My Work.
Discussion Post Week 5:
EQ 2: What is test bias, how does it impact students and how might I control for this bias? Test bias is essentially any assessment that has aspects that favor higher scores in certain groups of test takers over others. For example, if a standardized math test had some questions involving the movement from one point to another through city blocks, this would be considered biased because it gives an unfair advantage to urban students who are familiar with city blocks and navigation through a city over rural and suburban students who may not be as familiar with this context. The questions are basically inadvertently testing students on something that is not in the curriculum and is not necessarily even related to the course. Test bias can also be created when students have been taught differently or to different levels but are still given the same standardized test. In the YouTube video: The Secrets to Passing Culturally Biased Standardized Tests, Dr. Barbara Sizemore discusses the fact that certain schools had to cut out certain subjects in the first grade in order to ensure enough time to get students reading on grade level (AfroEthernet, 2013). If this extra time had not been taken, many students’ reading levels would be below grade level and these students would be at a disadvantage when taking standardized tests (AfroEthernet, 2013). Test bias impacts students because it leads to skewed test scores for various groups of students on standardized tests. Depending on what the test is, these skewed scores can effect student’s placement in classes or even their acceptance to various colleges. One way that I can control for this bias in my own classes is to create test questions that are as general as possible and only test the content at hand. For example, a non-biased test question may look something like: “A student is working in the lab and masses out 5.67 grams of calcium chloride. How many moles of calcium chloride did the student mass out?” The context of this question is in a lab setting which chemistry students are all familiar with, so it should hopefully not be biased in any way. I think that this method of generalizing the context of questions could also work on a larger scale with standardized tests. Popham suggests having groups of content specialists trained in spotting test bias and then having these groups go through standardized tests to look for and eliminate biased questions (Popham, n.d.). Test bias can have a big effect on bilingual students because in essence any content test that they take in English also inadvertently tests their English which can make answering the content questions more challenging if they don’t fully understand the context of a questions or specific vocabulary terms. Hernandez suggests that speech pathologists should be included in the development of any test that bilingual students will be taking so that they can help to eliminate any language bias from the test (Hernandez, 1994). AfroEthernet. 2013. Dr. Barbara Sizemore Reveals the Secrets to Passing Culturally Biased Standardized Tests. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYSbQNYzjk8&feature=youtu.be Hernandez, R.D. (1994). Reducing Bias in the Assessment of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Populations. The Journal of Educational Issues of Language Minority Students, 14, 269-300. Retrieved from https://ncela.ed.gov/files/rcd/BE020262/Reducing_Bias.pdf Popham. n.d. Eliminating Assessment Bias. Absenceofbias.weebly.com. Retrieved from https://absenceofbias.weebly.com/eliminating-assessment-bias.html Discussion Post Week 7: Essential Question: what is involved in being a game designer? I had a lot of fun playing through the quest on Gamestar Mechanic and creating my own game, so I can definitely see how incorporating games and game design in the classroom would be engaging and fun for students. From working with Gamestar Mechanic, I’ve learned that to make a good game you have to be creative in making a game that is winnable but also challenging enough to be fun and interesting. I’ve played a lot of videogames in my life and I’ve definitely taken for granted everything that goes into designing a videogame. When it came time to make my own game on Gamestar Mechanic, I had a lot of trouble in making a level from scratch that was fun and interesting and even when I was finished I felt the level I made could be greatly improved. This experience has given me a whole new appreciation for videogames. I think that the creative aspect of making videogames would be extremely beneficial in my science classes as there is a lot of creativity and problem solving involved in different science disciplines. Using game design software like Gamestar Mechanic would also align well with the new Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) as many of the standards require students to create or engineer some type of product. Cornally states that using games like Portal in the classroom to talk about the physics of the game can meet many STEM standards (Cornally, 2012). According to Aviles, games such as Minecraft and Fortnight can even be incorporated in the classroom if done correctly (Aviles, 2018). At first glance games like these may not seem very educational, but if we take a closer look, we can see that there is a great amount of strategy, creativity, and problem solving that go into playing them (Aviles, 2018). One way that I could use Gamestar Mechanic in my chemistry classes is that I could have my students create maze levels that their avatars have to travel through to get to the end goal. They can also write out chemical reaction equations that need to be balanced with coefficients. Each coefficient can represent the number of spaces that the avatar has to move in a specific direction to complete the maze. Then, students can have each other try to balance their equations and complete their mazes. If the students balance the equations correctly then they should be able to make it to the end of the maze successfully. If this is too easy, then students can have each other complete the maze while looking away from the screen. Aviles, C. (2018). How to Integrate and Manage Video Games in Your Classroom. Teched Up Teacher. Retrieved from http://www.techedupteacher.com/how-to-integrate-and-manage-video-games-in-your-classroom/ Cornally, S. (2012). Video Games in the STEM Classroom. Edutopia. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/video-games-in-STEM-classroom-shawn-cornally Gamestar Mechanic. (n.d.). Gamestar Mechanic. Retrieved from https://gamestarmechanic.com/join/redeem/MultiMedia586/premium |
Mini Action Research/ Differentiation of Content Infographic: Created to help students take a more active/ creative approach to learn about the five main types of chemical reactions.
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Reflection: My Mini Action Research plan was on having students create an infographic for one of the five main types of chemical reactions. Up to this point, I had never used Piktochart before so I tried to make my own infographic with it before having my students create their own. I found Piktochart pretty straightforward to use and only ran into a few issues along the way. Two problems that I ran into were uploading pictures to my infographic and printing out my inforgraphic but after a little bit I was able to figure it out. I was glad that I tried to use Piktochart before having my students use it because then I was better able to help them troubleshoot as they worked. I enjoyed using Piktochart and I think that my students really liked it too. I also think that my students did better with the topic of types of chemical reactions than last year because they were better able to visualize them from the infographics.
Gamestar Mechanic Video, Lesson Plan, and Game: Created to give students a more interactive and fun opportunity to balance various chemical equations.
Click to set custom HTML
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File Size: | 38 kb |
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Reflection: The game that I created involves writing out chemical reactions, balancing those reactions with coefficients, and then using those coefficients as directions for the number of spaces the avatar has to move in specific directions to successfully complete a maze. This was my first time using Gamestar Mechanic and my first time creating a video game in general. I had a lot of fun working through the tutorial and designing the game. I definitely think that using video games is a great way to make learning a content topic fun and engaging for students. Through this process, I learned quite a bit about what makes for an interesting and fun video game. I learned that levels should build up in difficulty and that there should be challenging aspects to each level to hold the players interest. I also learned that the backgrounds and structure are important in keeping each new level interesting. Finally, I learned that there is a lot of trial and error and editing involved in making a video game. To see if a level works you have to go back and forth between designing it and playing through it to see if it functions the way you want it to.
Global Collaborative Projects Presentation: Created to show the opportunities available for students to collaborate with students from other schools and countries on working to solve global issues/ working on global projects.
Reflection: The Global Collaborative Projects Presentation involved our group talking about the Global Guide site and the projects that it offers for students to collaborate with one another. My piece of the presentation was on how specific projects related to various STEM standards. As a result, I looked at a few science and math related projects that I though were really interesting. This was a very eye-opening experience for me. I never realized that there were so many opportunities available for students to work on projects with students from other schools and countries. There was even a project where students get the chance to collaborate with employees and astronauts from NASA. I really enjoyed working in a group on this project because it allowed us each to focus on specific aspects of the site and projects and I think that everyone's parts came together really well.
EDUC 586 Differentiated Assignment Rubric for Periodic Table Trends: Created to make a project that allows students to choose how they design their presentation and present to the class.
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File Size: | 32 kb |
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Reflection: For this differentiation assignment I decided to make the project on the chemical trends in the periodic table. For the assignment students have to make a digital presentation with digital models of various atoms but can use any program(s) that they like to achieve this. Any opportunity to come up with a way to differentiate my class is always great so I really enjoyed this assignment and will definitely use this in my classes and future classes.
EDUC 586 Space Podcast: Created to talk about two space travel podcasts and analyze what makes for an interesting and engaging podcast.
Reflection: The EDUC 586 Space podcast was on two space travel podcasts that I had listened to and thought were interesting. I also talked about the aspects that make for a good podcast and the aspects of each podcast that made them so interesting and engaging. This was my first time making a podcast and using Audacity and it was a really fun experience. I thought that Audacity wad pretty user-friendly and straightforward to use. I was able to record audio and import music but at the time was unsure how to fade music in and out so my podcast sounded a little choppy. I had to make sure that my audio and music didn't overlap, otherwise the listener wouldn't be able to hear the audio over the music.
EDUC 586 Chemistry & Science Research Podcast: Created to talk about the differences between the structure and content in Chemistry and Science Research classes.
Reflection: The EDUC 586 Chemistry & Science Research podcast was on the differences between the content and structure of my chemistry classes and my science research class. The video on how to fade music in and out was extremely helpful for this podcast. Since I was able to fade the music in and out, I could overlap the music and audio without the music being too loud during the audio segment. This allowed the podcast to flow better and made it sound more like a genuine podcast. I think that this podcast was better than my first one but there are still some aspects that I would like to improve upon in the future. For example, I would like to talk a bit louder and modulate my voice more during the podcast.
EDUC 586 Chemistry Misconceptions Podcast: Created to talk about common misconceptions that students come into chemistry with and to disprove some of these misconceptions.
Reflection: I really enjoyed recording this podcast. I had some of these misconceptions going into chemistry in high school and I think a lot of students have them as well. With any class, not just chemistry, I think it really helps to ask students what they've heard about the class at the beginning of the school year and clarify any misconceptions that students have. My high school chemistry teacher and some college professors did this and it really helped to put me at ease and to fully enjoy the classes.