Peter Lee
This report outlines a five-week enrichment project I coordinated with 34 students in a full-time Year 5&endash;6 GATS class in rural NSW. I was given a one-hour time slot each Friday in which to do the project with the only proviso that it would not involve too much study time during the week as the students already have a very busy schedule. In planning this project I had already decided that I wanted group work to be a feature of it and I wanted the groups to comprise a mix of both sexes to see how they would interact over the length of the project. I chose the topic because I wanted the students to have a real life problem to solve. From my study on the subject, many of the large car manufacturers have set the year 2004 as the year when they believe they will have models completely tested, sorted and ready for mass production at a cost effective price. This year happens to coincide with the year most students in this class will be aiming to get their licences and I used this fact to introduce the topic to the students.
In designing the project I borrowed some ideas from a few models. The model that I found most helpful was the multiple menu model. It is more a teacher guided form of learning that I thought would be easier to get every student equally involved in. I did not have the luxury of knowing all the particular areas of interest, skill or knowledge of the children but the class teacher, Rosemary, helped sort the students into groups of like-minded individuals where possible. One group was selected specifically for their drawing skills. One of my objectives was to observe how different children responded to the same set of instructions within each group. I also tried to design the questions so that they would appeal to students with different interest areas.
There are some very obvious leaders in this class. Many are well acquainted with speaking in front of peers and public. The students come from very diverse backgrounds. Occupations of parents include teachers, farmers, a truck driver, and an electrician. One student's father had converted their whole house to run off solar cells, batteries and natural gas.
The following explains how I planned to structure the project and formulate the questions:
a) Location, definition, and organisation:
b) Basic principles, and functional concepts:
c) Knowledge about specifics:
d) Knowledge about methodology:
The following is a list of the processes I wanted the students to experience:
Rather than isolating each type of skill and risk giving the students something too hard or too easy, I decided to mix them up in the activities that I gave them each week. The questions were worded in such a way that a student could do all of the work independently of the rest of the group but I intended to keep emphasising the importance of working in a group and comparing answers and sharing information.
To this end I decided to ask each member of each group to come out in front of the rest of the class in turn and share his/her ideas with everyone. This was designed to take up nearly half the lesson. The remaining half lesson was to be spent in the groups which would then discuss any problems with the members of the group. I also wanted to see some interaction between the groups as consultation would be needed to solve problems that affected more than one group. I was able to evaluate the children's learning by looking at each student's book to see if there was a change in awareness about the topic. In the last week of the project I asked the students to evaluate which ideas were practical and cost effective and finally to list in order their relative importance.
Questions given to each group each week were:
Tasks for week 3
Tasks for week 2
Tasks for week 3
Tasks for week 2
Tasks for week 3
Tasks for week 2
Tasks for week 3
The children of this class represented as diverse a range of students as I could ever have imagined. Some were very quiet though mostly they were very talkative. The general mood of the class was different, however. I did not notice the 'put-downs' or alienation of certain students that I have come to almost expect with students this age. There was very little bickering or antisocial behaviour. That is not to say the students were all quiet and always did what they were told when they were told but rather there was a continuous playful 'buzz' of action and interaction.
The students already appeared to have a good grasp of where to find information when they needed it. Many of them made use of computers, both CD-ROMs and the Internet, but still used traditional encyclopedias and other books. It was with interest that I noticed the sorts of magazine that some students brought in with information in them. Along with National Geographic and other environmental-type magazines there were several motoring magazines of the type usually only bought by dedicated enthusiasts. Of course these may well have been borrowed from older siblings or parents, but these students certainly seemed to know the contents of these issues extremely well.
The evaluation of this unit was done by asking the students a series of questions on a separate occasion, two weeks after the final session. The following is a summary of the questions and responses:
1. Were there too many/too few questions?
Response: All children agreed that the number of questions was not a factor that concerned them.
2. Were the answers too hard to find?
Response: A few students said there were a few answers that were hard to find.
3. Did you always understand what was meant by the questions?
Response: 'Most of the time we understood what you meant but sometimes the questions weren't very clear.' (One question group 2 found hard was question number 2 for week 3, concerning recharging. The question was incorrectly worded. It should have read: How can we test how long a battery will last before it needs recharging?)
4. Did you find working in groups helpful?
Response: 'We have never worked in groups before. Usually the boys worked together in one group and the girls sometimes worked together and sometimes they worked separately. Sometimes when we had a good idea and we told the group about it a person in the group would say that's not a good idea.'
5. Where did you get most of your information?
Response: 'From Dad', 'From the library', 'From the Internet', 'From my computer', 'From other books'.
6. What are some of the interesting things that you learnt?
Response: 'I learnt that there are many things to think about when designing a car.' 'I learnt that there are many important parts of a car that have to be designed separately but that still have to work together.' 'I thought it was interesting how many parts of a car you don't need if it's an electric car.' 'I had fun thinking of different gadgets for the car. '
7. What else would you have liked to do related to this unit?
Response: 'I would like to have built a scale model of an electric car.' 'We could have built a real one or at least a simple one.'
At the end of this question time I asked the students how they could have worked better in groups. They came up with several ideas such as putting all ideas for each week on a list for that particular group. As a group they would then discuss each person's idea fully before moving on to the next idea. Someone else suggested that negative criticism not be allowed within the group. Another person suggested that each person be given a time limit to explain his or her ideas.
I did not see many examples of higher order thinking but the unit wasn't designed in such a way as to promote this. There were, however, many examples of creative thinking especially with some questions. Some of the most interesting ideas came from the question: 'How can we use glow in the dark materials in our car?' Useful answers included glow in the dark numberplates and hubcaps.
One student came up with a problem I had not anticipated. He stated that electric cars would be virtually silent. This could prove dangerous for pedestrians who are visually impaired or simply not as aware. He suggested that a speaker be placed at the front of a car that would emit a non-irritating sound warning of the vehicle's approach. This sound could possibly be the sound of a quiet exhaust pipe. This creative problem solving was spawned by the question about what parts of an ordinary car would no longer be required in an electric car. One of the things mentioned was the muffler system. This was one example of the type of cross-level thinking that was observed.
I looked at the student's books each week and again at the end of the project. I also observed them making a banner based on the project during the last lesson. Their pictures reflected a change in attitude compared to their earlier drawings. The cars were noticeably more in proportion and more detailed. Other students' drawings contained some of the devices we had discussed and decided were practical and important.
One problem that I noticed with some children was that despite some ideas being so extravagant or impractical they still insisted that they should be included in the car. I also discovered that many children of this age (10&endash;11) did not tend to have a very good grasp of the actual value of money, ie what was good value. Volume and mass were other concepts they did not seem to have a good comprehension of.
One student, who happened to be part of the gadget group, used a lot of imagination in her project. Unlike all other students, who seemed to focus on their understanding of existing technology, this student invented a 'luggage shrinker' and various other devices not yet available. Her artistic approach was also very different. She invented a little friend who appeared on each page of her book to introduce the various devices. Her book also contained many lift up flaps and other novel ways to display her artwork. Her approach was not one I had anticipated.
In the evaluation session I asked if there was anyone who was not interested in the project to start with and a few indicated so. I then asked these students whether they were any more interested at the end of the project and they all said yes. We discussed what to do if at first we do not find a task particularly interesting. One student suggested that they make it appear as though it is interesting and usually they find something about the project they do like and concentrate on that. I then related an example from this project saying that if someone had a real interest in animals but not about things mechanical, they may have found it interesting to design a bulbar that would not hurt animals. Interestingly, more than one student was already aware of or researched an electronic product called 'Shoo Roo' that emits an electronic signal to deter kangaroos and some other wildlife from the path of the oncoming car.
Overall I think the curiosity level of the students was high as might be expected from gifted and talented children. Each week they eagerly awaited their next set of questions. When it came time to finish the project they were disappointed that there were no more questions. I noticed there was a great desire to share knowledge among the students. Their eyes lit up when they were given the chance to explain some intricate drawing or fascinating piece of information. The curriculum model used seemed to have been appropriate for the type of program I ran. It certainly allowed all students to get equally involved.
There are several ways I think this unit could have been improved. It would have been of more benefit to the students if I had asked them more about their areas of interest/talent and used this information to group them better and to formulate the questions. I could have designed the questions to promote higher order thinking. I should also have explained de Bono's thinking hats to facilitate the group work. The thinking hats could then have been used to allow a more useful evaluation to take place. On a practical note, I would love to have had the time and finances to at least build a working model of an electric car and maybe even something big enough for a student to fit into.
Peter Lee is a former teacher education student at UNE. Since writing this he has had the opportunity to build a working model that held a person, with a group of Year 6 to 8 students attending the annual Talent Enrichment Day at UNE.