Rutchelle Enriquez: Practical Situations Involving Thermodynamic Principles: Teaching-Learning through Learner-Led Lesson Demonstration

There are many practical situations each day that involve thermodynamics principles. For example, two drinking glasses that are stuck together will need some knowledge of thermodynamics in order to separate them easily without breaking any of the two glasses. Such a situation should find its way in the classroom as a problem for students to think about and develop a solution for (as opposed to listening about it from the teacher talking about it). In this case, students are doing active learning, which requires “doing” something and actively thinking about what they are doing (Bonwell & Eison, 1991). I argue that as a kind of active learning, learner-led lesson demonstration is a modality, in addition to class discussion, ensures engagement, scientific inquiry, and independent planning for the learners. Learner-led demonstration particularly provides an opportunity for students in teacher education programs to facilitate the teaching-learning process even prior to pre-service teaching, thereby giving them a head start into experiential learning early on in their program.

I propose a series of steps to facilitate this modality in the classroom throughout the semester. First, learners should be made to form groups of not more than five members. One class session may be allotted for discussing in their small groups about practical situations in everyday life. For this illustration, I use here the thermodynamics course. Practical situations involving thermodynamic concepts may include any or a combination of the following: proper placement of an air-conditioning unit in a room, do-it-yourself thermos bottle, and spoon gets hot when placed in hot cup of coffee, among others. Second, learners may be given the next two meetings for submitting with finality their practical situation so that they will have been able to do readings and internet search on their chosen practical situation before submission. All learner-led demonstrations, upon finalization, may now be randomly picked and arranged for one demonstration per meeting. This way, all learners know the schedule and can therefore plan ahead of time. The criteria for grading this demonstration may include accuracy of content, organization of ideas, manner of delivery, creativity, and teamwork. Third, leaders of demonstrations deliver their demonstrations. It usually consists of the leaders: 1) giving introduction, materials, the challenge, and needed participants; and 2) participants perform the challenge; 3) giving explanations and raising questions. Fourth, a debriefing is facilitated by the teacher pointing out strengths and areas for improvement about the discussion on the thermodynamics principles (content) and the demonstration (modality).

Reference:

Bonwell, C. C., & Eison, J. A. (1991). Active learning: Creating excitement in the classroom. Washington, D. C.: School of Education and Human Development, George Washington University.