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Training Science Teachers to Design Inquiry-Based Lesson Plans through a Serious Game

Authors:
Petros Lameras
Panagiotis Petridis
Kate Torrens
Ian Dunwell
Maurice Hendrix
Sylvester Arnab

Keywords: serious games; inqury-based learning; science; teacher training

Abstract:
A significant challenge for science teachers’ training is to understand how to enact teaching strategies that would encourage students to perceive learning as a memorable experience instantiated through an activity; and thereby getting involved in a process of meaning-making. This paper describes SimAULA, a serious game that aims to integrate inquiry learning into game dynamics for scaffolding science teachers’ efforts to design their lesson plans. To this line, the paper proposes a 7-step process of orchestrating inquiry features that enable science teachers to think about inquiry in the context of creating activities based on real-world situations that map closely on to students’ understandings rather than those with naturally occurring complex patterns. SimAULA’s overarching architecture is presented in the context of the 7-stage inquiry process to be implemented and evaluated in a number of schools across Europe.

Pages: 86 to 91

Copyright: Copyright (c) IARIA, 2014

Publication date: March 23, 2014

Published in: conference

ISSN: 2308-4367

ISBN: 978-1-61208-328-5

Location: Barcelona, Spain

Dates: from March 23, 2014 to March 27, 2014