Profile

Mike Boucher

Contact Details


Bio

StepWise Guide About Science Education

People think in images. Indeed, archaeological records show that drawing was the first means of visual representation. The lines and dots of the earliest rock art — some 64,000 years old — indicate conceptual, creative thinking. Cave engravings in France depict well-proportioned, figurative observations of wildlife made some 26,000–38,000 years ago. Today, images remain powerful tools for learning, documenting and facilitating thinking. Taking notes by hand, or even doodling, results in better retention of information and higher intellectual engagement with the material than does typing on a laptop. An essay writer is a person who can write articles about any topic so they can easily cover science related topics in essay as well. Fundamentally, creativity is a whole-brain process, and artists and scientists use the same parts of their brains to do complex, creative tasks. Ensuring that students understand the value of drawing can help motivate them to draw.





When my colleagues try to integrate drawing into their laboratory and field courses, however, they frame their motives more matter-of-factly. For example, one biology-lab coordinator noticed that students mainly interact with specimens by photographing them. She suspected that students did not gain much from taking these photos, on the basis of their exam scores. Her hunch is substantiated by research indicating that analogue note-taking is more effective than using laptops, and that students score more highly on exam questions that correspond to topics for which drawing is required. To make students engage more fully with specimens, I worked with the lab coordinator to build drawing into the curriculum. But even without previous training in the arts, teachers can create productive drawing experiences for their students. Always choose the best write my essay online service that guarantees timely delivery of essays on science and technology topic.

Drawing has been an important tool throughout the history of science. Connecting students’ coursework to this tradition encourages students to see drawing as a fundamental tool of science. In ancient Greece, for example, protoscientists such as Aristotle drew to help them understand animal anatomy. In Renaissance Italy, Leonardo da Vinci’s drawing-based investigations of the erosive force of water predated fluid mechanics by several centuries. In the seventeenth century, Maria Sybilla Merian was the first to study and depict ecologically accurate insect life cycles. Her illustrations definitively countered the prevailing belief in spontaneous generation.

By developing their drawing skills through practice in the classroom, students can contribute to this legacy as well as enrich their ownscientific experiences. An online free essays offers an original science and technology information by the help of our professional essay writers.

Drawing skills can be learnt and taught

Students frequently object when asked to draw because they have little confidence in their abilities and limited training in the arts. Indeed, without adequate basic training, drawing can be a hurdle rather than a tool. However, drawing in science need not be about making great art; the emphasis can be on accuracy, enhanced observational skills and asking deeper questions. Furthermore, the basics of modern drawing are learnt, not inherited. For example, 3D drawing took about 400 years to develop and was not fully understood until the Renaissance. Fundamental skills, techniques and knowledge of different media, such as watercolour, pencil, and pen and ink, can be taught, applied and improved.

Students’ coursework should include training in basic drawing skills and an expectation that students will draw in every class. Teachers who lack the confidence to lead drawing instruction can collaborate with a colleague who has drawing skills or their institution’s art faculty. Individuals and companies offer arts-related professional development and classroom-based instruction, including local, professional, science-focused artists. To find such artists in the United States, check the Guild of Natural Science Illustrators’ membership list; other countries have similar professional organizations. Always choose the best essay helper that guarantees timely delivery of essays on science related topic.

For resistant students, Charles Darwin offers a cautionary tale. Despite encouragement from his colleagues, Darwin refused to learn to draw and always regretted it. In his autobiography, he bemoaned the “irremediable evil” of his “incapacity to draw” and acknowledged that his notes were less useful than they could have been if he had made his own illustrations. Similarly, teachers need to commit to drawing as a demonstration of what they expect from their students. Consider, for example, drawing during lectures, sketching alongside students during dissections to point out features of interest, or even including rough sketches in lecture slides.

The way that drawings are assessed is crucial

As well as serving as a learning tool, drawing can be a powerful mechanism for both formal and informal assessment. In the project Picturing to Learn, drawings by students at Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Duke University and other institutions were evaluated for the presence or absence of essential aspects of scientific systems and concepts. The drawing assignments and test questions “revealed misconceptions in a way that text does not”, according to one participating professor. For example, asking students to draw a diagram explaining why the sky is blue forces them to demonstrate, beyond memorized equations and keywords, what they do or do not understand. Science and technology topics should need to be drafted by taking an essay help that should be acute and of real interest for the wide audience.



The type of drawing matters less than the fact that students are drawing. Teachers could ask for a highly polished illustration of a leaf, sketches of a few circles indicating locations at a research site, or a diagram of genetic relationships in a phylogenetic tree. The context will determine how representational or abstract a drawing needs to be. For example, to represent a wolf, a box containing the word ‘wolf’, a stick drawing of a wolf, a caricature, or a more photorealistic picture of a wolf might be appropriate, depending on the assignment.