Middle School

Reaching Across the Hallway: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Supporting Computer Science in Rural Schools

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"Reaching Across the Hallway: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Supporting Computer Science in Rural Schools" is in its first project year. Our goal is to design and develop a train-the-trainer professional development model that supports 5th-8th grade teachers in integrating culturally relevant computer science into their rural, social studies classrooms.

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Validation of the Equity and Access Rubrics for Mathematics Instruction (VEAR-MI)

Principal Investigator:

This poster describes the work of the Validation of the Equity and Access Rubrics for Mathematics Instruction (VEAR-MI) project, which aims to address the growing need to develop empirically grounded ways of assessing the extent to which the practices that are being outlined in research literature actually serve to support students who are currently underserved and underrepresented in mathematics.

Co-PI(s): Annie Garrison Wilhelm, Southern Methodist University; Temple Walkowiak, North Carolina State University

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Teacher Professional Learning to Support Student Motivational Competencies During Science Instruction (Collaborative Research: Harris, Linnenbrink-Garcia, and Marchand)

Principal Investigator:

This collaborative project uses co-design as a strategy to develop a professional learning approach to help middle school teachers support students' motivation and engagement in the context of NGSS instruction. The project brings together motivation experts, science education researchers, and middle school science teachers. The poster outlines the project goals, introduces five motivation design principles, and describes four tools that were co-developed to support teachers' professional learning and practice for supporting student motivation.

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Teacher Professional Learning to Support Student Motivational Competencies During Science Instruction (Collaborative Research: Harris, Linnenbrink-Garcia, and Marchand)

Principal Investigator:

This collaborative project uses co-design as a strategy to develop a professional learning approach to help middle school teachers support students' motivation and engagement in the context of NGSS instruction. The project brings together motivation experts, science education researchers, and middle school science teachers. The poster outlines the project goals, introduces five motivation design principles, and describes four tools that were co-developed to support teachers' professional learning and practice for supporting student motivation.

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Teacher Professional Learning to Support Student Motivational Competencies During Science Instruction (Collaborative Research: Harris, Linnenbrink-Garcia, and Marchand)

Principal Investigator:

This collaborative project uses co-design as a strategy to develop a professional learning approach to help middle school teachers support students' motivation and engagement in the context of NGSS instruction. The project brings together motivation experts, science education researchers, and middle school science teachers. The poster outlines the project goals, introduces five motivation design principles, and describes four tools that were co-developed to support teachers' professional learning and practice for supporting student motivation.

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Supporting Teachers in Responsive Instruction for Developing Expertise in Science (Collaborative Research: Riordan)

Principal Investigator:

With the increasing use of online interactive environments for science and engineering education in grades K-12, there is a growing need for detailed automatic analysis of student explanations to provide targeted and individualized guidance. In this work we describe a process of human annotation of student ideas based on deconstructed holistic scoring rubrics for knowledge integration in science learning and develop new NLP methods for identifying diverse expressions of student ideas and reasoning.

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Strengthening STEM Teaching in Native American Serving Schools through Long-Term, Culturally Responsive Professional Development

Principal Investigator:

This is a 4-year, level II Exploratory study within the teaching strand of DRK12. The research explores the functioning and impact of a nationally-developed STEM professional development model within the Navajo Nation. Teacher participants represent the entire K-12 grade range and multiple content areas, and they all participate in an innovative STEM-content, culturally responsive, 8-month professional development fellowship. We explore the extent to which culturally responsive principles are evident in their self-authored curriculum units.

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Building a Teacher Knowledge Base for the Implementation of High-Quality Instructional Resources through the Collaborative Investigation of Video Cases (Collaborative Research: Murray and Wilson)

Principal Investigator:

Analyzing Instruction in Mathematics using the TRU framework (AIM-TRU) is a research-practice partnership that is investigating the pressing problem of supporting teachers in increasing their capacity to implement high-quality instructional materials in the classroom with fidelity. Drawing upon the design-based research paradigm, the partnership has worked to co-design, investigate, and iteratively form the AIM-TRU Learning Cycle, which gives teachers the opportunity to understand the materials and how they are used in the classroom through a video-based professional learning cycle.

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Mathematical Learning via Architectural Design and Modeling Using E-Rebuild

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This poster presentation will introduce the current study findings governing the design and implementation of E-Rebuild, a 3D architecture and math game that aims to promote versatile representation and epistemic practice of mathematics for students in grades 6th-8th. Utilizing the real-time, evidence-centered in-game learning assessment and a game-level editor, E-Rebuild enables not only problem-based mathematical thinking and learning, but also adaptive learner support during gameplay and participatory design of game-based math problems.

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Incorporating Professional Science Writing into High School STEM Research Projects

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Description: Reading, writing, revision and even publication are integral to progressing science. Yet, these skills are not emphasized in the typical high school STEM classroom. This project investigates the experiences and outcomes of secondary students who have participated in the peer-review and publication of their STEM research projects. Overall, students report increased understanding of the role of writing and publication within science, and they express higher levels of self-efficacy, confidence and identity in STEM.
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