ProBase Project

Using ProBase activities in your school or college

Do you offer vocational or applied science courses?

Would you like activities that develop students' professional skills while they are using scientific ideas and techniques to tackle problems?

The ProBase database (visit www.pro-base.eu, click the “Show activities” link in the main menu on the left hand side of the page and click the link “enter the ProBase database of activities”) provides 32 tried-and-tested activities that enable you to do this in a planned and progressive way.

You will find the following links on the home page of the ProBase database:

Student Activities: this leads to a site where students (by clicking the title of the activity) can see the metadata and then can download the student’s document in any of the 3 languages in which it is available.

Tests: this leads to interactive tests that can be used with or without registration; the students can choose one in the appropriate language. After answering a question, they can click the "Feedback" button to see if their answer was correct.

Teacher files: compared with the student activities, these contain the much additional information necessary for teachers and technicians to use the activities effectively.

• English: leads to a site where the English versions of the teacher files are grouped according to their type (in pdf format).
• Hungarian: leads to a site where the Hungarian versions of the teacher files are listed according to their type (in pdf format).
• Slovenian: leads to a site where the Slovenian versions of the teacher files are listed according to their type (in pdf format).

Websites:

• StandardBase: leads to www.standardbase.com, where the students can find the StandardBase procedures that are necessary for many ProBase activities. They have to click the link “Enter procedures database” on www.standardbase.com. Then they should click "View or conduct a StandardBase procedure", then "View all experiments". (This database can also be searched for a particular procedure by keywords and fields.) By clicking the title of the procedure one can see the metadata. Click "show step-by-step" at the top of the main menu on the left-hand side and then the full text of the procedure appears in a pdf file.
• ProBase: leads to www.pro-base.eu, the communication part of the ProBase website.

All you need to do is choose activities that fit your curriculum. ProBase does the rest. Note, however, that risk assessments must be always carried out before starting any of the practical work.

In all 32 activities, students use scientific knowledge and understanding to solve problems while working in teams. In some activities other skills are added.

Stage 1
You might start by using one of the 4 “type A” activities in which students just use scientific knowledge and understanding to solve problems while working in teams. These take about 270 minutes (4.5 hours), including some work outside school or college time.

Stage 2
Students might then progress to some of the 12 activities in which one of the following skills has been added:

• communicating to scientists and non-scientists (“type B” activities)
• managing time and workload (“type C” activities)
• managing resources and budgets (“type D” activities)

These also take about 270 minutes (4.5 hours).

Stage 3
The next stage is trying some activities in which two of the skills listed above are added (there are 12 of these to choose from):

• communicating to scientists and non-scientists + managing time and workload (“type E” activities)
• managing time and workload + managing resources and budgets (“type F” activities)
• managing resources and budgets + communicating to scientists and non-scientists (“type G” activities)

These take about 540 minutes (9 hours), including some work outside school or college time.

Stage 4
The final stage is a “type H” activity in which students are asked to use the full range of skills. There are 4 to choose from and each take about 1080 minutes (18 hours), including some work outside school or college time.

Of course, which you choose will depend on the qualification your students are studying. Many are appropriate for coursework assessment - you just have to match the activities to your assessment requirements.