Assessment

The NGSA project seeks to better understand how to build and sustain the capacity of elementary science teachers to instruct and formatively assess students in ways that align with the NGSS. We utilize a professional learning model that places instructionally-supportive assessments at the forefront, and centers student discourse on disciplinary knowledge and practices to engage in sensemaking and reasoning. Teacher partners co-develop multi-dimensional assessment tasks and are starting to use them formatively with their students.

The NGSA project seeks to better understand how to build and sustain the capacity of elementary science teachers to instruct and formatively assess students in ways that align with the NGSS. We utilize a professional learning model that places instructionally-supportive assessments at the forefront, and centers student discourse on disciplinary knowledge and practices to engage in sensemaking and reasoning. Teacher partners co-develop multi-dimensional assessment tasks and are starting to use them formatively with their students.

We are studying the implementation and impact of Transition to Algebra (TTA), a year-long algebra support curriculum for underprepared 9th-graders. TTA responds to an urgent need for innovative approaches that foster success in algebra for high-need students. We are examining the impact of TTA on students' algebra achievement and attitudes toward mathematics, using a quasi-experimental design with propensity score analyses to reduce selection bias threats. We are also investigating how teachers use and adapt TTA.

Although several middle school science units are emerging with high ratings on an NGSS EQuIP review, few have been subjected to experimental or quasi-experimental study to examine their efficacy with teachers or students. We share the design specifications, development process, and research findings from a quasi-experimental test of a designed-for-NGSS middle school science unit. Treatment students outperformed comparison students on a test of three-dimensional learning (p = .019; d = .300).

Co-PI(s): Betty Stennett and Lindsey Mohan, BSCS Science Learning

The A-STEP project fosters collaboration between university faculty and pathway partners to implement common set of tools (Next Gen ASET Toolkit) across a science teacher training and development pathway. Partnerships across steps function under shared goals and paradigm shifts for pedagogical reform along the teacher pathway. A-STEP promotes change across our Networked Improvement Community (NIC) and the local pathway partners working with each university, ultimately impacting the enactment of the NGSS in respective K-12 classrooms.