Science+in+TIS

SCIENCE IN TIS
The two most important indicators of an excellent teacher are:
 * 1) improve students' learning performance - ﻿we'll be using the MYP Science rubrics as a key tool to achieve this.
 * 2) provide equity of education. - providing equal access to educational resources and opportunities, using wikispace, Menabi-mon and emails are examples of how Science in TIS provide equity of education.

__Engaging parents:__ My observation has been that students that have engaging parents often do better (excellent even). Student, parents and teacher are at the centre of MYP learning philosophy. So how can parents be engaged at the school level? What structure and what tools can I use to engage you? If you have ideas to share, please post at the discussion.

__Open Ended Experiments:__ Traditional science experiments are structured to have students arrive at one conclusion and investigate one factors. They are told what to do, what to record and observe. Learning, therefore, narrowly focused. In TIS, science experiments are often open ended. Students can study as many factors as their ability and time can allow. Creativity and critical analysis are encouraged. Quality of learning is improved as students are encouraged to look at experiments from different angles or lenses.

__Teaching skills, processes and conceptual learning:__ Conceptual learning is one of the essential drivers of 21st century learning. Factual learning is now taking the back seat and considered as lower order inquiry skills. Conceptual learning and application of concepts are required for students to perform higher order inquiry skills. Skills like performing titrations will be taught explicitly in our curriculum and what's important is understanding and using science processes such as process design, data collection and processing.

__Integrating technology into learning:__ It is essential that students are competent at using various technologies to improve effectiveness and efficiency of learning. Vernier probes, for example, allow students to collect various data simultaneously and efficiently. The amount of data collected using probes are more accurate and allow better analysis.

Web technologies such as wikispace can now break down learning walls that typically define traditional teaching. All students from grade 6 to 8 can now contribute their science understanding using Learning Without Walls Wiki and learn collaboratively.