Projects

This project leverages an existing game by embedding tools for studying patterns of students' decision-making and problem solving in the environment. This allows researchers to understand how students learn about computational thinking within a tool that bridges informal and formal learning settings to engage a wide variety of students. The project will also develop tools and resources for classroom teachers.

This project will address the need for high quality evidence-based models, practices, and tools for high school teachers and the development of students' problem solving and analytical skills by leveraging novel research and design approaches using digital tools and two well-established online instructional platforms: Zoom In and Common Online Data Analysis Platform.            

This project is focused on the work and learning of teachers as they engage youth from underrepresented groups in studying chemistry as a subject relevant to heavy metal contamination in their neighborhoods. The project will position Chicago teachers and students as Change Makers who are capable of addressing the crises of inequity in science education and environmental contamination that matter deeply to them, while simultaneously advancing their own understanding and expertise. The project will examine the malleable factors affecting the ability of teachers to engage underrepresented students in innovative urban citizen science projects with a focus on the synergistic learning that occurs as teachers, students, scientists, and community members work together on addressing complex socio-scientific issues.

The goal of this design and development project is to address the critical need for innovative resources that transform the mathematics learning environments of preschool children from under-resourced communities by creating a cross-context school-home intervention.

Mississippi State University is identifying characteristics of exemplary African American elementary science teachers and examining the role of mentoring on beginning elementary science teachers and their students.

This project provides support for a two-day workshop that would bring about 60 participants together to discuss the issues, challenges and opportunities in "Materials Education" and devise strategies for synergizing all stakeholders involved for further progress. Discussions will be focused on 4 topics: (1) Educating the public about the relevance of materials research; (2) Materials education for K-12 students and teachers; (3) Revolutionizing undergraduate education toward flexible curriculum; (4) Materials education for graduate students.

This project will work with middle school science teachers to design and evaluate a set of data management tools that will be embedded in a web-based science curriculum. The project helps middle school science teachers monitor their students' progress, plan lessons, and reflect on their lessons. This project will identify characteristics of data management tools that are more likely to be used effectively by teachers and have a positive impact on science teaching and learning.

This project proposes to create two books and a professional development manual about the roles and practice of writing-to-learn strategies in science classrooms. The books will emphasize the importance of purposeful writing as a learning tool. The first book will target K-6 teachers and the second will address the needs of 7-12 teachers.

This project is based on the assumption that teachers often make modifications to curriculum; reordering, skipping or adding lessons, changing an "exploration" into a lecture, and so on. This project pursues three related questions: What types of modifications do teachers make (and why), which types of modifications best help students learn, and how do teachers' modifications change in response to professional development activities designed to help them become more attuned to students' thinking?

This project is exploring how curricula and assessment using dynamic, interactive scientific visualizations of complex phenomena can ensure that all students learn significant science content. Dynamic visualizations provide an alternative pathway for students to understand science concepts, which can be exploited to increase the accessibility of a range of important science concepts. Computer technologies offer unprecedented opportunities to design curricula and assessments using visual technologies and to explore them in research, teaching, and learning.

This project aims to find principles of instruction for developing students' visual models in science, including design principles for curriculum development, technological tools, and new pedagogical principles. The project concentrates on methods teachers use to guide class discussions while using innovative model-based curricula in middle school biology and in high school physical science.

This project addresses a critical need, developing professional development materials to address the teachers of ELLs. The project will create resources to help teachers build ELLs' mathematical proficiency through the design and development of professional development materials building on visual representations (VRs) for mathematical reasoning across a range of mathematical topics.

This project will design, develop, and test a virtual learning community (VLC) to enhance the ability of first- and fourth-grade teachers to provide mathematics education. The goal is to produce a prototype of a VLC for first- and fourth-grade Everyday Mathematics teachers that integrates three primary elements: (a) learning objects rooted in practice, such as lesson video, (b) community-building tools offered by the internet, and (c) focused content that drives teachers' professional learning in mathematics.

The new ViSTA Plus study explores implementation of a program for pre-service/beginning teachers that is fully centered on learning from an analysis-of-practice perspective, addressing the central research question of "What is the value of a videocase-based, analysis-of-practice approach to elementary science teacher preparation?" The project is producing science-specific, analysis-of-practice materials to support the professional development of teacher educators and professional development leaders using the ViSTA Plus program at universities and in district-based induction programs.

This project enhances and expands video-based instruction to help prospective and practicing teachers analyze the development of children's mathematical thinking. It trains teachers to: (a) understand from a cognitive developmental psychology perspective how children learn and think about mathematics; (b) assess children's mathematical knowledge and plan instructional activities accordingly; (c) develop an evidence-based understanding of effective and developmentally appropriate teaching methods and curricula; and (d) develop a basic understanding of key mathematical concepts.

The purpose of this project is to fully explore the mathematics education literature to synthesize what validity evidence is available for quantitative assessments in mathematics education.

The main goal of this project is to validate a set of rubrics that attend to the existence and the quality of instructional practices that support equity and access in mathematics classes. The project team will clarify the relationships between the practices outlined in the rubrics and aspects of teachers' perspectives and knowledge as well as student learning outcomes.

This project focuses on the assessed impact of a teacher professional development (TPD) program around the applied sciences. Specifically, researchers seek to examine the measurable impact of an established teacher professional development program currently offered through the UC Davis Edward Teller Education Center. The Center delivers teacher training and curricula and draws upon an instructor cohort that pairs a regional master teacher and relevant LLNL scientists in curriculum development and delivery.

This project will refine, expand, and validate a formative assessment tool called Math Habits Tool (MHT) for kindergarten through 8th grade classrooms. MHT is intended to capture and understand patterns of in-the-moment teacher-student and student-student classroom interactions in ways that can promote more equitable access to high quality math learning experiences for all students.

This project will develop and systematically investigate a teaching model to assist teachers in developing ideas about proof in grades 2-5. The teaching model provides both a tool for learning on the part of elementary teachers and a model of practice from which they can learn as they implement it.

This project provides professional development and support for teachers of mathematics in Grades 3-5 and assesses the impacts of the project through a rigorous cluster randomized control trial. The project supports teachers to provide instruction that helps all students reach ambitious academic goals in mathematics.

This project is producing research syntheses that summarize and make available to practitioners results from research on effective mathematics curricular interventions, teaching practices, and teacher professional development that have been designed to improve achievement by students in Title 1 programs. The project’s goal is to bring together the best resources in both mathematics education and Title I so that programs are better able to serve the mathematical learning and instructional needs of Title I schools.

This project supports the development of a collaborative digital learning environment that embeds rich middle school mathematics tasks. The project aims to understand how students' individual and collaborative engagement in learning mathematics is enhanced by the digital platform, and how student engagement and learning is affected over the course of a year-long seventh grade course.

This project uses items and data from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) to develop two kinds of resources for preparation and professional development of secondary mathematics teachers: one in the form of prototype professional learning materials and a second in the form of PISA-based, research-grounded articles written for mathematics teachers and teacher educators. Work on both resources will focus on algebra and quantitative literacy and on factors influencing educational equity.

This project takes advantage of language to help students form their own ideas and pursue deeper understanding in the science classroom. The project will conduct a comprehensive research program to develop and test technology that will empower students to use their ideas as a starting point for deepening science understanding. Researchers will use a technology that detects student ideas that go beyond a student's general knowledge level to adapt to a student's cultural and linguistic understandings of a science topic.