from Street Scenes, Fall 2007
"The Kerlin Institute challenged us to think through science problems on our own yet provided just the right amount of structure and guidance to allow for our own discoveries... I left this course with increased confidence as I embark on a new science teaching position," said Monique Rothman, a fifth grade science teacher. She was one of 16 participants in this past summer's session at Bank Street's Kerlin Institute.
Ms Rothman's comments capture the essence of inquiry learning, which is the goal of Bank Street's Kerlin Science Institute. She teaches at The School at Columbia University in New York City.
The institute was created to strengthen natural and environmental sciences teaching by helping teachers think of science not only as an established body of knowledge, but as an active process of inquiry.
"Our objective is for teachers to learn to actively create their own understanding and to learn science through inquiry rather than taking someone else's dictum as truth. What we are really teaching is scientific thinking," says Michael Cook, who is one of the institute's co-teachers and math/science coordinator at the Bank Street School for Children. Founded in 2002 with an endowment from the Kerlin family and named after the late Sally Kerlin ('36), a Life Trustee, the institute is a collaboration between the School for Children and the Graduate School.
The Kerlin Institute addresses two needs of science teachers - understanding subject matter and development of pedagogy. Institute participants take a college-level, inquiry-based science course in the summer, and then meet in monthly seminars over the school year. During those seminars they develop curriculum relevant to their own classrooms. They learn about advanced scientific topics through their own investigations in the courses they take. Those courses are designed to strengthen their knowledge as science teachers, while they experience the inquiry-based learning strategies they can use in their classrooms.
This summer participants built their own aquariums, adding elements of aquatic eco-systems to them that modeled environments similar to lakes, oceans and rivers.
"By providing teachers with practical skills, in addition to scientific background, we can make a real impact in the classroom," said Laura Klancer, a middle school special education teacher and another participant in the institute.
"Learning is reinforced by doing work and for that same reason, the Kerlin Institute works," she says.