Comments on: Why Aren’t There Probes in More Classrooms? http://blog.concord.org/why-arent-there-probes-in-more-classrooms Revolutionary digital learning for science, math and engineering Fri, 24 May 2013 05:25:17 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 By: John Collier http://blog.concord.org/why-arent-there-probes-in-more-classrooms#comment-5753 John Collier Thu, 11 Aug 2011 17:47:14 +0000 http://blog.concord.org/?p=955#comment-5753 Probes really let students see the data they have collected. I hope we start to see more and more of them in classrooms.

]]> By: Dallas Price http://blog.concord.org/why-arent-there-probes-in-more-classrooms#comment-5751 Dallas Price Fri, 05 Aug 2011 22:23:51 +0000 http://blog.concord.org/?p=955#comment-5751 Now that I’m participating in ITSI-SU, I have great lessons with integrated probe activities and a few probes to get started with. As a 6th grade teacher, I didn’t have experience with probes untiI I began ITSI-SU. I think more teachers might use probes if they had similar resources and training.

]]> By: Cheryl Williams http://blog.concord.org/why-arent-there-probes-in-more-classrooms#comment-5750 Cheryl Williams Fri, 05 Aug 2011 21:52:02 +0000 http://blog.concord.org/?p=955#comment-5750 I wonder if probes are being used by university students? They were not when I was in school, but that was a long time ago. It seems teachers would be more comfortable using them in their classroom if they were the norm in the university setting.

]]> By: Charles Gale http://blog.concord.org/why-arent-there-probes-in-more-classrooms#comment-5500 Charles Gale Fri, 08 Jul 2011 15:04:52 +0000 http://blog.concord.org/?p=955#comment-5500 As a former science specialist at the elementary level, I can understand your dismay about the lack of the use of probes in science classrooms across the country. I found probes to be a very powerful way for students to engage in true science inquiry and to develop their own personal and sound conceptions about sophisticated real-world phenomena. When a second grader pours cold water into a container of warm water and sees the temperature rise on a graph right in front of her, she quite easily develops a fundamental understanding of what graphs mean and gains insight into basic thermal phenomena.

So why don’t more teachers use probes to engage their students in authentic and exciting science? At the elementary level, I suspect there are several reasons. One, many classroom teachers are not well versed in and therefore not comfortable with inquiry-based science; there are exceptions to be sure. Secondly, there is uneasiness with any technology that is more involved than an LCD projector and computers in a lab. Teachers I’ve seen and worked with in elementary schools are now pretty comfortable with the hands-on materials in prepared kits that most schools utilize these days. Very few teachers however, know about and understand the value of using technology such as probes with their students.

Perhaps with the STEM movement gaining more visibility and credence nationally, we will see more use of the T (technology) in the nations’ classrooms. If only more teachers could be exposed to the excitement and potential of technologies like probes, maybe we would see their use become more embedded into science and math programs throughout the country. The Concord Consortium plays an exciting and vital role in this movement.

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