The notion of a "field day" often conjures up a frenetic free-for-all where students romp and chaperones stomp trying to keep up with recalcitrant charges running amok in the woods while a guide lovingly describes a creature or habitat to stone-cold ears.
But that's not the way field days are conducted at Tyson Research Center. In fact, Tyson's Field Science Program, beginning another year of outreach in October, was recognized last month, along with the St. Louis Zoo, for exemplary work in outreach, alignment of programs with curriculum, and learning assessment by the St. Louis School District's School Partnership Program (SPP).
St. Louis city schools have 14 different programs to choose from at Tyson, ranging from bird-banding to weather and the seasons, geology, bats and predator-prey relations. There is also a program on discovering nature through the arts.
The Field Science Program will present programs to more than 100 SPP-sponsored student groups from October through May, involving more than 2,500 children in all.
The SPP recognized Tyson and the zoo on Aug. 20, when Janice Starke, director of the Field Science Program, and Lorene Reid, a teacher at Fanning Community Education Center, addressed 52 people from diverse organizations in St. Louis participating in the SPP. Representatives from the National Park Service, the Black Repertory Theater and The Saint Louis Art Museum, among others, learned how the Tyson Field Science Program and the zoo connect their topic offerings to national, state and St. Louis School District science curricula and how they assess student learning so that field trips directly connect to school work.
A summer-long project this year focused on assessments and culminated in a publication Reid authored titled "Tyson Field Science Programs, Standards, Curriculum and Assessments: What the Data Tell Us." The summer work was coordinated by the SPP through funding from the National Science Foundation/Urban Systemic Initiative (NSF/USI), one of several NSF programs designed to improve learning in math, science and technology.
"The alignment of curriculum and assessment are outcomes delineated by NSF/USI," Starke said. "We've connected the science curriculum to specific topics at Tyson. We've developed authentic assessment methods, performance-based, to identify what the students know and what they're able to do. This lets teachers know before coming out that the trip will be worthwhile and enriching."
Starke and Reid spent the summer a year ago connecting topics to curriculum and formulating assessment methods. Their efforts resulted in an SPP-published book titled "Correlation of Programs to Curriculum Standards," which includes connections and methods to pre-test students' knowledge of the topic and a post-test after the field trip to Tyson. They hope this information will help teachers select topics appropriate to their grade levels and course work.
"One of the important things with the assessments is that these are the kinds of tests that the state will use in the Missouri Assessment Program (MAP) -- the new performance-based achievement tests mandated by the state's Outstanding Schools Act of 1993," Starke said. "They're a more interactive way of testing when compared with multiple choice or true-false."
One of the assessments Starke and Reid have developed is the K-W-L Chart. Before the field trip, the students, using this chart, list in the far left what they know and in the center what they want to know. After the field trip, students list in the far right column all that they learned.
"We've done this with a number of groups, and it's always gratifying to see that the 'L' column is much longer than the 'K' column," Starke said. "So this is actually visual proof of assessment and very effective. Students like seeing how much they've learned, and they enjoy telling about it.
"Our programs have improved because of connections and assessments, and our teaching has improved," Starke added. "We hope that the use of authentic assessments will help ensure students' success on the new MAP tests."
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