How to represent the phenomenon
Investigations are, at heart, re-representations of complex phenomena in places and at scales that allow us to study them. Scientists have to decide what aspects of the phenomenon to represent and how to represent them, even before they are entirely sure what is important.
Allowing children to experience and make sense of uncertainty in representing a phenomenon helps them think about important parts of the phenomenon and how they might be related. They get a chance to make their thinking concrete and improve their understanding of the phenomenon through representing it.
A closer look at uncertainty in the classroom
Second grade students are working in groups to study how their specific seed (milkweed, maple, berry, etc.) travels by wind. The teacher brings in a fan and asks how they can use it to test their seeds. Children consider whether it is important to represent the height of the seed on the plant. You will see uncertainty arise, supporting science practice and conceptual progress as:
Children decide how to represent seed travel
Children consider what claims they can make
Children re-test and adjust their claims based on new evidence
Children decide how to represent seed travel
As they plan and conduct the investigation, they work in small groups with the teacher while others observe. As each group gets ready to test their seed, the teacher holds it up in front of the fan and asks where she should place it.
Leyla: On the ground.
Serena: I think you should drop it.
Ms. S: Why do you want it on the ground, Leyla?
Leyla: Because it might be on the ground.
Ayla: Yeah, but it grows up in high spaces, and when it falls the wind gets it right way.
Students discuss how the teacher should hold the seed in front of the fan and watch what happens.
Children consider what claims they can make
They test dropping the seed a few feet off the ground, then measure how the seed travels by marking where it lands on a piece of chart paper.
When the maple seed lands right near the fan, they have to make sense of whether their investigation represented the seeds’ travel well enough to help them make claims. In discussion, children disagree and indicate they aren’t sure.
Ms. S: Is everyone in agreement that the maple seed definitely does not travel by wind?
Ayla: Me and Dylan aren’t.
Dylan: It has to have a certain amount of wind.
William: It has to be, you know how the maple seed first starts in a tree, it has to be somewhere high.
Ayla: It is not exactly like outside, so how do you know it actually doesn’t, because I’ve seen it live so we think yes and no.
Ms. S: So are you suggesting that we do a different test?
Carl: How are we going to get it so high? With a ladder?
The teacher uses the students’ record of how far seeds traveled during the discussion.
Children retest and adjust their claims
The students retest how the maple seed travels by dropping the seed off the second floor of their school to represent how it would fall from a tree and compare how single and double seeds fall. They watch in excitement as the single seeds twirl, acting out the mechanism and talking animatedly about the importance of the seed falling from high up. Back in the classroom, they agree that they can claim the maple seed travels by wind.
Before testing, children disagreed about the maple seed. After testing, the teacher circled “yes,” indicating their revised agreement and recording their findings.
Instructional moves to support this form of uncertainty
Keep images of the phenomenon visible throughout investigation design and claim-making.
Present choices that represent the phenomenon better and less well.
Allow children to evaluate and retest, improving the investigation to help them make claims they are more sure about.
Link choices back to the phenomenon, “If we do X, how will that help us understand how the seed travels outside?”
Ask children to reflect: “Is there a way to improve our investigation so it would help us better understand how Y works?”
Where else can I learn about this form of uncertainty?
Explore Related Cases
Other Ways to Learn More
Review the Planning Investigations Conversations Tool, considering how it provides supports for children to consider how to represent the phenomenon.
Take a look at Seed Dispersal lessons 4-6, considering how discussions of representation are supported, and build, across the water, wind, and sticking investigations.
