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Interesting results on attendance. Now you have the research to backup your claims on attendance. What do you think?

Here is my constructivist environment example. In the past, I installed the second life software considering that it was a game. I roamed and roamed in worlds that already were created, chatted with people in another countries with my avatar. Then I thought that it was boring. It was just like sitting on Sunshine and talking with friends. Why I had to do this via my computer? This video shows us how Second Life Worlds can be used to create constructivist learning environments. In the video, a Second Life World that was prepared by a group of people called TELLS TEAM is presented. In this world, you can attend lectures, have group meetings for discussion, work on simulations and role plays whereever you are. All participants including the teacher has an avatar and walking, sitting, chatting as if they were in the same room. In this project, learners are active participants. They roam, talk, immediately can fly to role playing sessions and etc. Teacher is only responsible to present initial knowledge. I could not find how they evaluate the learners. However, it is up to you. This environment is just a tool. You can arrange your role plays, your simulations, and also your assesment. Also they have some guides to use the environment effectively on this web site: https://sites.google.com/site/secondlifeuwnshss/Home

You are invited to the conference held in TEDU next Thursday (11.04.2013). I will be happy if you inform me before coming so that I can meet you at the very beginning. http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/ekonomi/22593138.asp

Sinem, I wasn't able to attend to this conference but I am curious to hear about your insights. Anything interesting?

I wanted to see all group members in this conference. It was a second episode of our visit for " Seven Schools in Finland" exhibition in Cermodern. There was a model school design with its learning hubs conducted by Canon design and Koç University. It is very unique in Turkey will be finished in 2014. All the learning environments were designed according to the students' learning. Most of the learning hubs, not classrooms, are not square or rectangle they are curvic. Outside of the school were built with the glasses in order to take advantage of the sunlight properly. School is in the area of 7000 m2 in Beykoz, İstanbul. Teachers who will be work in the school have been trained within the framework of nature of the model school, student-centered approach. As you remembered, in Cermodern I could not find the answer to the learning environment of Finland schools. This conference let me go one step further to imagine what constructivist learning environment is. The emphasis on importance of "Educational Architecture" is another issue I was enlightened. Maybe, we can attend the openning of the Model School. Thank you for your concern.

This is a lesson plan I prepared during my last year of college while I was taking school experience course and attending a public school as an intern. My proffessor Jale Çakıroğlu also liked this lesson plan very much and published it in her book named "Bilimin Doğası ve Öğretimi". Moreover, I also implemented it this semester with preservice teachers at METU. I took activity from http://www.indiana.edu/~ensiweb/lessons/gr.fs.fd.html and adapted it into Turkish. I also made some changes to make it more appropriate for 6th graders. In this activity, students are active all the time. The teacher only provides them the required materials and answer their quesions to guide them. The students work in small groups to learn the nature of science aspects with an acitivity where they act as they are scientists. The evaluation is process based not product based and this is clearly explained to the students. Since I prepared this lesson plan, actually implemented it and saw that it worked perfectly I would not change anything, but I always welcome your suggestions. :))

Gamze, thanks for sharing the lesson plan. This is an exemplary lesson plan and let's talk about it in class.

7 schools from Finland.

Görüşmek üzere.

Just a moment from todays meeting: https://plus.google.com/photos/100618985435009225362/albums/5856011792223337681?authkey=CIzX7f7dxuvPMw

Science fields do not seem famous any more.

The important point in this case is that only girls who study for A-level physics are the ones who came from Girls' schools. It means that as the text stated, mix schools have a kind of characteristic that stereotype the physics as if it was boys' area. However, in my opinion, that's not true. Unless a job does not require so much muscles, it can be handled by both males and females. In physics, the brain, intelligence, and the disciplined work is necessary which are highly available in human beings, not just only in males.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/9609566/Girls-put-off-studying-science-in-mixed-gender-schools-says-headmistress.html Another news related to this!

The topic is about charter schools in US. It is not easy to understand what is charter school but it is like a publicly founded school where the "educational experience is qualitatively different". They just try different style of learning. "Charters were originally a progressive movement (called the "small schools" movement) started by University of Massachusetts professor Ray Budde and American Federation of Teachers leader, Al Shanker to explore best practices for education without bureaucracy." (wikipedia: charter school) Quote from the original text "Students taught by teachers with at least five years' experience outperformed students with less experienced teachers, regardless of the type of school attended, but charter school students with inexperienced teachers did significantly worse than students in traditional public schools with less experienced teachers. (The impact of this finding is compounded by the fact that charter schools are twice as likely as traditional public schools to employ inexperienced teachers.)" This means that experienced teachers are better than in experienced ones (Not suprised?) but more importantly it shows us that if you try something new it is better to have an experienced teacher :)

As far as I understand, if you have a brilliant idea about the ways that the education can be implemented, you can ask for being a charter school. As a charter school, you are free from governmental regulations and obligations. However, your performance is monitored closely. In that schools, new innovative methods are tried out, and apparently inexperienced teachers are not successful at all comparing to traditional ones. This is because the experience. I remember my internship time. As an intern teacher, I had difficulty even implementing techniques that I had been taught throughout my undergraduate career. It was because concrete experiences are much more hard to accomplish that abstract ones. And self-evidently being "concretely experienced" needs time. After years and years in active teaching, teachers naturally can have the ability to integrate innovative methods in their teaching. If the innovation is surprising (like technology integration while experienced teachers might not have enough knowledge), they at least have the ability not to confuse with the new innovation, they can resist and hold on their traditional experiences. New teachers may become confused with undergraduate knowledge and innovations since both of them are still not deeply got used to.