Supporting Inquiry to Build Content in the Chicago Public Schools' High School Transformation Project

Dr. Donald J. Wink
Professor of Chemistry
University of Illinois, Chicago

Friday, May 29

Location:

UW-Milwaukee
Student Union - Ballroom
2200 E. Kenwood Blvd
Milwaukee, WI 53211

DIRECTIONS

6:00 PM - Social Hour
7:00 PM - Dinner
8:00 PM - Meeting and Program

Menu TBA

For dinner reservations, please call
Jackson Messner
414-229-6639
or
e-mail: jmessner@uwm.edu (subject="ACS Dinner Reservation")

All are welcome.

ABSTRACT

The Chicago Public Schools' (CPS) High School Transformation project includes a three year science curriculum developed by two local universities, "Inquiry to Build Content," that aims to bring standards-based inquiry teaching to select CPS schools. The program uses existing text resources, including the ACS ChemCom textbook as the basis of a 10th grade chemistry course. To support the program at a large number of schools with more than 30 teachers, the Inquiry to Build Content program has created a comprehensive professional development program, including 30 hours of summer and 30 hours of school-year experiences, low-ratio coaching, and a system of model lessons to support teacher implementation. Vertical integration of concepts and skills among the three years of the curriculum includes implementation of a unified form of inquiry laboratory work that supports student reasoning in their learning. Thistalk will discuss the process of adaptation and alignment for this program, including refinement based on formative information.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

Donald J. Wink is a professor in the Department of Chemistry at University of Illinois Chicago and director of graduate studies for the UIC Learning Sciences PhD program that integrates learning in the scientific disciplines with insight from other education-related fields. He was trained as an inorganic chemist and maintains molecular collaborations with single crystal X-ray work. His chemistry education work involves the process of studying inquiry ?close to the classroom,? in authentic settings and on a large scale. When he joined UIC in 1992 he started projects in general chemistry, including project-based laboratory work and integrated chemistry and mathematics instruction. More recently he has participated with colleagues at UIC and at Chicago-area community colleges on natural science coursework for elementary education majors. He is also involved in work with teachers and others in the improvement of teaching and learning in the Chicago Public Schools, most recently in conjunction with Loyola University Chicago as part of a instructional development program to support the CPS' High School Transformation project. Contact e-mail: dwink@uic.edu

HTML by: Holger Foersterling - holger@uwm.edu - May 14 2009 12:34:01.