Diocesan schools adopt new science standards

Friday, Jan. 15, 2016

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah Catholic School students are learning a new way of approaching science that has them loving the subject, teachers say.

The Next Generation Science Standards, which a handful of the 16 schools already have implemented and the others will begin next school year, are “a way to help students become better critical thinkers” by delving deeper into core subjects, said Mark Longe, superintendent of Utah Catholic schools.

The change came about as the diocese conducted a routine review of its science standards, he said. Some schools had already begun incorporating the new curriculum because the teachers and administrators liked its approach, and it is aligned with the testing they do. 

 The curriculum emphasizes problem-solving and incorporates engineering in all sciences. For example, in Connie Waung’s 6th-grade biology class at St. John the Baptist Middle School, students studying pond water built devices that collected the water they studied.

Waung is enthusiastic about the Next Generation standards not only because her students now love doing labs but also because it focuses on problem-solving, whereas the previous curriculum “was more worksheets … a lot of memorization,” she said. Students now are given a problem and asked to devise their own solution, and then re-engineer their project if it doesn’t work, so the new curriculum teaches analytical thinking and perseverance, she said. 

During labs, students often work in groups, which “is great for communications skills,” said St. Joseph Middle School fifth-grade science teacher Walker Cornwell. Also, because students engineer their own projects, “the level of creativity with them has just gone through the roof, and it’s great because it’s both an aesthetics creativity that they would find in an art class, but it’s also a design and practical creativity,” he said. 

St. Joseph schools began teaching to the new standards last year; Shannon Reichert, who has a master’s degree in STEM education, serves as a mentor to others for the new curriculum. 

Under the Next Generation Science Standards, rather than just memorizing facts, students must use that information to solve problems, said Reichert, who sees her students responding enthusiastically. For example, in December they used toilet paper rolls to build crèches, which had to hold a five-pound weight simulating the baby Jesus.

“There were 40 students and 40 different cradles,” she said. “This is teaching creativity, this is teaching engineering and design, this is teaching problem-solving skills, this is teaching them communications skills because then they stand in front of the class, they explain how they came up with it, and it’s also using the engineering design process so if their product first failed, then they use the improvement phase and they learn how to make it better.” 

The new curriculum teaches students “to think like scientists: reason quantitatively, argue from evidence, design and conduct experiments – these are all practices of science and they’re incorporated into the Next Generation Science Standards at every grade level,” said Cari Pinkowski, who teaches science and math at The Madeleine Choir School, where she also instructs other teachers in the new standards.

Studies show that knowledge gained through personal exploration is deeper and more permanent than that learned by rote memorization, Pinkowski said, and the new curriculum “gives the students a sense of wonder about the physical universe and a genuine understanding of the things that they’re observing.”

The Madeleine Choir School introduced the new standards two years ago, and parents have responded positively, said Jill Baillee, principal. “Our scores have increased significantly; that tells me our kids are learning, and that gives the teachers a great sense of accomplishment. The parents, too.”

Similarly, at St. Joseph schools, “parents are thrilled and kids love it,” said Principal Nancy Essary. “Kids would much rather have a hands-on science [project] and figure it out and work with each other than to read out of a book.” 

Pinkowski, Reichert and Waung all agreed that the new curriculum can appear daunting at first to teachers, but once they dive in, “it’s pretty fun,” Pinkowski said. “Having the students engage in these different types of enquiry practices is so rewarding for both the students and the teachers.” 

Longe said that all of the diocese’s science teachers will receive training in the curriculum this spring; a second round of training is scheduled for the fall so that at the beginning of the 2016-17 school year there will be uniform implementation.