer institute ran MondayFriday July 25th- August 5th from 8am until 5pm each day. In addition, the participants
attended 6 additional academic year sessions from 6-9 each meeting. Also, they were
required to participate at least three times per month on EDMODO our group discussion
board. We had 24 high school teachers that represented our partner districts including
Sandusky City Schools, Toledo Public Schools, Hancock County, and Wood County. We
have found that the experiences of past participants are strongly impacted the desires of
teachers to apply and wish to participate.
The STAMPS Co-Investigators and teacher consultants used research-based
lesson plans that were field tested and researched by the University of Arizona and
funded by the National Science Foundation. This is the core of our professional
development in the summer. Following the recommendations in the Ohio Academic
Content Standards these lessons were based in active, engaging, challenging, meaningful
and motivational classroom practices (Ohio Department of Education, 2002). Each
morning began with a discrepant event (modeled after those researched at the University
of Arizona. The participants were given time to work in small groups to test various
variables and to try to determine cause and effect. The project directors and teaching
team worked with small groups to model facilitation questioning. Each group presented
their results in four modalities: graphically, mathematically, pictorially, and written
explanations during white boarding sessions. These models became the basis for Socratic
questioning to deepen content knowledge and understanding. Teachers worked in groups
to complete misconception-based problems to further develop the scientifically correct
explanations and to help extract common misconceptions in discussions and activities.
The final portion of the day was filled with practical experiences for participants to
“show what they know” and served as the projects daily assessments.
Each day was focused on a different content theme from physical science, with
the first week focused on Physics concepts and the second on Chemistry concepts. The
classroom teachers who are trained facilitators in the Modeling protocol took the lead on
the daily discrepant event. The project directors and the other teacher acted as assistants
for small group facilitation as well as during the modeling of Socratic questioning.
Threaded through the workshop were sessions (teacher mode) on the teaching
model itself and how to implement effectively each component of the model. The
teachers learned more about scientific inquiry, how modeling can be implemented in the
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classroom in several ways and at increasing levels of student involvement (NSES 2002,
Huziak 2003, Bybee 1997).
We had four major goals for this professional development: Improve student
learning in physical science, Improve teachers’ physical science knowledge, Improve
teachers’ beliefs and behaviors regarding science teaching, and Support teachers’ use of
the modeling framework to teach physical science. The first goal of improving student
learning in physical science is just beginning as the participants are now imbedding the
physics modeling in their own classrooms. Each student completed a pretest and these are
currently being scored by our evaluator and graduate student. The results will be shared
with the participants at the second academic year session as well. We will also collect
post evaluations as well as conduct classroom observations of teachers implementing the
lessons in their classrooms.
The second goal was to improve teachers’ physical science content knowledge.
All participants took the Force Concept Inventory (FCI) and the Chemistry Concept
Inventory (CCI) pre and post summer institute as well as at the end of the academic year.
An analysis was completed finding early significant improvement in the FCI and some
gains in the CCI. The participants scored high on the pretest for the CCI so there was less
room for improvement. Specific details including the post academic year scores are
shared in the external reviewer report. However, we did note a very interesting
phenomenon during the workshop. The first day, the participants were willing to “act as
students” and “get things wrong on purpose”. However, as the content became more
difficult and the participants were required to “rethink” their understanding, they began to
comment that they were for the first time understanding why students responded with
misconceptions. They began in small groups to identify the misconceptions that their
students (and themselves) held about content. In addition, they were able to identify ways
that the modeling lessons would help them guide their students away from
misconceptions to understanding. We are hopeful that this will be apparent in the student
scores at the end of the school year.
The third goal was to improve teacher beliefs and attitudes towards teaching
science, particularly with regards to modeling in physical science. The teachers
completed a survey before the professional development that provided a baseline for
attitudes and beliefs. The teachers also completed this survey at the end of the academic
year. Results show that the teachers significantly improved their self-efficacy beliefs
about science teaching, preparedness to use modeling, and their willingness to use these
modeling strategies. The results also showed that there was little change in their beliefs
about reform based teaching, we believe this is because their scores were very high
before the workshop began, so they already had deep beliefs about the necessity of
reform based teaching. More specific data can be found in the external reviewers report
and analysis. As you will also see later in this report, observations of teachers in their
classrooms showed a deep commitment to ‘trying’ modeling with their students and
committing to helping their students learn and deeply understand the content.
The final goal was to support teachers’ implementation in the classroom during
the academic year. All participants received either a physics or chemistry kit of materials
to take back to their classroom to help support the discrepant events. Also, all teachers
have all of the physical science lesson plans, handouts, and problem sets that were
modeled during the workshop and access to more lessons on the Modeling web site. Also
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we are using EDMODO to provide a forum for participants to share what they are doing
as well as questions that others and the PD staff can answer or respond to. Finally, the
first part of each academic year session is also devoted to “how is it going” white
boarding sessions. Teachers were asked to respond on their white boards to “successes
and struggles” (First hour spent allowing teachers to “debrief” how things are going
implementing in the classroom). Some success discussed were “Developing lab rules
huge success for most (bouncy ball lab really lends itself to doing this), Repeat students
really like it “what is this—we never did this before”, “Students are really engaged—
especially by the lab books”, “Teachers are more open to student responses--- listening to
students more”, “I have become very good at questing”. Struggles included “Not giving
in—not giving the answers”, “Time intensive”, “Asking “good” questions”, “Everything
is NEW”. These discussions were beneficial to develop the learning community as well
problem solving to reduce issues as they came up during the implementation phase
throughout the academic year.
b.
Describe internal monitoring used to measure the success of activities in
achieving project objectives.
As described above ongoing data collection has occurred before, during and after
the summer institute as well as throughout the academic year. Pre and Post/post-AY
content tests for teachers, pre/post content tests for students, Pre/post attitude surveys for
teachers, classroom observations and monitoring of EDMODO all served roles in
measuring the success of this program. In addition, the external reviewer and PI observed
and took field notes during the academic year follow up session. These documents will
all help us better understand the impact of the program and the changes that the teachers
experience.
The external evaluator, Jake Burgoon, was present for three days during the
summer institute and attended two fall and spring professional development sessions this
year. He will also conducted classroom observations during the academic year.
c.
Describe any changes from the original proposal (e.g., activities, audiences
served) including the rationale for the changes.
There were no significant changes from our original proposal. We had an exciting
level of interest again this year—more than 30 applications. We were able to include two
more teachers than our grant was originally funded for based on left over funds from
prior ITQ grants. We had 24 teachers participate.
d.
Describe administrative and/or programmatic problems that have been
encountered and how they were resolved.
There were no administrative issues this year.
e.
If publicity regarding activities and accomplishments has been obtained, please
describe and include samples.
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The STAMPS flier, information about presentations at PENTA and Northwest Ohio
Symposium are included.
F. Please provide any other related project information that you would like to share with
Improving Teacher Quality Program Staff.
The remainder of this report as well as the external reviewer report contains the necessary
information we would like to share. We are very excited to be in the midst of our second
year of this exciting program.
G. Provide a complete listing of all teacher participants. Include teacher name, grade, and
subject(s) taught in addition to the name, address, and phone number of the school and
school district and county were the district resides.
This information is included in a chart at the end of this report.
H.) Describe (with supporting evidence) how your project made an impact on
participants’
1) Content Knowledge
When we first began to plan Project STAMPS our major goal was to be sure that
participants had the skills and confidence to apply what they learned on their own. We
spent significant time modeling, presenting and reflecting on how the lessons were
designed and could be implemented into the physics or chemistry classroom. Significant
time during the summer was spent with participants in what we called “student mode”
where they “acted” like students participating in the lessons as their students would
during the academic year. The participants actively collected data, created white boards
with groups, discussed in “board meetings” and completed “assessments” and
“challenge” activities just like their students would in the future. The PI and Co-I
assisted the teacher facilitators and also took notes on some of the activities: For instance
on day three the PI noted:
“Big change today, as the content is getting more difficult participants are really
digging and are a little less willing to be “wrong” or to “act like students”. They have
clearly seen that they are really going to get something out of this. They are asking
teacher questions that show their interest in making this work in their own classrooms
like “what if a student does not believe that acceleration there is zero” or “why is the
focus so heavy on the kinematic graphs”? They are asking each other questions in
their small groups “why did you draw the slope in that direction” and they really
WANT to understand”.
This process of modeling the laboratory experiences, problems, and white boards
continued throughout the summer institute and into the academic year follow up.
Participants moved between “teacher mode” and “student mode”. An example of a white
boarding session would look like this:
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A representative from each group came to the front to share particle model of
salt. (Board meeting where everyone was up at the same time.) Participants noted
“some models look alike, while one group had salt at the bottom” Questions from
the instructor --- why did this happen? The questions included.. do some move
faster (whoosees) how would you show some of the sodium choride? What is it
that pulls the salt to the bottom.. why do you think it dissolves? Have you ever
dropped a rock in water—does it dissolve—is the rock made up of smaller
particles—for some reason they stay together—what does the pulling apart of the
salt?
Next set of questions included “Do the NA/CL stay together or do they come
apart when they are dissolving? Can you explain how the water being polar might
explain how the water pulls the NA/CL apart?”
We noted that as participants started doing this in their own classrooms writing down the
questions that the instructors asked became just as important as the set up of the lab and
the answers to the questions. These “white board” questions became the focus of the
“teacher talk” questions as well.
During the Summer Institute teachers also broke up into small groups with the
facilitators, PI and Co-PI to “practice” Socratic Questioning techniques. They quickly
realized that they really have to understand the content and what is going on to be able to
elicit questions that will help a student move from an incorrect answer to a correct
understanding of the material.
“Today in white boarding practice my group commented on how difficult it was
to be able to ask questions enough DIFFERENT ways to help a student move
from the wrong model or drawing to the correct one without saying “you are
wrong”. One teacher noted she had to ask more than 15 different questions to
make her point. She said this is really different than just telling them, but I can see
how this will help them THINK more as well.”
After the summer workshop the teachers commented formally about what they learned
about content. The following provides an example of these statements.




I feel that both the Chemistry & Physics Modeling helped me realize some
misconceptions I had on foundational material for each subject. It now makes
more sense.
There were [content] areas that I have not discussed or learned since college –
most was a review but new content was discussed as well and old material was
taught in a new way.
Content was very strong and helpful.
The chemistry seemed harder to piece the overall picture together as we skipped
many readings and worksheets. Perhaps less material coverage but greater focus
on fewer topics to see how it would go down in the classroom.
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Good content. Unfortunately, assumed I knew stuff that I didn’t know. That got
frustrating to try to keep up.
This same thread was continued through the academic year. During our “teacher talk”
white boarding sessions (First hour of every AY session) the teachers time and time again
commented on how using the modeling helped them think about the content in a new way
and learn the content in a ‘deeper more meaningful way’.




“Not only do I feel like I understand the content better and more deeply, I am
asking better questions and my students are understanding more as well.”
“I am applying what I learned instead of just repeating like I did when I was a
more traditional teacher, I think it has to do with my greater understanding”
“I always felt confident as a physics teacher, now I KNOW I understand because I
am willing to give more “control” of the learning to the students. I am more
willing to let them and myself make mistakes- it is light a light bulb turned on for
me this summer”.
“I have always taught Chemistry and this year I had to teach Physics for the first
time, I would not have felt nearly as prepared for this year without the course this
summer”
As has been reported in the literature, there are many pervasive misconceptions about
physical science concepts ((Driver, Guesne, Tiberghien, 1985; Soloman, 1983; Brook and
Wells, 1998; Brook and Driver, 1986). Many of these misconceptions have even been
passed down from teacher to student. We felt it was very important for the participants to
understand the content at a level above which they would be teaching. Many teachers
commented that there were concepts that they have not taught during their career (i.e.
chemistry teachers- learning physics), but they were interested in learning more and
actually felt confident in the “other” content area. The participants commented about
their content learning at the end of the summer, but it was really reinforced as they
themselves had to teach using the modeling approach.
2) Instructional Approaches/Teaching Strategies
The teacher participants began by learning more about scientific inquiry, how
modeling can be implemented in the classroom in several ways and at increasing levels of
student involvement and engagement (NSES 2002, Van Hook, Huziak & Nowak, 2005,
Bybee & Landes, 1988). Using techniques such as cooperative learning, modeling, and
real life examples, teachers experienced and learned how to engage and to teach physical
science concepts conceptually and for long-term learning. The teachers learned to use
equipment and modeling lesson plans provided to implement their adaptations of the
model lessons. The participants discussed strategies for how to take the curriculum they
already have, their texts, resources, and materials and integrate these curriculum models
in an effective manner. Finally, threaded throughout was how to use different types of
assessments in order to evaluate their impact on student learning of concepts and skills.
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The STAMPS model lessons were designed to follow science teaching best
practices and the construction of knowledge by the students as facilitated by the
instructor. In addition, scientific modeling and inquiry were key components to the
curriculum development. The teachers practiced teaching the content and to use the
pedagogy modeled during the summer institute then enacted these strategies in their own
classroom with support from peers and the BGSU faculty during the academic year. This
teacher reported data is also supported by the classroom observation findings. A
summary of the classroom observations for frequency of STAMPS model key
components is included at the end of this section as well.
The teachers commented after the summer institute and after the AY about the
pedagogy, strategies and curriculum they learned about during the institute below.

Modeling will allow me to dig deeper into the brains of my students to grasp
genuine knowledge.
 Teaching the class as a model for modeling was the perfect way to get the method
and be able to use it.
 STAMPS helped me to get “back to the basics”, meaning to really focus on core
concepts as opposed to taking more time during a lesson to go over more
examples or talk about related concepts. I am also using some lessons I found
online that were developed by some advanced modelers. These lessons were
great, but took too long, and with the upcoming change in standards and
expectations from his school and the state, I liked that the lessons provided by
STAMPS were more targeted.
Observations in classroom reveal that all of the teachers were attempting some
strategies of modeling with their students, the white boards being the most popular
strategy. However, more than half tried to implement full scale modeling with one of
their content areas (physics or chemistry). The chart below details some of the strategies
of modeling and the extent to which they were observed. Following is a sampling of key
observations and quotes from teachers and students about the implementation of these
strategies.
Table 1. Classroom Observation Data
N= 15.
OBSERVATION
Students/ Materials
Science materials actively used
by students and teacher
Teachers use modeling lesson
plans with or without
modification
Model development through
laboratory activity
Model development through
mathematical discovery
Model development through
YES
NO
N/A to that
Lesson
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
71%
7%
21%
64%
0%
36%
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discussion (white boarding
sessions/Socratic questioning)
Students work cooperatively
on model development
Students Drawing/ Modeling
representations of the concepts
Students summarize key ideas
verbally or by drawing/writing
OBSERVATION
TEACHER
Confident using the materials
provided by the grant funding
Confident teaching the content
as presented in the summer
institute
Confident checking for student
understanding through
questioning
Confident using modeling
techniques (labs/white boards,
mathematics)
Confident using modeling
curriculum
93%
7%
0%
86%
7%
7%
79%
7%
14%
86%
0%
14%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
100%
0%
0%
79%
14%
7%
79%
14%
7%
Sample of Field Observations:



I could tell that the students had been doing modeling throughout the year because
they were comfortable with the white boarding process. They all knew exactly
what to do when they were told to white board their results.
During this class period, the students participated in the “spring lab”. The students
set up a stand to which a horizontal bar was attached. The students chose two
springs and hung them from the bar. They attached weights to the bottoms of the
springs, and used a meter stick to measure the amount of stretch in the spring. The
lab was introduced the previous week (on Friday), and after a short refresher of
the lab, the students collected all of the materials they needed (from the nearby
storage cabinets and countertops) and began to work. The teacher suggested the
use of Logger Pro to collect data and create graphs. He also recommended the use
of two-meter meter sticks when the students’ initial measuring system didn’t work
out.
The students are learning about physical properties. The teacher instructed them
to interact with the materials (e.g., dump the sand into the watch glass, put the
metal shavings in the sand), and write their observations in their notebook. The
last part of the lab activity was to put sugar into two clear liquids and make
observations. The students made observations about the test tubes, and were then
asked to draw a particle diagram in their notebooks.
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 The teacher said that the class had been doing modeling since the beginning of the
school year. This was evident when the teacher said, “I want to make two boxes
in your notebooks,” and the students said “particle diagrams” before the teacher
could say it. The students also readily retrieved whiteboards from against the wall
to draw their diagrams. They certainly had done this process before.
 The teacher’s questions were successful at soliciting students’ ideas about the lab
activity and the physics concepts addressed during the activity. An example of an
exchange is:
Teacher: Lindsay did I give you the same amount of Mg as other groups?
Student: No, everyone got a different amount
Teacher: Does it matter?
Student: No, because it the same material. Also, when student asked her a
question, she opened it up to the class. One student said, “wait, so is the ratio of moles
the same as the
ratio of atoms?” and the teacher turned to a group of students and
said, “What do you think? What is a mole?”
 Used excellent questioning, and higher order questions throughout the discussion
and the group problem work. “Explain what you did” “Do you agree” “Do you
have questions for X about that answer”, “Let’s figure out where to go next”
“How do you know?” “Explain what you are thinking”…. These are small sample
of what was used.
We strongly believe that the teachers have improved in their depth of content knowledge
and have gained the ability to implement the modeling strategies in their own classroom
settings. The data suggests that teachers’ content knowledge has increased. Field
observations and teacher comments document the learning and use of the modeling
strategy.
I) Describe (with supporting evidence) how your project impacted student achievement.
As discussed above, the increase in teacher content knowledge and the change in
instructional strategies positively impacted student learning of the content. The
participants were asked to give a pre and post FCI, CCI, or PSI to their students. We also
requested that they ask a peer in their building to give the same tests to their students as a
“control” group. This was difficult to obtain for several reasons: 1) only teacher teaching
physics or chemistry in their building; 2) their colleagues already used modeling; 3)
principals that would not allow the data collection from teachers who did not participate.
Many of the teachers pretested all of their classes and turned these in. However, several
teachers decided to focus on modeling in just one content area instead of more than one
as they had originally planned. Therefore, our pretest numbers were much higher than our
post test results. The results of pre/post tests are described below and further in the
external reviewer report.
The participants who taught physics used the FCI test for pre and post test
assessment. Both the control and STAMPS participants students increased in their
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knowledge, with a significant increase for those students in a STAMPS teachers’
classroom.
Table 2: FCI pre/post test results
Likewise, the chemistry teachers used the CCI, a similar test to the FCI that
teaches chemistry topics. There was a significant increase in knowledge, however, there
was no control group to compare how these gains compare to other chemistry students.
Table 3 below shows these results.
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Table 3: CCI pre/post test results
There were several participants that focused mainly on physical science and used
the FSCI pre and post tests. The STAMPS grant focused mainly on curriculum for
physics and chemistry, however the instructors did address how these could be modified
for physical science teachers. However, they did also express “there is pretty wide
agreement that the lesson plans for on the modeling website for physical science are not
the “best” examples. More modification is needed and this is definitely an area for
growth” (STAMPS instructor). The teachers who tried to implement these lessons agreed
that they were not a “clean” or as “straightforward” as the other curriculum that was
modeled during the grant. However, there was still growth in both the STAMPS
participants classroom and the control classrooms. There just was no significant
differences between the two classrooms. From our observations of the physical science
classrooms, we believe we can explain the lack of difference in the lack of “full
implementation” of the model approach. Many of the physical science teachers
implemented “strategies” such as white boarding and hands-on labs, but this may not
have been different enough from what other 9th grade teachers were doing to show a
significant difference. However, as Table 4 below shows, there was an increase in the
understanding of the content.
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Table 4: FSCI pre and post test results
The modeling and hands-on experiences and excitement for learning science is
clearly important at this level. From Tables 2-4 above it is clear that there was a marked
improvement in student understanding. In addition, to student learning, there is also
significant evidence of student enthusiasm and excitement, as well as actively
participating in quality, hands-on lessons, which adds to their long-term interest in
science. Students having an opportunity to be actively involved participate in discussions
and even, sharing in some fun leads to long-lasting learning. In addition, the teachers
reported many different ways in which their students learned the concepts. There is
definite improvement in the scores from pre to post for all three tests (physics, chemistry
and physical science).
In addition to the student pre and post test data, classroom observations (we also
talked to students while we were out there) suggest that the modeling strategies were
impactful.
 I asked one groups of students if they liked doing white boarding, and they said
they like when they go up to the board to talk about it. One student said she likes
when they white board their homework because it gives them a chance to talk to
each other about it. Another group said that think the modeling helps them to
understand the content a little, but its still confusing sometimes. I asked about the
“board meetings” (during which the students and teacher discuss their models),
and the students said they freeze up. I asked if the students feel that they
understand the content better at the end of the board meetings and they said
mostly. When I asked them to compare their experience with modeling to what
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they might experience with textbooks, one student said that he’d probably be
sleeping if they were using a textbook, and would probably be getting worse than
a B in the class. (The teacher echoed a couple of these thoughts. He said that the
students don’t want to look incompetent in front of their peers, and so he tells
them some of the questions he might ask during the board meeting so the students
have a chance to think of an answer. Also, he said he never realized how little
students are allowed to get up and walk around in a normal lecture-based class.
With modeling, the students are walking around, getting supplies, working with
their hands to set up equipment or drawing).
The teacher had an AP class the period before, and two of the student stayed
during the class period because they had study hall. They stood behind the desk
and worktable in the front of the room. They had taken this same class last year
without modeling, and they said the students are now miles ahead of where the
AP students were last year. They said they wished they had used modeling.
During a white boarding session: It was great that several of the students were
able to notice “problems” with the diagrams and formulas.. students were able to
identify problems with white boards—seemed to be one or two brave students that
would point it out.. but great that they were finding this. Students stated “this
[white boarding] makes me pay attention and question not only my work but
everyone elses too”.
J) Provide a sample of participants’ comments. This has been included in the questions
above and in the external evaluator’s report, however, some additional comments are
included here to further support the effectiveness of the STAMPS professional
development.
1. experiences in the project:

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I feel that both the Chemistry & Physics Modeling helped me realize some
misconceptions I had on foundational material for each subject. It now makes
more sense.
Modeling & Socratic questioning are great inquiry based, student centric learning
methods.
This workshop was the most valuable education workshop I have ever been to.
This has been one of the best professional development experiences in my career.
I have done a fair share amount of PD & these two weeks were so great I am
immensely grateful.
There were areas that I have not discussed or learned since college – most was a
review but new content was discussed as well and old material was taught in a
new way.
My enjoyment for teaching is so much better this year, I can’t believe how much I
have learned and grown as a teacher, not since I first started teaching have I felt
this way!!
I think we have deeper content knowledge now— it makes you a better teacher, I
struggled all summer and makes you think, this is what it feels like to really learn
the content.
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Bowling Green State University
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I learned better questioning techniques, not telling, better wait time, listen instead
of tell. These are things I knew, but when I saw it in the workshop, it really hit
home, this is a prime example of how this is really done!
2. after using the activities/strategies:
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I know my students will reap benefits of my modeling instruction that will stick
with them as they go through life.
“Repeat students really like it “what is this—we never did this before.. we wish it
had been this way last year, I would have learned it then”.
Students are really engaged—especially by the lab books. I can’t believe how
much more my students are paying attention and actually writing things down!
I am more open to student responses--- listening to students more which has made
a difference in understanding how they are thinking and what they REALLY
know.
I have become very good at questing--- they are paying attention because they are
“afraid” of my questions.
3. Student performance:

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Students are doing more in class, so students are understanding more, they are
working harder than I am for the first time!
Students are thinking more!! Hurrah, I was beginning to doubt I could help kids
think more, but this is definitely the way—modeling has change my teaching and
their learning.
I think it [the curriculum] is too easy—I haven’t modified—but I have only had
two kids fail, so I hope they are getting it—they are really answering all of the
questions—last year I would have 60% answer the questions. I have very few F—
much more in traditional teaching..
I have more students DOING work and concerned about their grades!
K) Use the format below to list the activities, which your project conducted.
Type of Activity
Date of Activity
Contact Hours
July 25- August 5
September 6
Number of
Participants
25
24
Summer Institute
AY 1- Materials/AY
procedures, CHEM
Empirical Formula
AY 2- Reflection,
PHYS -Energy
AY 3- Reflection,
CHEM – Chem
October 6
23
3.5
November 15
22
3.5
80
3.5
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
Reactions
AY 4—Reflection,
PHYS - Waves
AY 5- Reflection
CHEM - Notation
AY 6- Reflection,
Assessment
strategies/ Data
Collection
EDMODO
Classroom
observations **
Northwest Ohio
Science and
Mathematics
Symposium
PENTA Symposium
January 12
22
3.5
February 7
24
3.5
March 8
24
3.5
Online Learning
Community
September 6ongoing still
September 10March 30
November 6th
24
20
15
1-2
10
5 teachers copresented with me at a
session on RIPE
3
8
Feb 2010
6
L) Describe the content focus on each follow up session.
As is noted in the chart below we held six follow up sessions each three hours in
length, as well as an online component each month. Each AY session is described here.
Session 1:
Session one focused on the academic year expectations as well as material
release, each teacher took home a kit of materials to assist in their implementation of the
modeling strategies. These materials included 12 white boards and dry erase markers for
each teacher. These were probably the most utilized materials during the class
observations! This session began to focus on the Chemistry unit 4—Chemical Reactions.
The first hour of the session was spent with teacher reflection and white boarding their
reactions to the following topic: Successes and struggles; how are your initial attempts
going in the classroom? Teachers expressed a variety of successes and had many
questions about implementation. Some examples of success:
 “Developing lab rules huge success” for most—bouncy ball lab really
lends itself to doing this. Almost every teacher implemented this instead of
former lab introductions.
 “Students all want to know how they did on the FCI/CCI really curious”,
teachers see this as a motivator for future years!
 “Fun for us and the students”, students are more engaged than ever before
in their teaching.
Struggles (Samples)
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark

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Not giving in—not giving the answers
Time intensive
Asking “good” questions
“Everything is NEW”
Difficult to listen and to question during white boards--- sometimes “dead end”—
the conversation just stops.
The remaining two hours were spent on an Empirical Formula Lab with packing peanuts
and a Relative Mass lab developing more models and continuing to explore the
curriculum from the summer institute.
Session 2:
The second session began with reflection and white board time on solutions for
white boarding concerns and implementation issues that teachers were having. The
teachers developed the following list of “solutions”:

Made it clear to students—not just looking at graphs, but learning new--- white
boarding time is “note time”… this is what you will be studying from.
 Have different groups white board different problems so the focus is different
with each presenting group
 Use the question “Do you agree or disagree with what “Jenny” just said” to keep
the whole class involved.
From there physics experiences and model development about Constant force, Unit 6 in
the curriculum. Several experiments were completed and model about constant motion
was developed.
Session 3:
In the third section the reflection was focused on success and issues again.
Teachers continued to note that students seemed more engaged, they are improving their
questioning skills and students are performing much better on labs, tests, and practical
exams. Chemistry was the focus again at this session, with Compounds being the focus
of the content. Participants used a computer model for electron movement that they can
also use in their classroom as well as completed several lab activities with compounds.
Session 4:
In the forth session, the reflection of this session was sharing the “best lab
experience” this school year and any concerns. The best lab experiences included ‘the
buggy lab, the bowling ball pendulum lab, icy/hot lab, and acid labs. Teachers shared not
only are their students more engaged in the labs, but they seem to retain the content
better. One teacher commented “I feel like I am really far behind, it took four days to
develop f=ma…. Acceleration and force—(net) board meeting over that paper, not any
old force, only this one is causing this force.. HOWEVER, 90% of my students GET IT!
This is a first in my teaching career”!
The content focus was on developing model for waves and understanding wavelength.
This was accomplished with several lab activities and white boarding sessions.
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
Session 5:
In session five, the reflection focused on the materials and curriculum, any
changes or questions? Teachers commented “that the materials were not appropriate for
Freshmen” However, most said that they were “Using the binder a lot, focusing on the
key models”. Others said that “Some of the worksheets are worded differently than those
they had in the summer (modifications made by instructors). Finally, some decided that
“Some worksheets need to be made a little easier—or maybe more practice is needed for
some students”. The rest of the session was spent focusing on Chemical Notation or
naming compounds.
Session 6:
In the final session the reflection was focused on the best thing they learned and
the focus for next year. Teachers commented that they have a “New perspective on what
is important, can cut out the “extras” and focus on what is important, “the curriculum
really helped guide my planning and helped student learning and engagement”, the
practical exams have become a focus in a way they were not in the past for many—
students are really able to “show” what they know, “Higher level of student
engagement”—discussing, trying harder, asking questions really helps, finally for many
teachers this has increased enjoyment for teaching is so much better this year!!
The content focus of this session was mixed with multiple assessment strategies shared
and modeled. Different ways to get to student understanding. Ranking tasks—student
have to also rank how they feel about their answer as well. “Whenever I do a ranking
task—it takes all period--- These types of problems reveal all of the students deeply held
misconceptions”. Another strategy is the “Goal-less” problems- you can make them as
complex or as simple as you want. You can give the same problem and just add to it with
each unit. This helps you understand the models that students are building and how it
relates to student understanding.
Finally participants completed the post AY FCI and CCI as well as exit surveys.
EDMODO Sessions:
Throughout the academic year, teachers were required to post on EDMODO at
least three times a month, one new post and two responses to peers. Below you will find
some samples of the types of “conversations” that took place on EDMODO.
Asking for Help:
Did anyone sketch the railroad rail, sponge and whiteboard demo? I forgot to sketch the
set-up and need to put it in my notes. If you have it, will you share with me tomorrow?
I did, but I think they are also in the back of the binder under Nate's stuff
Any Practicum ideas for Physics Unit 4 and 5:)
Unit 5, I've used Atwood' machine (pulley with masses on either side), I give
them one mass, and they must determine the other, and all they get is a stopwatch and a
meterstick. You could always do some play on friction, but that can be a little tricky (like
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
stopping distance).
For Unit 4, I use force probes and put something in equilibrium with strings pulling at
angles (I use an apple this year). They see the forces on the force probes, and they have to
work to find the mass of the apple.
I'm currently covering mass ratios in Unit IV Chem and I'm finding worksheet 3 to be
very difficult for the students. They are having very little success finding chemical
formulas, and I am having limited ways to present as I want to fall back to the periodic
table and find the mole ratios but have been resisting. Any suggestions on making this
worksheet work? (Mr. Lawrence)
 My students have trouble with U4 W3 too. I decided this year to only do
the first 2 pages because the third page is just too confusing for them. I
think the point is made in the first couple examples. Feel free to adapt and
adjust the worksheets!
 It helped when we just added a few words to the explanations - keep
asking how the ratio of this element to that element changes - and we are
using the little round models to illustrate it so they can actually see it.
Teacher Question:
I'm looking at the unit 6 activity: distinguishing ionic, molecular and atomic solids. Part 1
asks what distinguishing features can you cite about water. What are they supposed to
notice? Should it start a discussion about H- bonds?
Peer responses:
 How about MP, BP relative to other substances, how a fine stream of water is
attracted to a comb that has been run through someone's hair, less dense when
frozen - things they can observe.
 I am on the same worksheet, and I just skipped Part 1 on it. The rest of the
worksheet has been a headache as not one group in 3 classes noticed how the
substances in each row were similar. I had even saved this worksheet for the end
of the unit, so they could name them but could put 2 and 2 together.
Suggestions of other activities:
Here is a very cookie-cutter friction lab that Katrina wrote. You can include fewer
directions if you want them to do more on their own. It works great, and hanging the
spring scale upside down as part of the accelerating force allows you to use its weight and
not have it drag across the counter - some of us don't have force-meters and computers... I
think she did a great job coming up with the ideas. Really shows how decreasing the area
by a factor of four has very little effect on the mu.
And even after the grant was over one teacher:
I'm not sure if anyone's still checking here, but I wanted to share with the physics folks. I
used interactive physics to develop the central-force particle model since using the lab
equipment is extremely inaccurate. Then, I used the lab equipment today for a practicum.
They had to create a one-second cycle - determine appropriate hanging mass and
calculate the radius to get there. They had to demonstrate by swinging in 20 cycles - so
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
20 seconds. I gave them a 20% (4 second) leeway as I was not sure how this would turn
out.
It worked perfectly - the worst time I got was 18.11 seconds. In addition, the students
really had to think about the relationships as they worked through the assignment. Plus,
all of the students were actively engaged, even my "wanderers." Modeling instruction has
definitely helped to hold back some senioritis issues! (Tipping 4/26/12)
M) Describe any unexpected project outcomes
At this time, we are pleased that we are still seeing impacts on content knowledge,
attitude, enjoyment of teaching science and student learning. As with past professional
development projects, we are very happy to report that teachers are reporting that
students of all abilities are benefiting from the lessons being hands-on with modeling and
white boarding to aid in their learning. However, we did note that there were more
teachers of physical science than we expected in the grant. We did not anticipate student
gains at this level, but we were pleased that there was growth even though it was not a
central focus of our grant.
N) Summarize changes you would make if you were doing this project again.
There are three main changes we are planning for STAMPS II. First, is the
pre/post tests for the teachers. We did not anticipate so many teachers being familiar with
the FCI and CCI. We believe a different, but similar, test would help us show change in
teacher content knowledge more accurately. We have created one new physics test and
we adapted the change to the CCI based on research on the modeling web site. (The
ABCC has been under evaluation since 2009. Small changes have been made each year
attempting to address some statistical concerns raised in early data. In August 2011
version 2.6.1 of the ABCC was released for use within the Modeling Instruction
community through the modeling website). Because the ABCC is not commonly used by
teachers yet, we felt it was a better assessment.
Second, we plan to stress the importance of attempting to obtain a control
classroom if at all possible, even if it is at a near-by high school. (There were several
teachers who were the physical science department). There was clearly growth from pre
to post, but in order to understand how this compares to teachers who have not used a
modeling approach.
Third, although we talked to students informally during classroom observations,
we found ourselves wishing for more a student voice in the data collection. We will plan
a very short survey for teachers to give to their students to better address students
attitudes towards this new modeling approach.
O) Enclose a sample of materials developed for the project and a sample of the materials
developed by the participants.
A CD of the curriculum materials are included. Several pictures of teachers “in action”
are at the end of this report. Finally, samples of “participant” notebooks are included to
provide an example of what the teachers learned.
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Bowling Green State University
Huziak-Clark
P) Please enclose a copy of the external evaluator’s project evaluation report.
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