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Casey Diuguid
Jeni Davis
SCE4310
11 September 2014
Science Autobiography/Reflective Personal Narrative
It is widely believed that teachers teach as they were taught and I hope that I can break
that belief when it comes to science. I will be honest right now, I hate science. I have always
struggled with science classes and never enjoyed learning science at any age. Science does not
come naturally to me and generally confuses me. I also find that with science classes I learned a
lot of information that I will never use in my future and therefore felt like science was forced on
me for no good reason.
When I recall my experiences in science they are mostly negative. The only science that I
can really remember from elementary school is having to do science projects. I remember it
being difficult to figure out what my science fair projects would be on. I also remember how the
only part that I really liked was putting the science board together. I do not really remember what
my science fair projects were on. The only other thing I remember about science in elementary
school was doing a play on the planets. It was a musical and we sang songs about each planet,
including Pluto. I will admit that this was a positive science experience but it is the only positive
experience I can think of.
When I got into middle school I had this teacher who never actually taught us. I distinctly
remember how her class worked. We would come into class and on the back wall was a white
board with a list of what we had to do for the chapter. We would have a couple class periods to
complete this list. Everything on the list was busy work of some sort. I do not remember exactly
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what the work was just that we would sit in class the whole time working in our notebooks. Once
we had used up all of the class periods set aside to complete the list we would turn our notebooks
in and take the chapter test. I vividly remember the teacher only ever sitting at her desk in the
front of the room and only saying things to keep us on track.
In high school I took Biology and then two years of IB Chemistry. I do not remember
much of Biology except that the teacher, although not an IB teacher taught this class to freshman
in the IB program. She could do this because it was not an IB class. She made her annoyance
with the IB program and the IB students known and therefore this class was difficult because it
was known that the teacher did not have a care for me or my classmates. I took chemistry
because I loved the teacher who taught the class. He made science fun. However, IB Chemistry
was the only IB class I ever took that I did not pass. When I look back now I realize that even
though the teacher himself made the class fun he did not teach us what we needed to know to
pass the exam. When it came to Chemistry tests and subject matter I was lost, it was like looking
at another language. My teacher was always there to help me but no matter how many times he
would explain a concept to me I was lost. I tried but Chemistry never clicked for me. Even
though I liked my teacher, this experience made me dislike science more because I wasnt
actually taught much in the class.
I only took two science classes in college, Biology for non-science majors and
Environmental Science (online). Biology was very difficult. I had to put forth hours of studying
just to pass the class. I remember how the homework took me longer than it took my classmates
who I talked to. In the end, I formed a study group with some friends, put forth a ton of effort
and made an A in the course. However, if you were to ask me something about that class today I
would not be able to answer because I did not retain any of it in my long term memory. When I
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took Environmental Science online I did not learn anything at all. To sum that class up, its the
only B that I have on my transcript.
As I look at my memories of science experiences I can see that most of them are
negative. I find the common trend that I had a lot of science teachers who were not the best of
teachers. Even if they were great people, they did not teach their class effectively. I do not want
to place blame on my teachers for my hating of science but it would have helped if they taught
more effectively. I believe that my negative experience stem from my struggling to understand
the material. Still today when I look at science I feel like my brain is all jumbled up and I would
rather just not take the time to figure it out.
When I look back at my experiences in science, I do not feel like I was successful. I
understand that I always passed my science classes, with As or Bs, and except for IB Chemistry
passed the exams, but I still do not feel like I was successful. For me success comes from more
than just the grade that I can get in the class but from the genuine knowledge and enjoyment of
the subject. When it comes to science I do not feel like I learned enough to succeed in the subject
area.
The few areas of science that have made the classes memorable or meaningful to me I
can count on one hand. The play in elementary school allowed me to explore science though
singing and dancing. It was a production that we got to perform for our parents on stage and
everything. All the hype about it made it exciting. The other meaningful experiences I have
revolve around my IB Chemistry teacher being a really unique individual. As I stated earlier he
made class fun, however class time was mostly spent off topic as he told interesting stories about
his past. He also genuinely cared for his students. Although he was not the greatest when it came
to teaching the material he was full of knowledge on the subject matter. He was always willing to
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help a student in need but he had a hard time differentiating material for all students to
understand.
I now see that in order to be an effective science teacher I need to have knowledge of the
subject. I need to show enthusiasm when teaching science, even if it is in a fake it til you make
it context. I have to show my students that I care for them and differentiate my lessons so that
all students can learn what they need to know to succeed. It is important that if my students had
to write this paper in fifteen years they could write about positive experiences. I want them to
remember the new and exciting ways to explore science that we used in my classroom. I will
strive so that they can love science and that I can grow to love science as I become a science
teacher.
My science experiences left me with the belief that science is confusing. It is a part of the
world but it is not important and you can get by without knowing it. Science is something we
have to learn even if we do not want to. Though my experiences I learned that science could be
cool but science class was always dreadful.
To be a science teacher I have to know what I believe science is. I am currently taking
SCE 4310 and through this course I hope to develop a clear understanding of what I believe
science is. Right now my working definition of science is observing, analyzing, and collecting
qualitative or quantitative data found in the world around us. I believe that science comes from
asking questions about the world around us and looking for those answers. Science is not the
stereotypical lab table, beakers, chemicals, crazy scientist that many children believe it to be.
Science is everything and anyone can be a scientist.