Science

This project provides rural middle school teachers and career counselors professional development, and the support needed to collaborate with each other and local community assets in designing, integrating, and implementing effective STEM content and career development activities. School teams co-develop project-based learning units that incorporate a place-based education perspective involving STEM assets, careers, and stakeholders from the local communities for middle school rural youth that intentionally infuse STEM careers in their area with STEM content.

This collaborative early-stage design and development project has three goals: (a) develop automatically generated student reports (AutoRs) for three-dimensional (3D) science assessments to assist middle-school teachers to notice, attend to, and interpret information in ongoing classroom teaching, and (b) develop effective instructional supports to improve teachers’ use of AutoRs to make effective decisions for instructional moves, and  (c) examine the effectiveness of AutoRs and instructional supports to aide teachers’ decision making and students’ 3D learning.

This collaborative early-stage design and development project has three goals: (a) develop automatically generated student reports (AutoRs) for three-dimensional (3D) science assessments to assist middle-school teachers to notice, attend to, and interpret information in ongoing classroom teaching, and (b) develop effective instructional supports to improve teachers’ use of AutoRs to make effective decisions for instructional moves, and  (c) examine the effectiveness of AutoRs and instructional supports to aide teachers’ decision making and students’ 3D learning.

This collaborative early-stage design and development project has three goals: (a) develop automatically generated student reports (AutoRs) for three-dimensional (3D) science assessments to assist middle-school teachers to notice, attend to, and interpret information in ongoing classroom teaching, and (b) develop effective instructional supports to improve teachers’ use of AutoRs to make effective decisions for instructional moves, and  (c) examine the effectiveness of AutoRs and instructional supports to aide teachers’ decision making and students’ 3D learning.

This collaborative early-stage design and development project has three goals: (a) develop automatically generated student reports (AutoRs) for three-dimensional (3D) science assessments to assist middle-school teachers to notice, attend to, and interpret information in ongoing classroom teaching, and (b) develop effective instructional supports to improve teachers’ use of AutoRs to make effective decisions for instructional moves, and  (c) examine the effectiveness of AutoRs and instructional supports to aide teachers’ decision making and students’ 3D learning.

The goal of TL4CS is to generate knowledge about teacher learning that enables elementary school-based citizen science (SBCs) to support students’ engagement with authentic science content and practices. The study addresses three research questions: (1) What kinds of supports foster teacher learning for enacting SBCS? (2) How do supports for teacher learning shape the way teachers enact SBCS? and (3) What is the potential of SBCS for positively influencing student learning and student attitudes?

The Science Communities of Practice Partnership (SCOPP), a four-year $3.4 million National Science Foundation grant. The project is developing and studying a comprehensive teacher professional development model to transform science teaching and learning in elementary schools serving predominantly minoritized students.

Although science is increasingly recognized as a key dimension of early learning, findings to date indicate that young children, especially those enrolled in public preschool programs serving historically excluded communities, have limited opportunities to engage in high quality science investigations. This four-year design and development project brings together public preschool teachers, families from culturally and linguistically diverse communities, early learning and STEM researchers, and designers of media to co-design a Professional Learning Hub for Early Science.

The goal of the actLocal project is to develop and test iPlan 2.0, an online platform for K–12 teachers, students, and the public to easily create localized climate change adaptation simulations for any location in the contiguous United States. These simulations will enable high school students and others to implement and evaluate strategies to address the impacts of climate change in their own communities.

We are investigating factors that influence elementary teachers’ professional learning (PL) in science and engineering. The intervention and ongoing supports are offered at a distance to participants teaching grades 3-5 in rural school districts. Overarching research objectives include examining: (1) the impacts of online science and engineering PL; (2) the effectiveness of modest supports on the sustainability of PL outcomes; and (3) the changes to teachers’ engineering instructional practices.