The Great Socio-scientific debate...A.K.A. Nuclear Energy..

This past couple of years we've seen some crazy things happen, and when the Fukushima Daiichi Power Plant started having trouble after the earthquake and tsunami, the issue about the safety of using nuclear power came to the forefront again.  So much so that Japan has recently said they will phase-out nuclear power by 2040.  I think that this would be an interesting topic for a chemistry class (or other science class) to look into when they start discussing fission and the heavier elements. 

I think that several good connections to the Nature of Science, using this topic, can be made through carefully planned instruction.  If I were to use this example of a socio-scientific issue as a supplemental way to teach about our modern understanding of the atom, I would definitely touch on these three aspects of the Nature of Science: social, theory laden, and culturally embedded.

The ideas that are important for understanding nuclear energy started with one important aspect of NOS - the social nature of science.  The Manhattan Project was a collaboration of epic proportions with the goal of researching the process of a nuclear chain reaction.  The knowledge necessary for such a program grew out of the collaborative efforts of some of the greatest scientific minds: Einstein, Fermi, and Bohr just to name a few.

The social aspect of the nature of science leads straight into the theory laden aspect.  Each one of the scientists I just listed came to the table with a distinct knowledge and skill set that depended on the areas of science they worked in and the focus that they had before the Manhattan Project.  What we know now is based on the work that was done and knowledge that these scientists brought with them. 

Today the culturally embedded nature of science plays an important role in the debate over whether or not nuclear power should be used.  The pictures of victims from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the fact that Chernobyl cannot be inhabited for at least another half millennium (on the short side), and the radiation that came out of the Fukushima Daiichi Plant all have an impact on whether or not scientists or the public want to tackle this issue.  Another face of the culturally embedded aspect of NOS in this debate can be seen in the desire to find alternatives to coal and oil as fuel sources.  Even though countries around the world want to find something to power their grids that releases little or no pollution, they tend to turn to wind, solar, and hydroelectric energy before nuclear, even though nuclear power plants are sometimes 40% more efficient energy producers.  Why is that?  Because of the tragedies that I just mentioned, there is the pervasive idea that nuclear energy will never be safe.

My job is not to help students come to a decision about whether or not nuclear power is the future of energy production.  I want students to understand where the idea of using the energy contained in an atom came from, what changes these ideas caused in our understanding of the universe, how what we bring to the table affects what conclusions we draw.  If they come to a conclusion about the use of nuclear energy, more power to them because they made an informed decision when other people might not have done the same.

Glimpses of the Nature of Science in the Earth's Crust

Continents: A Jigsaw Puzzle with no Mechanism was a helpful tool in seeing how to fit different aspects of the Nature of Science (NOS) into a content lesson.  The authors of the article presented the different parts of the content in the way that they unfolded, then posed a question to help students look at a deeper message in the narrative: why things happened in the way that they did; what caused certain things to happen or not to happen; what caused the change, or the resistance to a change, in thought.  This article puts forth several ideas that can be translate into important aspects of NOS: theory laden NOS, empirical NOS, tentative NOS, and the theory-law NOS.

The authors have posed several great questions at key points in the article.  For instance, after reading about how two scientists came to two very different conclusions after interpreting the same data, there was a break in the content where the idea that scientists have to interpret the evidence that they are presented with.  This point presents the opportunity to mention either the empirical and theory laden aspects of NOS - science fact is based on evidence, and the theories that a scientist subscribes to will affect how they interpret the data.  A brilliant move by the authors from my point of view.

In my coursework I've come across the term Nature of Science several times, and in the past, I have had to work to see ways to teach it effectively.  The ideas contained in that seemingly simple phrase are complex and interconnected to the point that you can't always tell where one stops and another starts.  This article/story is a great example of how to bring these behind the scenes structures into the foreground in an way that they can be understood.

My Goals for a Classroom Full of Students

As someone who is going to be a science teacher, and someone who has been in science education classrooms for the last sixteen or so years, I can understand how important it is to have goals both for teachers and students.  These goals should push students or teachers to meet high expectations, but still be manageable or achievable for every student or teacher.  Progression toward these goals is also something that both teachers and students will want to see, so these goals should have a measureable aspect to them.  These goals should be well articulated and accompanied by an explanation of how we will determine if the goal has been met. 

Goal 1:  My classroom will one in which respect will demonstrated.

            This is one of the most important goals in my mind for any classroom.  Students who treat each other and any other person respectfully, any amount of learning is possible.  If student strive to reach this goal, there would be openness in the classroom because everyone’s ideas would be valued just the same.  When this occurs, critical thinking about ideas and coming up with new ideas, then proffering them and being engaged in classroom activities should increase as well.

Goal 2:  I will help my students to recognize that they are apart of something much bigger than just themselves, and seek to improve society.

            This whole goal is about getting students to look at things that are happening around them, and then transfer the things they are learning in the classroom to these happenings.  Seeing something that's happening, then using what you learn to fix it, or make something work better can be one of the most rewarding experiences in someone's life.  If we can get students to think critically about the events and environment that they live in and the concepts that they are learning about in the classroom, we may yet find someone to cure cancer or figure out how to travel faster than light.

Goal 3:  I want students to be confident in their work and interactions in the classroom.

            Confidence is espoused when students feel like their ideas and responses are valued.  Encourage respect, let the students know that what they are saying is worth it (writing down everyone’s ideas in a list as they give them, giving everyone in the class a voice in what’s happening, encouraging people look at things from a new angle, etc.), and it will be worth it.  Students will be more involved in classroom activities if they think that they won’t get jumped on if their ideas aren’t the greatest.  Dr. Kruse and I were talking about getting students involved, we talked about wait time – in my growing up years I was taught about the value of silence: taking time to organize your thoughts before you speak shows that you value fact that a person was willing to ask you about your ideas, and then waiting for them to respond reciprocates that you respect their ideas just as much as they respect yours.

Goal 4:  I want all of my students to exhibit critical thinking in their work, and responses.

            This ranks right up there with respect in terms of importance in a classroom – especially in a science classroom.  This skill is something that has pushed scientists to new understanding of the world around them.  This does not mean criticizing others ideas, or running them down because their ideas; in fact it means the opposite.  It means that you as a scientists respect someone else’s ideas to look at them and make sure that they have the best explanation possible.  This is how we as members of a scientific community make our ideas stronger and better, but to do things one must show creativity, curiosity, and communication with other scientists; we have to have a deep understanding of the content, and even what knowledge is as it is being changed.  Tying all those things together behind a the force of a critically thinking mind and anyone can be unstoppable, life-long learner.

Goal 5:  I will help students be able to demonstrate a high level of understanding of the course content and then be able to apply that knowledge to areas outside the classroom.

            Teachers always want students to learn the material that they are teaching.  Always.  But no matter how we try to get the students to learn something, we can’t force feed them the information and expect anything but regurgitation.  Fostering the curiosity and critical thinking, the interaction and cooperation; getting the students to have fun and be interested in the material – tying those things together is the best way to get students to a high level of understanding of the course content. 

Goal 6:  Creativity, curiosity, communication, and cooperation are imperatives in science.  I will encourage students to exhibit these when necessary to complete their work.

            How do you think we found out some of the new scientific ideas that have revolutionized the world as we know it?  People didn’t just follow some recipe, they try something new, they were creative, they communicated with people around them, they cooperated with some people and worked on their own for a while.  All in all they came up with something new – that’s what I call being creative.  But you can’t just come up with something and shout “Eureka!”  This creativity is disguised in many ways – everything from choosing how or what you measure, what or how you experiment, what conclusions you draw, how you analyze things.  A firm grounding in the subject material, the ability to think critically, and a healthy serving of respect, confidence and perspective those are the things that help put necessary creativity into our grasp.

Goal 7: Knowledge is a tool; I aim to show students what the nature of knowledge is and how to use it for their benefit.

            Having a tool but not knowing how to use it is just about as bad as building an atomic bomb and not knowing how devastating it can be.  We as educators need to show students that knowledge is something to be desired and isn’t just isolated for one area – what you learn in one area can be used in another.  Knowledge is a powerful tool and should be used correctly; it’s our job to help students see that.  How do we do that, just about the same way that I’ve saying: work at fostering all of those things that I’ve talked about in previous few paragraphs and the understanding of what knowledge is and how to use it.

Goal 8:  I want my students to be actively engaged in learning, and to do so I want them to set, and strive to achieve goals that the set for themselves.

            Getting students involved in their own learning experience is the ultimate goal for most teachers.  We want to see that students have that students know what knowledge is, the content knowledge, creativity, cooperation, respect, communication, critical thinking, and their perspective through their participation.  If we can get students to set goals for themselves and help them achieve them we empower them in their own learning which help them throughout the rest of their lives.

After watching and reading several materials from Dr. Kruse and adapting my experiences, these goals and their explanations would be something that I would put in a class syllabus that would be handed out to all of my students, but also posted in the classroom where they could be seen by everyone.  Doing this would ensure that these goals were always on the students minds – students would always be striving to achieve them.

Teaching the Nature of Science

In my last post, I wrote about what science is, and something called the Nature of Science.  This post is is going to look into ways to teach aspects of the Nature of Science, and to do that I think giving a few examples would be a good way to do this.  There are many things that make up the different aspects of the Nature of Science, but I am going to look at these three: the semi-permanence of science fact, difference between law and theory, and our reliance on empirical data but not at the expense of critical thinking an creativity.

Teaching Semi-permanance of Science Fact:

One of the first things that comes to my mind is how the scientific community has changed their view about atomic theory.  Throughout history there have been several ideas about the "smallest" piece of matter.  From the Greeks atom - the smallest indivisible piece of matter - through all of the iterations and descriptions to what we have now: a definitely more complicated, definitely more accurate understanding of the atom.  At each different stage in the progression of these ideas, the commonly held idea about the atom was fact.  Then as technology improved and scientists were able to do more to test their ideas, they were able to prove that some things were not the way that the natural world worked.  When one thing was found to be obsolete the fact withered into historic idea and new conclusions became commonly held fact.

This unit provides a great platform for teaching students about the durability of science fact, but also that they are only fact until we can better explain our observations and analyses of our data.  I want to get students up into the higher level thought processes, so as we are going through each of the iterations of the atomic theory, I want them to do what real scientist would have done: analyze the strengths and weaknesses of each iteration.  I would ask students questions like "Why do scientist/students continue research into a subject?" or "How did new conclusions based on evidence obtained from a new experiment/technology better explain an older concept?" will help students see that maybe in a few years, some of what we think is fact was just holding its place until a better explanation can be found.  Helping students to look back and reflect on the why certain explanations has been an accepted and why another was left by the wayside will show them that an evidence based innovation can change what we know as scientific fact.

And, if we really need to we can remember that when I was a high schooler, Pluto was still a planet.

Law versus Theory: The great misunderstanding

Scientific Law: idealized, generalization about an occurrence in nature.

Scientific Theory: a set of ideas that explains a possible why something occurs in nature.

The problem does not come in understanding their simplified definitions, but rather in how the terms are used and how they are connected.   One of the problems that leads to a misuse in the terms is that they are connected and intertwined.  Theories explain laws, but some laws are integral parts of other theories.   This leads to the terms being interchanged improperly; correcting this is one of the first things that must be done: knowing the difference, then keeping them straight when we are writing or speaking.

Let's look at an example:   The Law of Conservation of mass states that matter/mass cannot be created or destroyed.  That's a fairly all encompassing relationship that, to date, all experiments have followed (remember - the facts as we know them now may be different in the future).  But what explains that law?  Atomic theory does.  Atomic theory describes the current ideas about an atom: atom made of protons and neutrons in a nucleus, surrounded by a cloud of electrons.  Principles, rules, and other laws govern how those subatomic particles behave, interact with one another, and how they interact with other atoms.  Each of these particles has a specific mass, meaning even if you split the atom the mass of all of the particles will be the same as the whole atom you started with; if there is a chemical reaction the mass of the material that is present at the beginning of the reaction is going to be the same mass when the reaction ends.  There's a lot more to the Atomic Theory that scientists prescribe to today, but no matter how much you split an atom even down to the point where we have use Einstein's relationship between energy and mass, or if a reaction is on the extreme macro-level, the Law of Conservation of Mass can be explained by this theory.

In teaching this concept I can see it happening on a continuous timeline.  First there would be vocabulary lesson where students would hear what the difference between the two were, and then helping students see how all of the laws that we would talk about are explained by a theory, each time I would ask the students to use different aspects of the theory when they are explaining what a law means.  Dr. Kruse used an example of this in one of his classes: he performed a "magic-trick" then had his students attempt to replicated and then explain their process.  But in order to explain the way that they went through trying to solve the problem before them, he asked them to explain it using the learning theories that they discussed in previous classes.  This reflection process can help students understand how to use theories and laws correctly when they are putting forth their conclusions.

Empirical Data is King, but...

Everyone knows that you have to take measurements and use numbers in science classes because those numbers are objective information.  We want to see data.  This often leads to the assumption that science is a very "dry" endeavor with very little wiggle room.  What people seem forget is that each scientist is a different person with different life experiences up to the point where they see a certain set of data.  Each one may choose to analyze a different aspect of it, the conclusions that they draw may be different.

This is not a bad thing.

Creativity and critical thinking are among the most important aspects of a good scientist.  We - the people looking at the data - are the ones who draw the conclusions: that objective data has to go through the subjective lens of the scientist.

When I'm teaching, I'll probably be in a high school chemistry class, and the first place I'd bring up this concept is when we start talking about quantitative and qualitative observations.  But it would not end there; every time we have a lab, I would ask the students to go through and a take down both types of observations and ask that they take both into account for their conclusions.  This way they'll see that both the subjective and objective observations from the work that they are doing have a vital role in getting all of the information across.


There are multiple ways to teach each of these concepts.  And, I am pretty sure that after I teach them a couple times, my reflections about these activities and practices will help me to fine tune them and make them work better in the classroom.

The Nature of Science is...

Nature of Science.  A really technical sounding, and somewhat misleading term that to me says “the what and how of the thing we call science.”  Science classes were always one of the most fun classes that I had during the year.  It was always like a puzzle with one more piece.  Try and try and try to find out where and how the piece fit with the rest, and once the right spot was found, more space appeared.  That’s how I like to think of it at least. 

As I was preparing to write this post I went through several articles that were written about the Nature of Science and the importance of it in science education in our schools.  As I was reading it seemed to me that the people who were writing the articles had a similar thought about what Nature of Science is and what it appears to have become.  Today, it seems that the ideas that people have about science are centered on an unfortunate argument: tenets or questions.  Too often I’ve been in a science class, or been trying to explain a concept to another person and I have heard or said “It is just the way it is,” suggesting that its something to accept as fact rather than study, and learn about.  In his article, Clough writes that the here are several ideas about the Nature of Science that would have a clear impact on science education but they have been distilled down to “it’s just the way it is.”  The best science classes that I have had have been the ones where the teacher, even if they said something was just the way it was because, they always wanted their students to look critically at the ideas.  We may have only been trying to replicate or reinforce the ideas that the original scientist came up with during their investigations, but that’s part of the process: coming up with a question then pursuing the questions. 

Brunsell wrote in his 2010 piece that there is a disconnect between the Nature of Science in schools and what scientists in the world actually do.   I can attest to the recipe-like nature of the experimentation practices throughout high schools and college, its wasn’t until my junior and senior years in college that I was really forced to come up with my own experiments.  Truthfully, I think that there is some place for a “recipe” if you will, because as I’ve seen in my different education classes up to this point, there are different levels of development and up to a point some people may not be at the developmental stage where that kind of critical thinking is necessary.  But, like Brunsell and Kruse, I tend to look at science like a journey (or continuous puzzle).  Both of Brunsell and Kruse commented on the deterministic style science education has today.  Always looking to the end result.  I don’t know if that has anything to do with the publish-or-perish mindset that many academic/research scientists have – get to the end of an experiment and show the results to the world.  But that really isn’t the point of the work that they actually are doing.  The product may be what the world wants to see, but the journey to that is just as  important.  Thomas Edison once said about the number of times he tried and failed to create a light bulb, “I have not failed 10,000 times.  I have not failed once.  I have succeeded in proving that those 10,000 ways will not work.  When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”  This quote seems to typify the ideas about how we look at and teach the Nature of Science in schools.  It’s a process of continued learning; its not just the what, but the why and how as well.  Revision too.  How many times has the wheel been “re-invented”? Think about it, we see the cartoons with the solid stone wheels, but that isn’t what we use today.  Wooden wheels, wooden wheels with spokes, iron-rimmed wooden wheels, all the way up to the rubber wheel with an air filled bladder in it.  Science, like the wheel, does not stop with the first conclusion.  If it did, the earth would still be the center of the solar system.  Except that people made observations that didn’t fit with common understanding of the world at the time they were made.  Theories and understandings of the world evolve over time, and we need to be aware of that.  There are a lot of theories out there, and a few laws.  There’s a big difference between them.  The “that’s just the way it is” comment is applied to theories even though those are the ideas that people should be looking at critically because they are only theories.  Almost every article that I’ve read about the Nature of Science talked about the semi-permanence of scientific “fact.” Even though it may seem that we’ve explained almost everything we can, we may have only seen the first 10,001 things that don’t work.

Dr. Kruse’s article had some pretty interesting ideas in it, not to mention ones that should be really considered by those of us who are looking at becoming science teachers.  One of the first things that he talked about was how the Nature of Science is taught:  one unit at the beginning of the course, then on to the “meat” of the course.  We as teachers and educators need to make sure that we continue teaching these ideas throughout the year.  My experiences summer are a prime example, I am working on a couple of content courses for my endorsements – bot of them in a science field.  The textbooks that I purchased for these classes are very informative (based on their pricetags), but the Nature of Science is contained in one or two sections of the first chapter.  It has been simplified down to the barest-of-bones ideas, and in one of the textbooks, the explanation of the scientific method makes it seem like the recipe, step-by-step approach that we often learn in middle and high school science classes is the only way that science can be done.  Another part of Dr. Kruse’s article that I really liked, was the collection of important ideas about the Nature of Science that he put together.  They are (paraphrased as I understood them):

-       Knowledge is not permanent, but it is durable.

-       Science is discovery plus invention.

-       We as scientists cannot be completely objective, we’re human, but we should try to be as much as possible.

-       There are many facets to science and they all have different functions.

-       The natural world is what we are focusing on, not the supernatural; but that doesn’t mean we should make claims about the supernatural.

-       Reliance on empirical data is a must, but that is not mutually exclusive from analyzing that data and being creative.

-       The scientific method is a tool, but it isn't the only one in a scientists toolbox.

-       In science we can’t prove something outright, we can only see resounding evidence in favor of one thing or another.

-       Theory and Law are not the same; theory doesn’t become law; a theory explains a law.

-       Models are problem-solving tools, we should look at them as things that show how reality might work.

If science teachers can use these ideas in there instruction, and get students to ask the why and how questions, rather than just the who, what, where, and when questions, we will be teaching the Nature of Science as we teach the information that earlier minds have established.

In the last couple of articles that I read by (one by Schwartz and one by Moreno), I really came to see that sometimes it isn’t what is being taught that students are having trouble with, sometimes it is what is being said.  In Moreno’s article, the idea that teaching the Nature of Science can help us in an era where science has taken a position of increased importance, yet the scientific literacy needed to understand the issues is lacking.  Schwartz’s article touched on an idea that truly combat what Moreno was seeing: we need to be careful about what we say and how we say them, as well as educate our students to communicate their ideas more effectively.  One statement that I saw criticized in several articles was “The data tells…” or “The data shows…” yet in reality data can’t tell or show anything.  The person who looks at the data has to analyze it in order to make any conclusion.  I keep coming back to the idea that we need to be careful what we say, because, pardon the old phrase, but “loose lips sink ships” and in this era when science is very important, we can’t have any of our students’ ships sinking.

The Nature of Science is an interesting topic: something that is inherently needed and useful to know, but often times is overlooked or oversimplified.  As I was growing up and going through my science classes in school, I cannot say that I actually remember hearing this term.  Even though I did not hear it, I think I came to have a decent grasp of what it means: continuously questioning, continuously learning—a journey to understand the world around us.  But, it seems like a one-size-fits-all recipe with a product being the desired outcome, has replaced this broad look at the Nature of Science.  Critical thinking, analysis, and creativity in a science classroom sometimes take a backseat to getting an answer.  Sure, there are times when having a right answer is needed, and grading a right or wrong answer is much easier than grading a more abstract concept, but science education should not be just about the end product. 

Resources:

Brunsell, E. (2010).  How to Teach Students to Think Like Scientists, Edutopia. 10/26/10.

Clough, M.P. (2007) Teaching the Nature of Science to Secondary and Post-secondary Students: Questions rather than tenets.  The Pantaneto Forum, Issue 25, January.

Kruse, J.W. (2008). Integrating the Nature of Science Throughout the Entire School Year.  Iowa Science Teachers Journal.  35(2). 15-20.

McComas, W.F. (2004).  Keys to Teaching the Nature of Science. NSTA Feature News Story. 10/29/2004.

Moreno, N.P. (2007). Teaching Science in the 21st Century – Teaching the Nature of Science: Five Crucial Themes. NSTA Reports, (1/3/2007).

NSTA Position Statement (2000). The Nature of Science.

Schwartz, R. (2007).  What’s in a Word? Science Scope. 31(2), 42-47.

Lesson Delivery Reflection

At the beginning of the assignment (the planning stages) I kept feeling like I needed to be able to explain everything about the topic in here.  It was something that bugged me up until Amanda and I actually presented.  It also meant that as the instructor we had to be comfortable enough with the material so that we could help the learners make connections in the material, in a way that is pertinent and applicable to them.  One of the ways that I used and felt made a difference was by giving multiple examples of the material, and each example I used had a different “theme.”  Using different themes (kindergartners at recess versus technical collision theory) makes me think critically about the material and who I am dealing with in order to facilitate learning the best way I could.  I really like it when teachers ask questions of the students to get them to think about the material because it keeps students engaged.  When we first started the lesson I was trying to get students to answer questions about a demonstration that we showed (on youtube) so the could come up with somewhat of an understanding of the concepts on their own before we spouted the technical jargon—that way they would have a better idea of what that technical jargon actually meant.

Amanda and I discussed several different methods of assessment that we could use during our presentation, and settled on using a shared document with the problems on it and asking students to email answers to us.  This style of assessment worked ok for the size of class that we had, but any more people or having more sections and students, this would not be a feasible method.  If I were to uses some kind of digital assessment tool for multiple classes, I would use something like surveymonkey.com or polleverywhere.com because these sites compile answers really well and then you won’t have hundreds of emails from every student.  I also think that if a teacher is intent on asking students good questions through out the class period, they can assess in real time where each student is, and if they need to review material or if they can move forward somewhat quicker than expected.

As someone who wants to go into teaching sciences, I think it is very important for me to know and use as many instructional strategies as possible.  By being comfortable with and using several strategies I would be able to keep student invested and engaged in the lesson for the entire time I am in contact with that class.  If I can keep the students engaged in an activity which will help them grasp some aspect of the material, I have succeeded as a teacher because the longer the students stay on task, the more opportunities I would have to help students with material they are struggling with.

Tech Project No. 5: QR Codes

A couple years ago I entered a sweepstakes and ended up winning a Garmin GPS unit by scanning the 2-dimensional QR codes.  As more and more kids have cell phones this type of technology could become an interesting, interactive way to have students learn.

What I created:

I used the QR generation tool on http://qrcode.kaywa.com/ to create a code that would be a part of a scavenger hunt.  I would make several sets of QR codes that would have questions, one that would have links to informational websites, one that would have links to pictures of the subjects in the material.  This would create an interactive experience that I would be somewhat able to control in order to make sure that students would see the material that I thought would be able help them learn about subject material.

This one is a clue to a scavenger hunt about prominent chemists.  Another code I made linked to a website that had information on the scientist from the code above.

Rationale:

This type of activity would cater to the bottom three levels of Bloom's taxonomy if it were used just as is.  Students would be able to gather information in an interactive and fun way.  But if it were coupled with another assignment like making a bumper sticker or poster.  By using it as a stepping stone to another assignment students will elevate this activity toward the upper levels of Bloom's Taxonomy--students would have to analyze, evaluate, and then create a project to illustrate the information they were just perusing.

Struggles for Implementation:

One of the struggles that I can see coming up in the implementation is that students will not have the technology at their disposal to read these codes.  I've seen apps for the iPhone/iPad that would allow the students to use these codes, and there are probably apps out there on other platforms as well, but their availability to students may be limited due to cost, or lack of a phone that can run the app.  Another struggle could be convincing administration that the activities would be worth it to use in the class room. This is a unique activity that is very technology intensive, but I can see how administrators would have a hard time justifying the use of cell phones in the classroom on it.  Administrators could say that it would be better for students to use the materials that the school provides rather than requiring them to use private resources.

Biases, Trade-offs, Limitations:

A major bias that I noticed right off the back is that you can only utilize digital, internet resources.  This would limit what information students would be exposed to.  However, this limitation would also help make sure that you as the teacher would know what information students would have access to, making sure that they got reliable information.  It would be a possible means to magnify the technology divide if there were students who had phones that could accomplish this task and those who did not in the same class.  I could see a way around this if you made a partner activity and had a student with a phone and one who did not work together create the project after this activity.

Standards:
INTASC
5.)  Depending on what questions you ask the students with the codes, any amount of critical thinking is possible.  Using this activity as a partner activity will also encourage collaboration between students who are technology comfortable and those that aren't, in other words encourage collaboration between a diverse set of learners.

8.) This is combination of several active learning strategies that are meant to help students stay engaged in the learning process for the duration of the time that they are in class: partner work, having them get up and move around the room, do their own research in order to create something to describe what they learned.

Citation and Evaluation of Source:

A Multiple-Modality Approach to Word Study: Vocabulary Scavenger Hunts

Sally Vaughan, Sharon Crawley and Lee Mountain

The Reading Teacher
Vol. 32, No. 4 (Jan., 1979), pp. 434-437

This article described a process that would be similar to using QR codes but through a much more analog process.  Students would define their vocab terms then go out to find pictures of things that would be described by those vocab words.  Even though I could not access the full article it shows that this type of interactive experience has been around for a long time, and teachers keep figuring out new and useful ways to keep this strategy up to date in the ever changing technological climate of our society.  I think that it would work better if there were fewer students in each group than was outlined in the source (5-10) because that way you would eliminate the number of students who could "coast through" the activity.