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Asia-Pacific Forum on Science
Learning and Teaching, Volume 5, Issue 2, Article 5 (Aug., 2004) Isaac Pak Hoi TSE, Winston Kwok Kuen LEUNG and Shing Yi CHAN Science, Technology and Society - An authentic exploration on IR thermometers application in schools
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Scope for Setting Different Project Learning Scenarios
Science education was criticized as disappointing in U.K. based on the observation that despite undertaking 12 years of compulsory science education, the majority of students still appear to "lack any familiarity with the scientific ideas which they are likely to meet outside schools. (Millar and Osborne, 1998: p.4) The curiosity, awe and wonder that the natural world inspires in younger pupils are not sustained. (Warwick and Stephenson, 2002: p.143) Even where apparently 'interactive approaches' are applied, practical work is sometimes offered as a matter of routine rather than as a means of developing procedural understanding and critical reflection. (Hodson, 1990) Warwick and Stephenson (2002) added one more, the "Failure of current curricula to emphasize the importance of discussion or analysis". Hence, the problem lies in how science is taught. So far, there has been too much emphasis on content transfer instead of nurturing the thrill of the learning process.
In the school we serve, student hygiene prefects on duty present to teachers their empirical problems in using the IR thermometers. The school Principal and laboratory technicians formed a team to conduct this investigation step by step. We explored the terrain and utilized what we learned from our study to train a team of student hygiene prefects to serve the morning patrol. They were encouraged to repeat the experiment after our demonstrations. They learned to restrict a fixed distance of the client from the IR thermometer device. This repeated demands soon become spontaneous, willing and understood positioning step on the client side. The student hygiene prefects are also very efficient to aim at the center above the nose and between the eyebrows once they understand the temperature distribution around the forehead. The rest would be routines. In other words, this opens up an opportunity for the learned student prefects to train juniors and hence another opportunity for leadership training. If we could start all over again, we believe we could include students in the investigation team.
As an independent project or as extra-curricular activity, without reminding students of the Inverse-square law, nor the distribution of temperature around the body, and definitely before showing one of the IR-thermographic images (Fig. 11), students could be encouraged to study the consistency of measuring with a single point targeting policy or a simplified multi-point circle targeting policy (Fig. 10). Experiments could then be explored as we did with exploring the Specification Requirements.
To go beyond the school setting, there can be scope for design of purpose built foolproof version of IR non-contact thermometer if students aim to advance in the technology field. Thorough understanding of the use and limitation of the IR thermometer device is definitely an advantage in the technical sales industry, in both marketing and technical training of clients.
Copyright (C) 2004 HKIEd APFSLT. Volume 5, Issue 2, Article 5 (Aug., 2004). All Rights Reserved.
