Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 14, Issue 2, Article 12 (Dec., 2013)
Allen A. ESPINOSA, Sheryl Lyn C. MONTEROLA and Amelia E. PUNZALAN
Career-oriented performance tasks: Effects on students’ interest in Chemistry

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Intervention

Career-oriented performance task approach

The COPT class utilized the usual routine in teaching and learning process namely, motivation, lesson proper, generalization, and assessment.

Orientation regarding the Career-Oriented Performance Tasks that the students need to accomplish and submit at the end of each topic was done before the start of discussion.

The motivation stage made use of presenting different careers or professions stipulated in the COPT in addition to the usual games, demonstrations, simulations and predict-observe-explain or POE activities.

The lesson proper stage made use of cooperative or group learning, hands-on and laboratory activities, small group discussion, reflective thinking, think-aloud technique, inquiry and discovery learning to increase participation among students using researcher-made worksheets and activity sheets.

The generalization stage made use of group presentations aside from the usual summary of the lesson.

The assessment stage made use of the Career-Oriented Performance Task aside from the usual seatworks, quizzes and long tests. Since the COPT was given even before the discussion on a certain topic commences, students had about two weeks to accomplish the task at their free time.

A separate meeting was devoted to the presentation of COPT outputs per group. This was done when the topic covered in the COPT had been discussed already.

A Career-Oriented Performance Task is a researcher-made set of performance tasks, which aims to integrate career-oriented examples and inquiry-based activities in selected topics in Chemistry. The selected topics were the ones covered in the Pre-Final Grading Period of the General Inorganic Chemistry. These were Gases, Liquids, Solids Solutions and Colloids. For each topic, three different career-oriented performance tasks were prepared.

The COPT has the following parts: the purpose, which is the objective or what is intended to be achieved after doing the task; the task, which focuses on the career or profession that is being connected to chemistry concepts; the addressees, which is the intended readers or viewers of the product; the setting, which is the project’s problem; the output, which is the required product in the project; and the norm which is the basis for grading the project.

Example of the career presented in the COPT under the topic gases is SCUBA diving instructor. Students need to create a pamphlet manual that will explain the diving rules to prevent divers to suffer from “bends," air embolism, and oxygen toxicity. These are derived from the gas laws, such as Boyle’s, Charles’, Dalton’s, and Henry’s laws. Outputs were graded according to creativity, organization, completeness, and content.

Traditional teaching approach

The TTA class was exposed to the usual routine in teaching namely, motivation, lesson proper, generalization, and assessment. The motivation stage made use of games and demonstrations; the lesson proper stage use lecture-discussion; the generalization part involved summary of the lesson; and the assessment part focused on seatworks and quizzes.

Table 2 shows a sample learning plan showing the difference between the COPT and TTA classes.

Table 2. Learning plan comparison between the COPT and TTA classes on the topic gas laws

COPT

TTA

Motivation
Prior to the start of the lesson, the COPT is already distributed and explained to the class.
Activity: Kinetic Molecular Theory Song

    1. Teacher plays the KMT Song while students sing along with the song.
    2. Students identify the postulates of KMT as well as the properties of gases from the song.
    3. Teacher flashes pictures of different professions and let students identify the different professions. He then tells the class to keep these professions in mind and at the end of the lesson they must relate these professions to the topic to be tacked.

Lesson Proper
Activity: Learning Stations  

  1. The class is divided into three groups.
  2. Each group is given a worksheet for the three learning stations.
  3. The task of each group is to work on each of the three learning stations and identify the relationship of the given properties of gases with each other.
    1. Learning Station 1: Marshmallow Madness
      In this learning station, students investigate the relationship of pressure and volume.
    2. Learning Station 2: Hot or Cold?
      In this learning station, students investigate the relationship of volume and temperature.
    3. Learning Station 3: The Amazing Soda Can  
      In this learning station, students investigate the relationship of temperature and pressure.

Concept Development: Boyle’s Law
  1. Students describe what they found out in the first learning station.
  2. Students realize that pressure and volume are inversely proportional.
  3. Students set-up a mathematical equation for the relationship of pressure and volume.
  4. Teacher posts a sample problem on Boyle’s Law.
  5. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  6. Students solve the problem using think-aloud technique.
  7. Teacher shows the interrelatedness of pressure and volume using PhET simulation and relates it to the solved problem.
  8. Students solve several problems on Boyle’s Law.

Concept Development: Charles’ Law

  1. Students describe what they found out in the second learning station.
  2. Students realize that temperature and volume are directly proportional.
  3. Students set-up a mathematical equation for the relationship of temperature and volume.
  4. Teacher posts a sample problem on Charles’ Law.
  5. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  6. Students solve the problem using think-aloud technique.
  7. Teacher shows the interrelatedness of temperature and volume using PhET simulation and relates it to the solved problem.
  8. Students solve several problems on Charles’ Law.

Concept Development: Gay-Lussac’s Law

  1. Students describe what they found out in the third learning station.
  2. Students realize that temperature and pressure are directly proportional.
  3. Students set-up a mathematical equation for the relationship of temperature and pressure.
  4. Teacher posts a sample problem on Gay-Lussac’s Law.
  5. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  6. Students solve the problem using think-aloud technique.
  7. Teacher shows the interrelatedness of temperature and pressure using PhET simulation and relates it to the solved problem.
  8. Students solve several problems on Gay-Lussac’s law.

Concept Development: Combined Gas Law

  1. Students derive the equation for the combined gas law using the mathematical relationship of the three basic gas laws, namely, Boyle’s, Charles’ and Gay-Lussac’s.
  2. Teacher shows a problem on Combined Gas Law.
  3. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  4. Students solve the problem using the think-aloud technique.
  5. Teacher shows the interrelatedness of temperature, pressure and volume using PhET simulation and relates it to the solved problem.
  6. Students solve several problems on Combined Gas Law.

Generalization/Synthesis

  1. Using the same group, students do a mind map on the properties of gases and Gas Laws.
  2. Students relate the different gas laws to the professions flashed at the beginning of the lesson.
  3. Students present their COPT outputs.

Assessment
Boardwork, seatwork. Quiz, mindmap (gas laws), career-oriented performance task

Motivation
Activity: Kinetic Molecular Theory Song

    1. Teacher plays the KMT Song while students sing along with the song.
    2. Students identify the postulates of KMT as well as the properties of gases from the song.

Lesson Proper
Concept Development: Boyle’s Law

  1. Teacher shows the mathematical equation of Boyle’s Law.
  2. Students realize that pressure and volume are inversely proportional.
  3. Teacher posts a sample problem on Boyle’s Law.
  4. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  5. Teacher shows how to solve the problem.
  6. Students solve several problems on Boyle’s Law.

Concept Development: Charles’ Law

  1. Teacher shows the mathematical equation of Charles’ Law.
  2. Students realize that temperature and volume are directly proportional.
  3. Teacher posts a sample problem on Charles’ Law.
  4. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  5. Teacher shows how to solve the problem.
  6. Students solve several problems on Charles’ Law.

Concept Development: Gay-Lussac’s Law

  1. Teacher shows the mathematical equation of Gay-Lussac’s Law.
  2. Students realize that temperature and pressure are directly proportional.
  3. Teacher posts a sample problem on Gay-Lussac’s Law.
  4. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  5. Teacher shows how to solve the problem.
  6. Students solve several problems on Gay-Lussac’s law.

Concept Development: Combined Gas Law

  1. Teacher shows the equation for combined gas law as well as a problem on about it.
  2. Students identify the given and the required to find in the problem.
  3. Teachers show how to solve the problem.
  4. Students solve several problems on Combined Gas Law.

Generalization/Synthesis
Students enumerate the different gas laws as well as the equations for them.
Assessment
Board work, seatwork, quiz

 

 

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