With the release of "Core Literacy System for Promoting Students' Development" and the revision of China's senior high school curriculum standards, core literacy has become the key word for deepening senior high school curriculum reform, and both teaching materials and teaching should focus on developing students' core literacy. Listening and commenting activities also need to be constantly improved around cultivating students' core literacy.
This paper mainly combines biology teaching in middle schools, provides some ideas for teachers to attend and evaluate classes based on core literacy, and suggests teachers to collect reading.
Listening assessment course based on core literacy: five "changes"
At present, there are some problems in attending and evaluating classes while making great achievements. In the process of listening and evaluating classes based on core literacy, we should first face up to these problems. Some scholars have pointed out that the current problems in attending and evaluating classes are sloppy, superficial, ostentatious, across-the-board, unprepared, less dialogue, imprecise and inefficient.
Professor Cui Yunkuo believes that the problems existing in the activities of attending lectures and commenting are: there is a task, and there is no cooperation; There is a conclusion, no evidence; There is practice, not research. The listening and evaluation course based on core literacy should solve these problems and realize the following changes.
(1) preset and achieve the goal.
In the aspect of goal preset and achievement, listening and evaluation should change from focusing on three-dimensional goals to focusing on core literacy. The core literacy of biology is an upgraded version of three-dimensional goals. According to the statement of "Biology Curriculum Standard for Senior High School (Draft for Comment)", it includes four aspects: outlook on life, scientific inquiry, rational thinking and social responsibility. In the future, teachers should evaluate the presupposition and achievement of goals from these four aspects.
I think paying attention to core literacy should not only pay attention to the core literacy of biology (of course, this is the most important), but also pay attention to the development of students' core literacy at a higher level. The core literacy of the discipline is consistent with the core literacy of students' development, but they are not the same.
In the final analysis, we should pay more attention to the educational value of this course. After listening to each class, we should think about whether this class has educational value. What is the educational value? Or is it only the value of "education"?
(2) Teaching content
What kind of content to choose to achieve the goal, in this regard, I think it is necessary to realize the transformation from focusing on subject concepts to focusing on core concepts and cross concepts.
In the past, teachers attached great importance to concepts, regardless of big concepts, important concepts and minor concepts, and sometimes even paid attention to specific facts instead of concepts. Facts serve to master concepts, and sometimes we take specific factual materials as teaching objectives, while putting concepts aside and paying insufficient attention to them. Some teachers pay attention to the concept of discipline, but after a class, the focus is often not prominent. We should change from this situation, pay attention to the core concepts of disciplines, and also pay attention to interdisciplinary concepts.
Core literacy is comprehensive, and interdisciplinary concepts are very important for students to form core literacy. There are many interdisciplinary concepts in biology, such as system, life system, matter, energy and so on. American "New Generation Science Education Standard" puts forward the importance of discipline core concept and interdisciplinary concept. Of course, it is important to consolidate the core concepts of the subject and pay due attention to interdisciplinary concepts on this basis. In the process of lectures and comments, we should pay attention to whether teachers attach importance to the teaching of core concepts and cross-concepts of disciplines.
(3) Teaching activities
What is the relationship between inquiry and practice? Different experts have different understandings. My understanding is that inquiry is mainly to solve the problems of "what" and "why" and to explain natural phenomena; When you see a phenomenon and want to know what it is, you should explore it. What you get after exploration is knowledge, an explanation of nature, a new concept, a new theory, a new viewpoint, and something at the scientific level.
Practice is not mainly to satisfy people's curiosity, but to solve practical problems that need to be solved in production and life, rather than to obtain new concepts, viewpoints and theories. The solution may be to produce new products or invent new technologies. Practice education is a clear requirement put forward by the Ministry of Education, and practice is also an important way to improve core literacy. Therefore, science education should attach importance to both inquiry and practice. This is also a trend of international science education. One of the popular STEM is engineering practice.
Not long ago, I went to Wuhan for investigation, and the teacher of Wuhan No.49 Middle School told me that their school attached great importance to students' practical activities. Students make cosmetics and soap after learning to extract effective ingredients from plants. After learning about plant tissue culture, they made some test-tube seedlings and luminous tissue culture seedlings.
Through such activities, students' core literacy has been greatly improved. Moreover, they also set up a student company, including general manager, marketing staff, financial staff and so on. , all students, carry out a series of activities in the school, including research and development, production, packaging, marketing and so on. This is very important to improve students' innovative ability and practical ability.
(4) Teaching methods
There may be more changes in teaching methods. I just want to make two points.
First, in the aspect of situation creation, it is necessary to realize the transformation from focusing on situation design as an introduction link to real situation as a problem-solving learning task. In the past, we used to evaluate the situation creation of a class, often to see whether the lead-in link was designed skillfully and vividly, and whether it could arouse students' interest. According to the requirements of core literacy, as a situation creation, it should be as real as possible. The so-called truth should not be fictional, but exists in real life and scientific research.
For example, in the section on population density in our textbook, the "problem discussion" creates a situation: on a piece of paper, there are many pieces of paper with different colors scattered, so that students can count how many pieces of paper are red and green. How do you count it? Students may think of sampling. According to previous views, this situation should be feasible.
But according to the requirements of core literacy, it is not a real situation, but a fictional situation. In real life, who will count so many small pieces of paper? What's the point? So change it. Agricultural scientists and technicians tested the weeding effect of a new herbicide (low toxicity and harmless), and the number of weeds was involved in the test. This is the real situation. We put a scientific research paper of agricultural scientists here for students to discuss, and students will find it very meaningful. This is a big problem and a difficult problem in our future teaching methods.
Originally, we paid attention to teachers' doubts and doubts, but according to the requirements of core literacy, we should cultivate students' innovative spirit and critical thinking. It is not enough to solve doubts and doubts. Make sure that students have questions, ask questions, and then analyze and solve them. How to arouse suspicion? Not enough has been done so far. After a class, it is often the teacher who asks questions, and the students just passively cope. In senior high school, questions and answers are very common, but they do not meet the requirements of core literacy. Can students ask questions on the basis of more thinking? Should be the focus of listening to the evaluation class.
(5) Teaching evaluation
How do teachers evaluate students in the teaching process? What is the means and how is it done? In this respect, the course of listening and evaluation should realize the transformation from focusing on promoting learning function to focusing on educating people. It turns out that the purpose of our various evaluations is to further discover the problems existing in students' learning and promote students' learning. This is relatively limited, and the vision is not wide enough and the realm is not high enough. According to the requirements of core literacy, we should pay more attention to the educational function of evaluation and educate people through evaluation. When evaluating, teachers should not only pay attention to his mastery of knowledge, but also pay attention to his performance in emotion, concept and thinking. If the teacher does this, it is that he pays attention to the educational function. We should also pay attention to the performance of teachers in this respect.
From lectures to classroom observation: what to observe and how to observe?
On the evaluation of lectures, the more professional view now is classroom observation. In order to make class activities more professional, we must realize the transformation from "attending classes" to "classroom observation". Need to be clear, what to observe? How to observe?
Observe what? Professor Cui Yunkuo pointed out four dimensions of classroom observation: students' learning, teachers' teaching, curriculum implementation and classroom culture.
How to observe? Including preparation before class, observation during class and communication after class. Preparation before class is very important, and no preparation often has limited effect. Some people say that what we see is often determined by what we want to see or will see. You often turn a blind eye to what you don't want to see. Einstein also said, "Whether you can observe the phenomenon in front of you depends on what kind of theory you use, and the theory determines what you can observe." This is called observation load theory in cognitive psychology. Every scientific observation is guided by theory and loaded with theory to observe.
Do some theoretical preparation before class. In the preparation stage, Li Jie put forward five determinations: determining the observation theme (not necessarily the topic of this class, such as observing classroom questioning, dialogue behavior or other topics), determining the content, determining the methods, determining the tools and determining the division of labor. Tools include some scales, which should be designed in advance; After the division of labor is completed, it is necessary to determine where the observer sits to observe. If everyone sits in the back, it is convenient to observe the teacher's behavior, but it is not convenient to observe the students' behavior. If the listener is responsible for observing the teacher's behavior, then you should sit in the back. If you are responsible for observing the students' behavior, you should sit in the front corner.
Observation in class, someone put forward "2+ 1", that is, two records and one interview: recording time, recording details, and finally interviewing after class. There are two kinds of records in class: qualitative records and quantitative records. You can use qualitative records more. If you want to do classroom observation and improve the scientific nature, quantitative observation is more desirable.
Quantitative observation is to deconstruct and classify the elements in the classroom in advance, and then record the behaviors that occur in a specific time. For example, the subject of observation is to ask questions, and the solution to the problem should be composed of several observation points: the number, type and level of questions, the purpose and way of asking questions, the way and type of students' answers, the time for teachers to wait for answers and the way of teachers' reasoning. ...
Many years ago, Xiamen Academy of Educational Sciences conducted a special study on classroom observation and published a monograph. For example, questions can be deconstructed into judgment questions, description questions, argumentative questions and emotional questions. When the teacher asks a question, you should judge what kind of question it is, and then tick the corresponding position. Is the way to ask questions directly named, or is it all free to answer at once, or is it a raise of hands to answer, not a raise of hands to supplement? Check the corresponding box. The record of problem breadth is the coverage of students. Draw the order of seat positions on paper, and tick which classmate asks questions in which position, and the breadth of questions will be clear at a glance after a class. "
Teachers' rational answers are divided into several categories in the observation table: memory, goal, development, diagnosis and depression. I've also seen repressive ones that make students feel frustrated, which is not good. If the classroom observation table is designed, it is very simple to record. Regarding the classroom dialogue, some teachers also discussed the types and records of the dialogue. You can also read the literature and learn the method of recording.
Of course, there are also observation tables with overall comprehensive records, which are relatively common and convenient to use, but relatively extensive.
Evaluation: scientific democracy+humanistic care
Classroom evaluation includes the contents and methods of classroom evaluation. As for the content of class evaluation, some people comprehensively evaluate teachers from eight aspects: teaching objectives, teaching materials, teaching procedures, teaching methods and means, teaching personality, teaching ideas, teaching basic skills and teaching effects. I won't elaborate here, but focus on how to make class evaluation scientific, democratic and humanistic. To do this, we should pay attention to the following problems.
(1) communicate with the instructor before class evaluation to avoid preconceptions.
It is risky to evaluate the class immediately after listening to it. Let me give you an example. Once when I was listening to a class, I found that the teacher said everything and asked students to think about the sidebar and expansion questions in the textbook in class. I don't think it's necessary. These are expansionary. Students will think if they are interested, but not if they are not interested. This is also our intention to compile teaching materials. I want to criticize this practice when I evaluate the class. Fortunately, I talked to the teacher before criticizing.
He said that everything is tested in the college entrance examination now, not to mention the sidebar thinking questions, even the small materials are tested, and I dare not let go. That's understandable. Although it doesn't meet my idea, he has his reasons, so I will evaluate it positively. In the limited time, we should focus on important concepts and big concepts, and some minor things can be done by students after class according to time. This shows the necessity of communicating with teachers after class.
(2) The teaching and research culture of equality, democracy, sincerity and inquiry should be advocated and constructed.
The researchers are experts from all over the world, and the teachers speak highly of you. When evaluating classes, first, don't assemble experts; The second is to mobilize other teachers in the region to evaluate. I have had several classes in Beijing and participated in their district teaching and research activities. They are very democratic, and district teaching and research personnel often don't speak first. As an organizer, let the teacher speak first; Teachers' evaluation is very good, what are the shortcomings and how to improve them are in place; Finally, the teaching and research staff summed it up again. I think this approach is very good. To advocate a culture of equality, democracy, sincerity and discussion, the examinee will feel that you are really helping him, not condescending to grade him.
(3) Group lectures according to the division of labor.
Each group should focus on evaluation according to the division of labor, rather than comprehensive evaluation. Teaching and research personnel can make a comprehensive evaluation at the end of the summary, and other teachers can divide their work in advance.
(4) Speak with evidence to convince people.
To achieve more professional classroom observation, we must use evidence to convince people.
(5) Excavate the theoretical (conceptual) support behind facts (behaviors) and rise to the theoretical level.
It is necessary to dig out the theory behind the facts or the idea behind the behavior, and rise to the theoretical level to evaluate the class. After rising to the theory, it can affect the teacher's future classroom teaching, and it can be extended, not just this class.
When I was listening to a class in a place, the teacher asked the students to do group activities. In fact, they used a tutorial plan to do the problem. The students are sitting around the table, reading carefully and doing problems on the lesson plan. Very quiet. After a minute or two, the teacher suddenly said loudly, "Why do you all do it yourself?" ? We should work in groups and discuss together! "The students began to discuss.
Later, when I communicated with him, I said that group cooperation is not a form, and students must be allowed to do it independently. When it is difficult to complete independently and cooperation is needed, cooperation should be based on autonomy.
For example, to do a complex experiment, some people are responsible for operation, some people are responsible for observation, and some people are responsible for recording, so everyone cooperates. Do the fill-in-the-blank questions on the study plan, and cooperate with what? You can do it yourself first, and then communicate when you are finished. In other words, the teacher's understanding of group cooperative learning is still misunderstood and not in place. Why cooperate? He doesn't know yet. I feel that since I am surrounded, I have to cooperate in everything I do.
(6) Pay attention to educational value and life education.
Biology should pay more attention to life education, especially students' life experience. Every time a student attends class, it is a kind of life experience, which is all his experiences. Whether this experience is pleasant or painful, exciting, exciting or boring, it is different. We should value life education and educate people through his life experience. Sometimes teachers think it's okay to make a joke, but if the joke makes students uncomfortable, even if it gives them a bad life experience for a moment, it's not good. This is actually supported by a theory.
(7) Respect the teacher according to the occasion.
Teachers should be respected according to different occasions. On different occasions, there are different ways to evaluate classes, and crying is not the purpose. No teacher likes to be criticized for crying, but sometimes experts criticize teachers for crying. Therefore, we must pay attention to the ways and means, some will be discussed at the meeting, and some will communicate with the teacher alone.
(8) It should be standardized, flexible and focused.
Don't be stereotyped in class evaluation. There is a saying that experts sleep in class and wake up when the bell rings. Three advantages, two disadvantages and one suggestion. This is a routine.
On the standard of a good class
There should be standards for evaluating classes. What is the standard of a good class? What kind of class is a good class? There is no standard answer to this question, and different angles will have different answers. From the perspective of examination and education, the answer is definitely different. Different schools will have different answers, different people and different roles will have different answers. The evaluation angles of provincial teaching researchers and municipal teaching researchers are not exactly the same.
Although there is no standard answer to a good class, it has the same requirements, that is, based on the development of students and aiming at the core literacy of students. Many experts have put forward different standards, so I won't go into details here.
My personal opinion is that taking biology class as an example, the most basic thing in biology class is to highlight one word-"live". All living things are living things, so we must talk about living. How to embody the word "live"?
First, learn knowledge. Concept teaching should focus on understanding the essence of concepts, rather than picking words. If you just choose words and can't understand the essence of the concept, then you can't live, and the more you learn, the more you die.
Second, thinking should be active. It is very important to mobilize and activate students' thinking. If students just passively listen to the teacher, they will definitely not survive.
Third, thinking should be flexible. It is not enough to be active in thinking, but also to be flexible. If thinking is always stuck in a dead end, not thinking from another angle and not diverging, that kind of thinking will no longer work. The diversity and complexity of biology determine that we need flexibility in thinking when studying biology.
Fourth, there must be effective student activities. Student activities should include inquiry activities and practical activities.
Fifth, we should connect with real life. Even if you study very microscopic content, you should connect with real life.
Sixth, enlightening life and guiding students to create a future life are the highest requirements. Can students' biology lessons enlighten their lives? In the article "On the Subject Essence of Biology in Middle School", I talked about the characteristics of the subject thought of biology, saying that it has achieved the full coverage of world outlook, outlook on life and values, and listed many examples of how biology affects people's world outlook, outlook on life and values. Isn't that enlightening?
For example, when we talk about cells, we will talk about apoptosis, which is the process in which cells automatically end their lives. This is a contribution to the individual and the whole, and of course it is also determined by genes. Let's get in touch. Living in society sometimes requires some sacrifice. Sacrificing individuals and parts is for the whole. For another example, we talk about the steady state of the human body. Speaking of steady state, it is a condition for the survival of the body. It is shared by each unit and built by all units. Isn't this what * * * creates * * to enjoy, and cooperates with * * * to win? If cytology reaches this level, will it inspire life?
Different people have different views on the standard of a good class. I'm not talking about the standard answer. I hope all teachers can think together and supplement the standard of a good class.