Robert Clarke, a science teacher with more than 30 years’ experience, shared some insights about the shift towards an inquiry-based approach in Ireland.
Can you tell us a little about your work in Confey College?
My name is Robert Clarke. I’ve been teaching for over 30 years and teach in Confey College in Leixlip, a mixed comprehensive just west of Dublin in Ireland. We’re a secondary school, and I teach Junior Cycle science to students who are aged 13 to 16 and from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds.
How many students do you have in your classes, and do you use any specific curriculum?
Health and safety regulations limit the number of students in science classes to 24. In Confey, we have five science labs, and we follow the Junior Cycle science specification. It was introduced in 2016 and is skills-based: it encourages students to explore science, connect the dots, and develop their own ideas.
Were you involved in the change of curriculum or the creation of the new standards?
Yes, I worked with the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA). Students in my classes in the two years before the implementation of the new specification were trialing experiments, for example, classroom-based assessments.
The NCCA tracked and monitored these activities over that time, and this helped formulate the final features needed to assess the student work produced.
In what way does the new curriculum differ from the previous curriculum?
It’s very much inquiry-based, and the specification is worded carefully to ensure students are encouraged to expand their understanding of science beyond the repetition of facts. Some of the words that appear in the new specification are collaboration, curiosity, connection, creativity, innovation, and relevance, for example.
The objectives are clear: help students connect the dots so that their science education is relatable, relevant, and of use to their everyday experience. So, it’s not just about the science itself but about developing critical thinking skills and understanding through engagement with meaningful activities.
Society has changed a lot since the Industrial Revolution, but the curriculum hasn’t. The new Junior Cycle specification should help students develop the skills they need today: they have to be able to think outside the box and propose great solutions to the problems they will encounter.
What kind of students do you have in Confey?
We have a wide variety of students. Some students arrived this year with no English at all, which is quite a challenge for them. We have students who have a language exemption. We have students who study in Irish, and also students who follow a modified curriculum and have additional educational needs.
Do you have any funny stories about science teaching you can share?
Yes, when I taught in England, the curriculum at that time specified that students should learn how to wire plugs! We carried out that activity with success, and I thought nothing more of it. A few days later, one of the students came back into class beaming from ear to ear.
She was overjoyed because the family had gone through a messy separation a few years before, and they hadn’t had any lights on their Christmas tree since. So, she went home after class and was able to change the plug, and had Christmas tree lights for the first time in two or three years!
How did you discover Science Bits?
My first engagement was through Dublin City University and their CASTel project (Centre for Advancement of STEM Teaching and Learning). I was offered the opportunity to look at Science Bits and immediately fell in love with it because it matches my model for teaching.
Science Bits follows the 5E Model with great fidelity and engages students. It provides a lot of stimulus to engage them, and then builds on their interest. You catch their attention first, expand that interest, and give them opportunities to explore and develop understanding from the initial stimulus.
Students engage with the activities, and it’s interesting for them. One of my colleagues felt she was cheating as a teacher with Science Bits because she could let her students work through a module with very little support: “They’re doing the work in there, by themselves, and they’re all learning!”
What would you say is the most important value for you as an educator?
It makes it easy to monitor and react to student progress. I can instantly provide formative assessments to students through the message facility in Science Bits, or give feedback to a student’s answer, like: “That’s very good! Would you like to share that with the class?”
Science Bits makes it very easy to monitor progress and any alternate conceptions that might creep in.
How do your students react?
They find it engaging. We’re an iPad school, they all have their own devices, and they’re very familiar with technology. They like the simulations and the animations: the materials include a light essence of gamification that’s purposeful, challenging, and which engages their interest and thought processes.
It also clearly helps them make connections and is well thought out. If we’re looking at sustainability or ecosystems, the Base on Mars lesson starts off with prawns in a goldfish bowl. They make the connections quickly, and a lively discussion leads them into a variety of other activities.
They can work individually and then compare their work and success. They can learn from each other, and making mistakes is part of the process as they are finding answers. It’s the same with practical work and lab equipment. It’s all about making them think: What are you trying to do? What do you need?
In terms of science, this is very important, and Science Bits helps focus the direction of their learning. Another example would be the magnetism lesson: there’s a lovely activity that helps them understand the effect of different magnets and how close you can get before you start moving an object.
After running simulations, students can use what they’ve learned and can extend their understanding with science lab activities.
What would you most recommend to other teachers about Science Bits?
The fact that it engages students. It’s so easy to monitor their activity from the front of the class by looking at the back-end of Science Bits. You don’t have to be at the back of the class trying to look at the students’ screens to follow their progress. It shows you each student’s activity.
And, as I said earlier, because Science Bits engages the students, it reduces potential classroom management issues you might see with a traditional approach. With Science Bits, they get caught up in the material and learn, sometimes even despite themselves! It’s a very natural learning process.
Would you ever willingly go back to using a textbook?
There is some value; some students like the comfort of textbooks, but today it’s a supporting rather than leading role. Textbooks give answers but not how to find them. One of the textbooks describes itself as “A companion to,” which is a nice way of putting it.
The new specification means that we prepare units of learning, and we take elements from across different strands and unite them together. We introduce elements, including the nature of science from all of the science strands, and build cohesive learning units.
Students need critical thinking skills, to be able to use data, and to run research projects and devise experiments. This approach will become even more critical with the new Leaving Cert: individual investigation and experiments will count for up to 40% of the final grade for students.
The skills developed in Junior Cycle, from work in the classroom and with Science Bits, will be needed again in the Leaving Cert. There’s a very real attempt to provide cohesion between the Junior Cycle, Leaving Cert, in fact, between primary, secondary, and tertiary studies in Ireland.
It sounds like real efforts are being made to make science relevant in education in Ireland.
Yes, I think so. Science should be relevant! When students enter the class for their Science Bits lesson, the class is one hour long. My students are engaged and learning for the full hour: there’s no drifting off or “How long until break?” They’re there, actively involved and engaged with their learning.
When the bell goes, there are students who are surprised and ask, “What? It’s the bell already?”
That’s lovely to hear! Thank you and all the science staff at Confey College for making a difference.
