Conference Reflection Paper

Conference Reflection Paper

SED625SC

Carole Smith

The conference that I attended was Practical Activities for Strengthening Your Teaching of Chemistry Concepts. The seminar is one put out by the Bureau of Education and Research, www.ber.org and was a one-day seminar held during the week in the city of Anaheim. The Bureau of Education of Research is considered by many to be the leading provider of seminar training for professional educators. Their goal is to provide high quality programs, based on sound research, with an emphasis on practical strategies and techniques that can be immediately implemented. I teach different levels of chemistry: College Prep, Honors, and Advanced Placement, and I looked forward to the seminar, believing that regardless of the level that the program focused on there would be something useful for my teaching.

The seminar itself was directed towards helping teachers achieve the following goals:

To help all students feel less intimidated by science

To help students move beyond memorization of facts to understanding of concepts

To help engage students in the inquiry process

To decrease the stress involved in daily teaching chores

Although the seminar was rather large, with easily over a hundred participants, the speaker, Al Guenther, tried to involve the participants in the seminar as much as possible. Throughout the day, there were many demonstrations and activities for us to do.

Unfortunately, I was disappointed in the seminar. Perhaps that is partly my fault for having gone with positive expectations. Although the seminar had several strengths and weaknesses, overall there were two aspects that seriously detracted from it being a successful experience for me. Firstly, although the seminar was specifically geared towards Chemistry teachers, the seminar would have been much more useful for a middle school science teacher. Nearly all of the lessons, concepts, and strategies shared throughout the seminar are more in line with a middle school curriculum than high school. Secondly, the presenter was trying to cover so much material in one day that the impact of each concept was minimized.

However, I was very impressed with Al Guenther, the presenter. I am sure that he was an amazingly dynamic teacher (he is now retired) and had a great deal of valuable information to share. The research that went into the seminar was looking at such variables as how students learn best, how to maximize learning of abstract concepts and how to ensure understanding of concepts rather than memorization of facts. Certainly there is a wealth of data on these topics, but it appeared that the seminar was based more in the presenters personal experience rather than objective data. His experience, although it comprised nearly a half-century of teaching, may not be the same for others. Many teachers find themselves teaching students from an entirely different background from themselves, and I consider it necessary to understand these differences in order to build a feeling of community within a classroom. His approach was a one size fits all that may work for some.

Each participant received a sourcebook/handbook at the beginning of the day. The seminar went through the book, with as much covered as possible. As the book is over 200 pages, it is clear that this s a great deal of material to try to cover in one day. I would have preferred it greatly if instead of just following through the book, more time was spent on some of the key concepts on how to promote student learning. A focus of the day was teaching practical ideas for inquiry-based chemistry activities, and so much time was devoted to showing the participants how to do these inquiry based activities. As all the directions for the activities are in the sourcebook, I would rather have learned more about the theory behind inquiry based instruction. Generally speaking, instead of spending most of the day replicating activities that are in the sourcebook, I would have liked to hear more about why these methods work.

However, the seminar was far from a wasted day. I usually avoid seminars that occur on weekdays, electing instead to attend weekend conferences whenever possible. The NSTA is a favorite of mine, as there are so many different classes and seminars there to choose from, and if one is a disappointment there are others to try. I always enjoy being around other science educators that are looking to advance their teaching skills, and find that I can learn much from fellow participants as well as the seminar itself. I learned a great deal of new ways to teach material that I am familiar with. Often, when teaching a difficult new concept, there will be students that just dont get it. Having a variety of different approaches to explaining a concept helps eliminate this. I was reminded of the importance of providing opportunities for feedback during lessons, not just afterwards. I am very glad that I went, although there were ways in which it had been different.

Guenther, Al. Practical Activities for Strengthening Your Teaching of Chemistry Concepts Resource Handbook, Bureau of Education and Research, 2006.