Research on the Application of Visual Thinking Tools in Science Teaching

First, ask questions.

After years of reflection on science teaching in primary schools, students have not completely become the main body of classroom activities, and they have no enthusiasm for learning. They just listen to the teacher, remember what the teacher said, do not actively participate in classroom activities, do not actively think about problems; However, teachers only teach students fragmentary knowledge, without forming a system. Students' cognition of knowledge stays at the primary level and they have no deep understanding.

At the same time, the effect of cultivating students' thinking ability in teaching is not good. Many students tend to pay more attention to the answers to questions and ignore the thinking methods and processes of generating answers. Many times, students only have one-sided and superficial knowledge.

The Primary School Science Curriculum Standard (version 20 17) points out that the primary school science curriculum aims at cultivating students' scientific literacy, focusing on cultivating students' interest in science, correct thinking mode and study habits; Let students experience the basic process of scientific inquiry and develop their scientific inquiry ability; Develop learning ability and thinking ability. The Science Curriculum Standard emphasizes the importance of thinking ability. Thinking quality is the breakthrough of developing students' intelligence and ability, and it is also the key to the core accomplishment of the subject.

Using a series of graphic techniques to present the invisible thinking (thinking methods and thinking paths) in science classroom teaching, and using visual "thinking" tools to present the process and methods of students' thinking, help students to dig and present the thinking laws behind knowledge, and train students to master these thinking laws, which can make students understand scientific knowledge more deeply, thoroughly and systematically, cultivate students' scientific thinking ability, and thus improve their learning ability. Therefore, the application of visual thinking tools in science teaching meets the requirements of science curriculum standards and the current situation of science teaching in primary schools.

Pupils' logical thinking ability and abstract thinking ability are poor, but they are naturally sensitive to visual information. In teaching, students can easily understand abstract scientific phenomena by thinking in images, and intuitively display scientific concepts and knowledge by using visual thinking tools, which meets the requirements of primary school students' cognitive psychology.

In short, in today's curriculum standards, thinking ability is emphasized. In our teaching process, students need to better start with thinking in images and gradually cultivate and improve their abstract thinking ability. By using thinking visualization tools in teaching, teachers' teaching and students' learning can be changed, so that students can get a good learning experience, build a clear knowledge structure and realize internalization, thus cultivating and improving students' core thinking ability.

Second, the research status at home and abroad

In foreign research, thinking visualization is usually used as a method in different fields. Foreign scholars have developed many thinking visualization tools to help people organize and organize their thinking. Mainly used in education, industry, enterprise management, administration and other fields to improve work efficiency. In the field of education, foreign countries have been used for teaching organization and knowledge construction, and the development is relatively mature.

Domestic research usually focuses on the combination of thinking visualization and education. Domestic scholars have studied thinking visualization in the field of education from the following three aspects: the first aspect is the influence of thinking visualization on teachers' teaching; The second aspect is the relationship between thinking visualization's tools and cognitive level; The third aspect is to design a teaching model based on thinking visualization. The concept of visual thinking was first put forward by Liu Zhuoyuan of East China Normal University. The technology to realize thinking visualization mainly includes two types: graphic technology (mind map, model map, flow chart, concept map, etc. ) and software technology to generate graphics. The first category is mainly used for primary school teaching. At the same time of our research, 20 18, we studied the teaching strategy of scientific inquiry in primary schools based on "thinking visualization".

Figure 1

As can be seen from the above figure, from 20 15 to 20 18, there are more and more papers on thinking visualization, including 28 papers on 20 15, 34 papers on 20 16 and 36 papers on 20 17. Thinking visualization has always been concerned, and its research has become increasingly active. Among them, 28 of thinking visualization's teaching papers explain a certain subject, accounting for 49% of the total. Thinking visualization's teaching application involves Chinese, mathematics, English, geography, chemistry and physics 1 1 disciplines. According to the results of quantitative statistics, biology and physics are the first two subjects most used in middle schools. There are 27 articles in primary schools, including 3 articles in mathematics 14 and science, which are concentrated in 2065,438+07,2065,438+08. Other subjects are Chinese, computer and English.

In the past, thinking visualization's teaching application was mainly concentrated in science and engineering disciplines, and there were many teaching mode designs or teaching experiments based on a certain discipline. The results of foreign research show that the visual thinking effect in science teaching is better than that in liberal arts; In biology teaching, it is superior to other sciences.

The definition of visual thinking tools comes from several professors who study visual thinking. Among them, the bubble chart and flow chart adopt American education expert David? The concept of ThinkMaps put forward by Hyrle, the mind map put forward by Tony Buzan, England, and the concept map adopted by Jovak, Cornell University, USA. Professor Liu Enshan also classified venn diagram, flow chart and circulation chart as concept maps. They have different names. These tools are regarded as different categories in primary school mathematics and science textbooks, which are more suitable for primary school students. Our goal is to let children use these tools, and finally achieve proficiency and ease of use, without worrying about what names to call them.

Figure 2

The above picture classifies some visual thinking tools at home and abroad according to the sorting type of thinking, which is convenient for teachers to choose and use in teaching. There are many different views on the classification of visual thinking tools, and the classification is not completely consistent, because a tool has a variety of uses.

Visual thinking: Visual thinking refers to the process of using a series of graphic techniques to present the previously invisible thinking (thinking method and thinking path) and make it clearly visible. Visual "thinking" is more conducive to understanding and memory, so it can effectively improve the efficiency of information processing and information transmission. Also known as thinking visualization. Generally speaking, it is to use icons, symbols, tables, multimedia and other means to intuitively reflect students' way of thinking.

The visual thinking tools commonly used in science teaching in primary schools studied in this topic are: bubble chart, network chart, venn diagram, mind map, flow chart, concept map, icon, cartoon, table and so on.

Verb (abbreviation of verb) research goal

1. Summarize some visual thinking tools suitable for science teaching in primary schools.

2. Construct the basic methods and paths of applying visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools.

3. Promote students' understanding of scientific concepts and improve their thinking level through the application of visual thinking tools.

4. Through the research of the subject, improve the educational and scientific research ability of school science teachers.

Research content of intransitive verbs

1. Research on Visual Thinking Tools for Science Teaching in Primary Schools;

2. Study the basic methods and strategies of applying visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools.

This topic studies the use and application of common visual thinking tools in science teaching: bubble chart, mind map, venn diagram, concept map, flow chart and classroom statistics chart; Use thinking visualization tools to enter teaching practice and form rich application cases; Carry out empirical research, obtain first-line data, construct the application strategy of visual thinking tools suitable for students' cognitive reality, reflect and improve the application strategy, and provide some reference for visual thinking tools to truly become practical teaching tools and learning tools.

Nine, the research process:

The research of (1) has gone through three stages:

1. Preliminary investigation and establishment stage (April 20 17-2065438+September 2007)

Investigate the current situation of science classroom teaching, analyze the characteristics of high efficiency or low efficiency of classroom teaching, and complete the investigation;

Using literature research and theoretical research, the subject is established and demonstrated, and the research scheme of the subject is completed. ?

2. Overall implementation stage of the study (20 17,10-2019, June).

Put forward the specific tasks of organization, management and scientific research and carry out research experiments. Specifically:

Through teaching and research activities such as attending lectures and evaluating classes, we went deep into the classroom, wrote typical cases and completed excellent classroom teaching records.

Complete the teaching design and teaching case compilation of visual thinking tool teaching application;

Summarize the basic methods and strategies of applying visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools.

3. Project summary and conclusion stage (June 20 19 ~ June 2065438+09 1 1).

Summarize the research results and write research reports and papers.

(2) In the research, we have mainly done the following work:

1. Classroom teaching, comparative experiment

With the help of a camera, the whole process of teaching activities can be photographed completely, from which students' performance in learning activities can be found, so as to evaluate the development of students' scientific literacy in all aspects, and at the same time, the cognitive development of students in the learning process can be observed. We have collected more than ten scientific teaching records using visual thinking tools. After the lecture, the students' scientific knowledge and ability before and after the research class are compared and tested, and the students' scientific literacy is compared and analyzed at the beginning and the end.

2. Scientific records, materialized results

Students often need to materialize their learning achievements in the process of learning. Scientific record is an important means and one of the carriers of visual thinking tools. Tables and mind maps record students' pre-concepts, and at the end of the study, they recall the learning process of the whole unit. Compare the record sheet, judge whether the current idea is more comprehensive, and modify and improve your own ideas. Records provide an effective carrier for students, so that they can reflect on their own learning and complete their understanding of learning. It is a tool of visual thinking and metacognitive thinking.

In teaching, we have prepared a science notebook for each student and recorded our thoughts with visual thinking tools. In the notebook, mind maps, concept maps, flow charts and so on are very exciting, and students are used to using visual thinking tools.

3. Behavior observation

By observing children's behavior in learning, such as students' operating level and cooperation status in the course teaching based on visual thinking tools, we can understand students' reaction when using visual thinking tools in teaching and evaluate the effect of using visual thinking tools in teaching.

4. Paper and pencil test

At the end of each semester, we will conduct a scientific literacy assessment. The content of the test is mainly children's understanding of some scientific concepts, basic views on some problems, scientific attitudes and so on. From the test results, we can know their scientific literacy. In the past two years, we have conducted four tests of students' comprehensive scientific literacy and two tests of teaching effect after research.

5. Summarize the types of tools used in different science classes, and collect the application examples of visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools.

X. Research effects and achievements

1. Application of Visual Thinking Tools in Concept Learning Class

Concept learning is an important type of science class. Use bubble chart, venn diagram and mind map in visual thinking tools to distract students' thinking. Through associative description and comparison, students can deeply understand concepts and master them effectively.

"Brainstorming" is a teaching method often used in the teaching of scientific concepts in primary schools. "Bubble diagram" and "network diagram" make students' divergent thinking closely around the key issues in brainstorming, and play a guiding and recording role. Bubble charts and network charts are widely used in the third grade science textbooks of Education Press to record brainstorming and construct scientific concepts. The network diagram records the content related to the head word (topic) in the form of graphics, and shows the relationship between the head word and its related content. The use of bubble diagram and network diagram is helpful for students to sort out and process known information, and can be used as a means for teachers to understand students' pre-concepts.

Case 1:

In the third grade "Materials" unit, materials such as "wood" and "plastic" are presented on the blackboard as the central words. Students write their own characteristics through brainstorming and divergent thinking, and show their existing knowledge with bubble charts, laying the foundation for new knowledge learning.

Figure 4

Case 2:

The first lesson of the unit "Water and Air" published by UNESCO in the third year of science is "Water". Students are very familiar with it, but their thinking is scattered and disorganized. Use the network diagram to let students communicate, help students summarize, and string together with circles and straight lines to form structured knowledge. Network diagram helps students to construct the core concept of "water" and improve their understanding of water. Under the guidance of teachers, students classify and sort out water knowledge from the aspects of "use", "relationship with biology" and "basic characteristics", forming a network thread of thinking and improving students' ability to process information (Figure 5). The network diagram of "water" allows students to clarify the relationship between old and new knowledge, clarify new exploration goals, and build a thinking bridge for building scientific concepts.

five

In traditional mathematics teaching, venn diagram is a visual thinking tool with high usage rate, such as the calculation of intersection and union. Venn diagram is also a very useful tool for selecting, classifying and comparing information in the teaching of scientific concepts. It can be used to sort out and observe the comparison results, form clear concepts and show the relationship between concepts.

Case 3:

In the lesson "Big Trees and Big Grasses", the first volume of science in grade three, the morphological characteristics of big trees and big grasses are very different, and students get a lot of scattered knowledge points between them through comparison. Venn diagram classified these scattered knowledge points together, combed and formed the concepts of woody plants and herbs, and then found the common internal relationship between the information from their classified information, revealing the common characteristics of trees and grasses. Students realize that regardless of individual size, they are all alive and have the common characteristics of life. Through the comparison and classification of venn diagram, the teaching clearly points to the core concept of the unit "the common characteristics of life".

Science textbooks, such as comparing the similarities and differences between plants and animals, comparing salt crystals before and after evaporation, comparing solids and liquids, and comparing floating and sinking objects in water, all help students find the common characteristics of life, the characteristics of salt dissolution, and the different properties of solids and liquids. Through the tool of venn diagram, venn diagram played an important role in the process of students' concept construction. With these thinking tools, the communication between students becomes smooth and efficient; Students learned to think scientifically and developed the way of thinking scientifically, which was confirmed in our experiment.

2. The application of visual thinking tools in problem-solving class.

In the process of solving scientific problems, the introduction of visual thinking tools can help students communicate the relationship between concepts, change the piecemeal and fragmented mechanical learning in the past, and form meaningful learning that pays attention to relationship and context and is full of active exploration vitality, thus promoting the integration of scientific knowledge and enabling students to form a systematic cognitive structure.

Case 4:

In the first volume of Science for the fourth grade published by Education Press, let students know the working process of muscles, bones, joints, respiratory system, circulatory system and digestive system of human body, and then find the relationship between the systems according to the work done by each system. This unit is to make students realize the coordination of human organs, treat the human body as a whole system, understand its internal structure and function as a whole, and apply the viewpoint of "system theory" to treat the structural composition of the human body. It is difficult for fourth graders to understand. In the textbook, students are required to complete simple connections by drawing pictures. Students first extract the elements in the relationship clue, such as heart and oxygen, and then clarify the relationship between two adjacent elements, mainly expressed by words that express actions and processes, such as help and exercise, to form the following relationship diagram:

When students can express the relationship between various organs, the teacher will guide them to make a comprehensive description. Connect the elements with lines, indicate the direction of the relationship with arrows, and visually display the relationship between various parts of the body through charts (as shown in Figure 8). Students find the characteristics of body coordination in their work and feel the beauty of precision and harmony of human body. This is a complicated flow chart, which some scholars call a visual chart or concept map. Its use highlights the intuition and enhances students' understanding of "all organs of the human body are coordinated".

Figure 9

After drawing the picture above, students can use the picture to express their knowledge and communicate with each other. They can explain their diagrams and describe relationships to deepen their understanding. Students also exchange their flow charts in the study group. Because of the differences in students' understanding angle, understanding depth and expression mode, the flow chart will be different, and such differences are good learning resources for students, which will prompt students to rethink and rediscover the relationship between organs.

After the experiment or observation is completed, the problem-solving science class often needs statistical data. At this time, it is suitable to use charts to show students' grades and guide their thinking. For example, the first volume of the sixth grade, "We Look Different", students find out the character code of the whole class after observing the appearance characteristics. With so much character code data, primary school students lack certain sensitivity to experimental data. How to show them more clearly? How can we observe it better? We use the following EXCEL table for statistics, synchronous display, data visualization, analysis and discovery of data trends, commonness and conclusion.

Figure 10

3. Review the application of visual thinking tools in intensive courses.

In science unit review class, the introduction of visual thinking tools can integrate unit concepts, process organizational knowledge, and realize the reorganization and generation of knowledge structure.

Case 5:

After learning Food, the first volume of the fourth grade of the education edition, the teacher led the students to effectively process and sort out the knowledge through self-made mind maps, and the knowledge structure was more optimized. Students learn to reflect on their own learning process and improve their metacognition level. The following is a summary of the teacher's blackboard writing and the "food nutrition" reviewed by the students in the lesson "Slow down food deterioration".

Figure 1 1

Figure 12

Case 6:

The fifth grade unit "The Movement of the Earth" is abstract and difficult for students to understand. When sorting out the knowledge of this unit, it is found that students have serious conceptual confusion, especially the lack of overall grasp and cognition of the relationship between knowledge. When reviewing, let the students summarize the content of this unit through diagrams, so that students can see the position and relationship of each knowledge point in the knowledge structure at a glance, which is helpful to the formation of students' knowledge network. After sorting out the mind map and frame map, students can understand the teaching materials as a whole, sort out the context of each teaching content in the unit, fully understand the relationship between teaching contents, realize visual learning, and guide students to think deeply.

Figure 13

Figure 14

(2) Experimental results and analysis.

After two years of experiments, the experimental results are as follows:

1. 130 1 a questionnaire survey of students' scientific literacy in the early and late stages of the experiment.

Before and after the experiment, the experimental class was investigated by scientific literacy questionnaire (see annex). The contents of the survey include students' scientific knowledge, emotional attitude and values, and scientific inquiry. 50 valid papers were recovered before the experiment and 5 1 paper were recovered after the experiment. The results of the second questionnaire survey are shown in the following table:

Figure 15

As can be seen from the above table, although the growth of students' scientific knowledge and inquiry ability is related to their age, through the application of visual thinking tools in classroom teaching, students' learning attitude has changed significantly compared with that before the experiment, which has improved students' interest in learning and improved students' problem awareness and ability to analyze and solve problems.

2. The final evaluation of students' scientific literacy

At the end of the year, when the whole school checked the scientific literacy of different grades, it was found that the students' thinking ability had been obviously improved. They think faster, think more carefully, better grasp the main points, communicate more orderly and accurately, think about problems from different angles and give reasons. It promotes students' cognitive learning and active inquiry, and students' initiative and autonomy are brought into play. Because of the participation of students' thinking, students can feel the happiness of learning. Thinking allows students to enjoy learning and success; The pleasure of success after thinking is the most valuable reinforcement and encouragement for students' good study habits and sustainable development. (See Annex I for details of students' scientific literacy analysis in different grades)

3. Using visual thinking tools for pre-test and post-test teaching of the course "The Secret of Float" can help students to better grasp scientific concepts.

4. Actual classroom teaching situation

Judging from the situation of classroom teaching, some students are often inattentive and lack interest in learning without using visual thinking tools in class. During the experiment, the above situation has been greatly improved, and most students can devote their attention to their studies in class. The phenomenon of inattention in class is obviously reduced. Through interviews with six students (grade 2, average 2, poor 2), students generally reflect that visual thinking tools in the classroom are easier to understand and remember than simply listening to the teacher's lecture, and the classroom is not so boring. Some students with poor academic performance report that although visual thinking tools are difficult for them, they are more willing to study this course than before. It can be seen from the observation and interview that students' learning attitude, learning initiative and inquiry ability have been greatly improved.

(3) Analysis of the results of the members of the research group

1. Typical course set

Collect, sort out and classify the typical examples of using visual thinking tools in science teaching, and find the law. After the collection is formed, these lessons are classified to find out the common rules. What kind of class is suitable for what tools, and the effect is better, which provides reference for similar teaching content in the future. In the past two years, we have collected more than 20 examples of applying visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools.

2. Abstract of the paper

Members of the research group regularly write papers to form theoretical results. There are 1 national first prize papers, 2 provincial prize-winning papers and 1 municipal prize-winning papers.

3. Student and teacher portfolio

When we applied visual thinking tools to teaching, we collected a large number of outstanding students' works. When we look for them from the perspective of research, we find that: firstly, most students are very interested in the application of visual thinking tools, and they like to learn to think in this way. Their works are wonderful and their thinking ability is getting stronger and stronger. Many students have been able to use them freely and independently. When a problem needs to be analyzed in class, they will take the initiative to use graphic thinking tools for analysis. This shows that using visual thinking tools, students will not feel the pain and irritability of learning if they think about it in science class; I can't take it easy. I'm on pins and needles in class, and I'm miserable. Students' thinking is visible, so teachers can understand students' thinking context, start teaching according to students' thinking trajectory, and then change "knowledge infusion" teaching into "thinking development" teaching, so that students can learn and show.

4. Excellent classroom presentation

For the excellent cases in the class, we show them through teaching and research courses, open classes, first-class quality courses, micro-courses and other platforms, so that these excellent cases can become role models and play a leading role.

5. Achievements of members of the research team

In the research practice, the quality of teachers has been continuously improved, the teaching theory of the members of the research group has been continuously improved, and the professional level of teaching has been continuously developed. Teachers' subject education and teaching level, scientific research consciousness and ability have been improved.

XI。 Research reflection

The application research of thinking visualization tools in science classroom teaching in primary schools, through concept maps, mind maps, flow charts and other legends, transforms the relationship between our thinking, knowledge structure and knowledge from the center to the periphery into something that students can easily understand. By cultivating students to use visual means and visual interface to reflect their own thinking process in teaching activities, students can take science course learning as a fun and a means to show themselves, and realize the cultivation and development of students' advanced wisdom in the learning process.

(1) Since the implementation of the project, we believe that visual thinking tools can mainly play the following roles in science teaching:

1. As a teaching tool and a cognitive tool for students, it can improve students' cognitive ability and scientifically construct cognitive structure.

2. As a tool to improve students' thinking ability, improve students' logical thinking ability.

3. As a teaching evaluation tool, evaluate students' understanding of knowledge in a certain field and explore students' internal cognitive structure.

4. As a tool to represent the thought of cognitive subject, it is used to analyze problems and make decisions.

(B) the application strategy of visual thinking tools in science teaching in primary schools

Through teaching practice, we deeply feel that the reason why visual thinking tools can be highly evaluated in the teaching of various subjects is related to a series of effective teaching strategies adopted by teachers. By introducing visual thinking tools into normal teaching activities, we summarized the following strategies:

1. Clear goals.

Teaching goal is the starting point and destination of classroom teaching, which determines what changes will happen to learners and what the teaching results will be. Classroom teaching based on visual thinking tools should continue towards the teaching goal and finally achieve the teaching goal. We use visual thinking tools to achieve teaching objectives, to improve students' thinking, not to learn how to use tools.

Visual thinking tool is a tool that can effectively help us improve our thinking efficiency, but it is only an auxiliary tool, which can assist thinking and cannot replace thinking. Being able to use these graphical tools does not mean that you have strong thinking ability; But a person with strong thinking ability can significantly improve the efficiency of thinking by making good use of these tools.

2. Grasp the teaching materials and carefully select the types of visual thinking tools.

As far as the teaching content is concerned, although there are many materials to explore in primary school science courses, not all the knowledge is suitable for students to learn with visual thinking tools. Therefore, when implementing the teaching of visual thinking tools, we should pay attention to selecting appropriate content and carefully selecting the types of visual thinking tools.

3. Perfect evaluation

It has been revised and improved many times, so that students' thinking can be continuously developed and improved.

(3) Problems to be solved

This study is only a practical preliminary discussion on how to guide students to use visual thinking tools in science classroom teaching. Due to the lack of practical experience and limited level, there are still some shortcomings in this study, and there are still many problems to be discussed in the research process:

1. How to make visual thinking tools better implemented in science classroom teaching and achieve the best teaching effect remains to be further explored in future classroom teaching practice.

2. The research on students' use of visual thinking tools has not yet formed a complete evaluation system, and how to quantitatively evaluate the use of visual thinking tools needs to be further improved.

refer to

Baidu encyclopedia:? Visual thinking

Wei Wei? Why should we organize science education around scientific concepts?

Where is Zhu? Knowledge of concept map and its overview

Xiong Pin and Hu Xiaoyong, Visual Thinking Scaffold: A New Perspective of Concept Map Research.

Wu Baoxi's Visualizing Students' Thinking in Classroom Teaching

Yan Xu and Zheng Liping's tool-supported learning theory and its application in thinking visualization.

Zhao Guoqing's Middle School Thinking Training 1- thinking visualization

Zhao Guoqing's Eight Diagrams

Strategies for Improving Liu Zhuoyuan's Teaching Efficiency Based on thinking visualization.

Zhao, Blair and thinking visualization's Research and Prospect in China.

Primary school science curriculum standard (20 17)