|
 |
| Intellectual Merits
|
The project will undertake research
in urban high schools in New York City, involving students from
circumstances of economic challenge and early career science teachers,
graduates from an alternative certification program designed for
career changers and graduates in science and related fields. Through
the use of participatory forms of research, including design experiments,
the project will identify promising practices that are adopted in
successful science classes and the extent to which curricula are
transformed by forms of research designed to be catalytic.
A network of early career urban science teachers will collaborate
through an interactive website, participate in research in their
own classrooms, and attend colloquia in which science at the frontiers
and developments in science education are foci. Students from the
participating teachers’ classes also will be selected to comprise
a network of urban youth who will learn how to do research on the
teaching and learning of science and participate in a colloquium
series including topics on the frontiers of science.
A network of college science teachers and science teacher educators
also will be created with the goal of them learning about inquiry-oriented
approaches to teaching and learning college science and undertaking
research in their college science classes. As is the case with the
other networks the goal is to improve the quality of teaching and
learning college science through research, in the contexts of participating
in colloquia, interacting electronically and undertaking design
experiments. The project will provide a means to coordinate science
teacher education within CUNY and change the manner in which science
is taught, including the infusion of inquiry. A Council of Science
Education will be created to support the improvement of science
education in CUNY.
The research done in this project will involve teachers (college
science instructors and early career urban science teachers), students,
and outsiders in multi-method research, using ethnography, design
experiments and surveys. Discussions of what happened in class,
especially pertaining to the roles of teachers and students, will
set a context for curriculum reform, making changes based on evidence
identified by participants. Endeavors will be made to identify and
resolve contradictions and build collective responsibility for ensuring
that changes are enacted as planned.
A primary goal is to mentor new science educators and formal efforts
will be made to create an infrastructure to support the scholarly
growth of promising non-tenured faculty so that they will remain
involved in urbanscience education..
|
| Broader
Impacts |
For many years teacher educators have
advocated the use of reflective teaching as a means of improving
the quality of enacted curricula. Despite the intuitive appeal of
reflection as a means of changing how teachers think and act the
results have not matched the vision of what ought to happen. This
project addresses means of creating solidarity in science classrooms,
whereby students and teachers accept shared responsibility for the
quality of the interactions and the effectiveness of teaching and
learning. Hence, what is learned has the potential to change programs
for the education of science teacher candidates, approaches to the
professional development of science teachers, and policy relating
to the structures needed to sustain new teachers in urban high schools.
The project also has the potential to identify fresh approaches
to improving the quality of college science teaching, especially
by infusing inquiry into the teaching of science and assisting college
instructors to undertake research in their own classroom.
|
|
