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Teachers’ educational beliefs influence their decisions and actions before, during, and after class. Classroom actions are a result of decision-making processes wherein teachers judge how they can teach effectively. The early years of teaching profession is important in shaping new teachers’ practices in accordance with their beliefs. This study identifies how the beliefs and classroom practices of a new science teacher change within the first three years of working. This study’s participant was a new high-school science teacher in Midwestern United States. Changes were investigated by employing qualitative research methods. Data for this longitudinal case study were gathered from interviews, questionnaires, and classroom observations for three years. The findings show that teachers cannot practice their reformist beliefs without experiencing real class environments.

Teachers are expected to improve their students’ analytical thinking and decision-making skills through evidence-based thinking and critical evaluation processes. In this study, a three-hour workshop was conducted to investigate science teachers’ views about teaching socio-scientific issues through argumentation and introducing an instructional scaffold, Model-Evidence Link diagrams to promote the use of argumentation and critical evaluation in science classrooms. 125 science teachers, who were working in public schools of an urban area in Turkey participated in the workshop. Findings revealed that 90% of the participants stated that the use of MEL diagram is appropriate for science teaching. Promoting higher order thinking skills was the highest benefit, whereas the need for time for the development and implementation of the material was the greatest challenge for the use of the MEL diagrams in science classrooms. This study contributes to the literature on teaching socio-scientific issues, especially through argumentation, evidence-based thinking, and critical evaluation.

Background Prior research reported that motivational beliefs that individuals attach to specific tasks predict continuing interest and persistence in the task. A motivational approach may be particularly useful for understanding undergraduate students’ engagement with research in their first and second years in college. The current study utilizes the expectancy-value theory of achievement motivation to qualitatively explore how much and in what ways early year undergraduate researchers value their research experience and what kinds of costs they associate with it. Results The results revealed that intrinsic value had the highest expression in participants’ motivation to engage in research. The second most expressed value type was the utility value of undergraduate research with regards to obtaining the desired outcomes, and attainment value played the least important role in participants’ motivation to engage in research. Findings also indicated that some of the participants associated a cost(s) to their research experience. The highest mentioned perceived cost was opportunity cost, where participants commented on losing other valued alternatives when engaging in research. Participants commented on the time, effort, or amount of work needed to engage in research, and a few participants commented on the emotional cost associated with their research experience in terms of the fear of failure. Conclusion As perceived cost is the least studied in the expectancy-value framework, this study contributes to cost values within college students, particularly about early year undergraduate researchers. The findings of this study can form the basis for future work on exploring ways to increase the values and decrease the costs students experience in their undergraduate research experiences.

Research has shown that mentorship provided to undergraduate researchers affects the extent of research outcomes. Although a large body of literature focuses on the faculty-undergraduate dyad mentorship structure, little is known about mentoring triads (i.e., interaction among undergraduate students, faculty, and graduate students or postdoctoral associates) or the support provided to early-year undergraduate researchers. Mentors provide various types of support (e.g., intellectual, personal, emotional, and professional support) to undergraduate researchers to increase their engagement in a discipline. This qualitative exploratory study aims to investigate undergraduate researchers' perspectives on mentoring structures and the support provided to them in their first and sophomore years. The majority of participants described the mentorship they received as having a triad structure, indicating interaction with both faculty and postgraduates. Participants also reported receiving different types of support from faculty and postgraduates depending on their mentoring structures and the amount of research experience they gained. Given the potential benefits to undergraduate researchers, undergraduate research programs should be designed to provide clear roles, responsibilities, and expectations to maximize the support provided to undergraduate students.

Integrated STEM education leverages interconnections between science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in order to reflect upon how each discipline operates within real world contexts. Students benefit from the integrated STEM approach because it values the real-life experiences of students along with the hands-on applications that mirror professional STEM work. Nevertheless, integrated STEM instruction remains ill-defined with many gaps evident in the existing research of how implementation explicitly works. The school setting central to this case study was a suburban public middle school that had sustained an integrated STEM program for a period of over 5 years. Through the use of phenomenological qualitative inquiry, we focused on both teachers’ and students’ experiences of participation in one integrated STEM model. Three major themes emerged as part of this inquiry. First, teachers engaged in continual reflection that along with district supports contributed to the durability of the model. Second, teachers and student engaged in dynamic learning transactions based on the particular task and concept covered. Third, science projects anchored learning opportunities deemed most successful by participants.

The Strategic Undergraduate STEM Talent Acceleration INitiative (SUSTAIN) provided a coherent ecosystem of academic, social, and career support services designed for a diverse cohort of high-achieving, low-income STEM students during their first year of undergraduate study. Findings are discussed in terms of the efficacy of the program interventions to enhance students’ socialization and retention within the STEM community. Results indicate that participants perceived the interventions to have helped them adjust to college life and develop skills in understanding science and the scientific process. Which in turn, participants reported, helped them to succeed in their STEM courses and visualize themselves as part of the larger STEM community. The participants rated STEM faculty mentoring, research experience and community building as more helpful than other interventions. Our findings will aid researchers to better understand how SUSTAIN interventions influence students’ socialization into the STEM community and provide valuable insight to guide policymakers in shaping future programs that are successful in retaining diverse students in STEM fields.

Discussing the teaching of evolution with concerned parents is a challenge to any science teacher. Using the medical education pedagogy of standardized individuals within the field of teacher education, this article addresses how preservice science teachers elected to verbally interact with standardized parents who questioned the teaching of evolution and proposed alternative curricula. Analysis of video recordings of the simulated interactions yielded three primary themes connected to teachers' understandings of what “counts” as science, teachers' justifications for teaching evolution, and teachers' explanations of the impact of teaching evolution. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Sci Ed94:552–570, 2010

Background context This study was prompted by 1) the almost universal use of patient education as an initial or at least an ancillary step in the treatment of patients presenting with low back pain, 2) the relative dearth of studies evaluating the effectiveness of patient education and 3) the complete lack of support in the few existing studies for the efficacy of education in improving patients' long-term health status. Purpose A feasibility study to evaluate the efficacy of an individualized biomechanical treatment educational booklet to effect improvement in health status. Study design A prospective, longitudinal cohort study. Patient sample Sixty-two subjects (35 female, 27 male), average age 42.4 years, reported a mean duration of back pain before inclusion of 10.4 years. However, because of attrition, only 48 subjects had complete data across the 18-month follow-up period. Outcome measures Outcome measures included pain status, number of back pain episodes, subject compliance with self-care behaviors, knowledge and opinion of booklet content. Methods Volunteers with chronic low back pain were provided a copy of an individualized biomechanical treatment educational book and told they would undergo a written survey of its content 1 week after reading the book. Subjects' health status at 9 and 18 months was evaluated using a structured telephone interview. Results One week after the 62 subjects, with an average of 10.4 years of symptoms and extensive use of the medical system, finished reading the index book, 51.62% reported noticeable improvement in their pain, their content comprehension was good and opinions about the text were generally positive. At 9-month follow-up, there was statistically significant and clinically relevant improvement in reported pain magnitude (p Conclusion This study's results suggest that the Treat Your Own Back book may have considerable efficacy in helping readers decrease their own low back pain and reduce the frequency of, or even eliminate, their recurrent episodes. These findings also justify conducting a randomized controlled clinical trial to assess this book's efficacy in improving health status in subjects with low back pain with the study design including internal controls to minimize bias issues and a wider range of outcomes, including measures of pain, function, disability, patient satisfaction, utilization of health care services and psychosocial measures.

(2012). A Framework for Instructional Innovation in the Preparation of Tomorrow’s Teachers. Journal of Digital Learning in Teacher Education: Vol. 28, No. 4, pp. 130-132.

The current national priority for systemic approaches to the reform of science and mathematics education has led to unprecedented interest in research on the efficacy of science and mathematics teacher preparation programs. In response to this priority, a focus on collaborative approaches to educational reform and to research on educational reform resulted in a national collaborative research consortium of insitutions of higher education. The consortium was formed to investigate the following question about secondary science teacher education: What are the perceptions, beliefs, and classroom performances of beginning secondary teachers as related to their philosophies of teaching and their content pedagogical skills? The research design and instrumentation yielded detailed descriptions that elicited knowledge and beliefs held by beginning teachers about science, the nature of teaching and learning, and their philosophy of teaching. An analysis of video portfolios of beginning teachers provided classroom-based evidence of their performance in both subject matter and pedagogical dimensions of teaching. Among the findings from this 3-year exploratory study were that teachers graduated from their teacher preparation programs with a range of knowledge and beliefs about: how teachers should interact with subject content and processes, what teachers should be doing in the classroom, what students should be doing in the classroom, philosophies of teaching, and how they perceived themselves as classroom teachers. Beginning teachers described their practices as very student-centered. Observations of these teaching practices contrasted starkly with teacher beliefs: While teachers professed student-centered beliefs, they behaved in teacher-centered ways. Undertaking intensive, collaborative studies such as the one described in this article, is the beginning of efforts through which the science and mathematics education communities can strive to address the needs of students, teachers, teacher educators, and other stakeholders working to establish a common vision for excellent instruction and systemic, long-lasting reform. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 36: 930–954, 1999

This study examined the perceptions of male and female scientists concerning their experiences in achieving and maintaining a career within the scientific community. Additionally, how male and female scientists viewed the nature of science itself was explored. The intent was to determine the commonalities and differences that exist within and between these groups to gain additional insight into the problem of the under-representation of women in science. Male and female respondents had contrasting experiences in becoming scientists as well as maintaining careers within the scientific community. Women perceived many more barriers than did male respondents. Despite differences faced by male and female respondents, their beliefs about what constituted science were nearly identical.

(1998). A Case Study for Use in Science Methods Courses. Journal of Science Teacher Education: Vol. 9, No. 2, pp. 153-164.