Difference Maker: Enacting Systems Theory in Biology Teaching

Laying down a new path in biology teaching, this book explains how to enact a learning environment where meaning isn't transmitted or discovered, but co-constructed. Read how to provoke understanding through diagrams and dialogue. Inside you'll find: The recursive teaching model. An innovative evidence-and-theory informed model for co-constructing meaning with students rather than just telling them or having them discover alone.
Detailed examples of my lessons. I show the exact diagrams I've drawn in a lesson and explain how I've drawn them step by step. I show the exact questions I've asked students, at what point in the lesson, and why. A theory-informed how-to guide for planning explanations. I show exactly how to explain biological concepts by applying the variation theory of learning and enactive cognitive science. This simple heuristic will revolutionise your students' understanding while hugely cutting your planning time.
A theory-informed how-to guide for encouraging conversation in lessons. You never know how students will interpret a new explanation so conversing with them is essential. I show, using a new model for conversation, how to keep everyone on the same page. Through examples from my lessons, I show the types of questions that allow a conversation to develop, without them becoming too open and inefficient.
Keep your classroom conversation on point while also receiving rich feedback on what your students understand. A theory-informed how-to guide for co-constructing stock and flow diagrams. These diagrams have vastly increased my students' understanding and have also made teaching more fun and conversational. I show exactly how to read, design, and teach them, with detailed lesson examples. There's also an appendix of 37 of these diagrams I've used with my classes.
A new model of curricular content. I show that the curriculum is not just a list of content of equal weight. There are key ideas that give meaning to the rest of the curriculum. I explain the concept of "metacontent" and show exactly how I apply it in detailed examples. The first type of metacontent I explain is a set of systems principles that I share with students and discuss during every topic.
These unifying principles avoid the feeling that biology is just a lot of facts to learn. The second type is understanding understanding itself. I share a taxonomy of understanding that allows students to grasp what I expect of them in every topic. Rather than success criteria, which change for every topic, this framework gets to the heart of biological understanding and how to get there. I provide example sentences for each level of understanding, example questions I've asked to test my students' understanding, and example answers my students have given.
A way of seeing and being. Rather than a training manual with activities to follow, this book provides teachers with a new conception of teaching, learning, and acting together in the classroom. Yet, rather than being an academic book of just abstract theory, it thoroughly exemplifies all the ideas in practice from real lessons in real teaching contexts. Laying down a new path in biology teaching, this book will change how you perceive and act in teaching and learning.