Search

This study focused on K-12 students attending outreach activities (i.e. activities from STEM-based industry emphasizing applications of STEM content in the STEM field), with the main objective being to motivate students for a future career in STEM. Outreach activities can be regarded as environments that extend the regular in-class learning environment and that differ from regular environments in terms of several dimensions, such as autonomy, relevance and learning resources. To date, little research has been conducted on these types of learning environments. We followed a person-centred approach in identifying students' motivational profiles and corresponding student groups in outreach activities, and in evaluating whether students with different profiles differ in their STEM-related attitudes and experience of outreach activities. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected. Latent-profile analyses revealed four different motivational profiles: good-quality motivation, moderate-motivation, high-quantity motivation and low-quantity motivation. Students with a good-quality motivation reported significantly more favorable-attitudes towards a future career in STEM compared with the other groups, with content and personal relevance being key factors for students with this profile. This study provided support for adding outreach activities to the school learning environment.

We investigated teachers' perceptions of an online inservice teacher course in China and its outcomes, as well as connections between these two types of perceptions. Data were collected from a sample of 251 teachers following a course on Information and Communication Technology in education using a questionnaire survey and interviews. Teachers were generally satisfied with the setup and content of the course, but considered that interaction during training and motivation were not optimal. A correlation analysis showed that teachers' perceptions of the course were significantly and positively related to their perceptions of training outcomes. Regression analyses revealed that the connection of training content with teachers' daily practice contributed most positively to teachers' perceptions of the training outcomes. Suggestions for optimizing online inservice teacher courses are provided.

Professional development programmes for teachers that aim at context-based science education are usually lengthy and less effective than intended. In this study, a one-year professional development programme was designed and evaluated that consistently started from the teachers' concerns regarding context-based education. The teachers reported a positive shift in concerns, from self-as-teacher concerns towards student-learning concerns. They also reported that they came to grips with what context-based science education means in teaching practice. Although the number of participants was small (n = 5), this study uncovers that focusing on teachers' concerns throughout the professional development programme is a potentially effective approach to teacher learning. The shifts in their concerns is an important condition for long-lasting change.

In teacher education programmes, text-based portfolios are generally used to assess student-teachers' competence as new teachers. However, striking discrepancies are known to exist between the competencies reflected in a written portfolio and the competencies observed in actual classroom practice. Multiple assessments should be used to provide a more valid assessment of student-teachers' competence as new teachers. Technology can support this kind of multiple and flexible ways of assessment. In a Research & Development project, four types of e-assessments were designed, implemented and evaluated in 27 interventions in 13 post-graduated teacher education programs in the Netherlands. Teacher educators reported positive outcomes of the interventions in terms of new procedures, materials and tools. No significant effects were found of the implementation of the four types of e-assessments on the evaluation by either teacher educators or student-teachers. A possible explanation for this absence of effects might be teething problems of the interventions implemented.

The present study investigated outreach activities, developed by STEM-based companies or universities in co-creation with secondary education with the aim to inform students about and motivate them for a career in STEM by connecting the work-context with school-science. Although many of such activities are being offered, little is known about their effects. We investigated students' perceptions with the outreach learning environment, perceived need-fulfillment, self-reported motivation and attitudes towards STEM. Data were gathered from 729 high-school students engaged in 12 activities in the USA and the Netherlands. The students completed a questionnaire, which contained questions about four elements of our theoretical frame based on the Self-Determination-Theory (SDT). Perceived needs-fulfillment and motivation were measured using the basic-psychological-needs-scale and the self-regulation-questionnaire. Attitudes were measured using the test-of-science-related-attitudes. Learning environment perceptions were measured in a previous study using subscales of what-is-happening-in-this-classroom (WIHIC), constructivist-learning-environments-scale (CLES) and classroom-environment-scale (CES) and typified by activity characteristics. Multilevel analyses of variance were conducted for the two motivation scales (controlled and autonomous-motivation) and the two attitude scales (social-implication and career-interest). Activity characteristics explained almost all variance in these variables between activities. Specific characteristics of outreach activities that statistically significantly related to autonomous motivation and positive general attitudes towards STEM were: workshop-format, understanding science, an out-of-school component. The attitude towards a possible STEM-career was positively associated with autonomous-motivation and negatively associated with controlled-motivation. Thus, outreach learning environments indeed created opportunities to increase students' motivation in STEM and attitude towards STEM, but the impact varied according to particular characteristics of the activities.

Integrated curricula seem promising for the increase of attention on science and technology in primary education. A clear picture of the advantages and disadvantages of integration efforts could help curriculum innovation. This review has focused on integrated curricula in primary education from 1994 to 2011. The integrated curricula were categorised according to a taxonomy of integration types synthesised from the literature. The characteristics that we deemed important were related to learning outcomes and success/fail factors. A focus group was formed to facilitate the process of analysis and to test tentative conclusions. We concluded that the levels in our taxonomy were linked to (a) student knowledge and skills, the enthusiasm generated among students and teachers, and the teacher commitment that was generated; and (b) the teacher commitment needed, the duration of the innovation effort, the volume and comprehensiveness of required teacher professional development, the necessary teacher support and the effort needed to overcome tensions with standard curricula. Almost all projects were effective in increasing the time spent on science at school. Our model resolves Czerniac's "definition problem" of integrating curricula in a productive manner, and it forms a practical basis for decision-making by making clear what is needed and what output can be expected when plans are being formulated to implement integrated education.

Many students in secondary schools consider the sciences difficult and unattractive. This applies to physics in particular, a subject in which students attempt to learn and understand numerous theoretical concepts, often without much success. A case in point is the understanding of the concepts current, voltage and resistance in simple electric circuits. In response to these problems, reform initiatives in education strive for a change of the classroom culture, putting emphasis on more authentic contexts and student activities containing elements of inquiry. The challenge then becomes choosing and combining these elements in such a manner that they foster an understanding of theoretical concepts. In this article we reflect on data collected and analyzed from a series of 12 grade 9 physics lessons on simple electric circuits. Drawing from a theoretical framework based on individual (conceptual change based) and socio-cultural views on learning, instruction was designed addressing known conceptual problems and attempting to create a physics (research) culture in the classroom. As the success of the lessons was limited, the focus of the study became to understand which inherent characteristics of inquiry based instruction complicate the process of constructing conceptual understanding. From the analysis of the data collected during the enactment of the lessons three tensions emerged: the tension between open inquiry and student guidance, the tension between students developing their own ideas and getting to know accepted scientific theories, and the tension between fostering scientific interest as part of a scientific research culture and the task oriented school culture. An outlook will be given on the implications for science lessons. (Contains 2 tables and 1 footnote.)

By applying the self-to-prototype matching theory to students' academic choices, this study links the unpopularity of science in many industrialized countries with the perceived gap between typical persons representing science (e.g. physics teachers) on the one hand and students' self-image on the other. A sample of N = 308 Dutch and German students described both themselves and typical teachers representing different school subjects using 65 trait adjectives. The following hypotheses were tested: The typical hard sciences teacher and the typical languages teacher will be perceived as differing in their personal characteristics. The typical physics teachers will be perceived as being less similar to students' own self-image than teachers representing languages. Actual choices students make during secondary school should correlate with the perceived fit between students' self-image and the prototype of teachers representing different school subjects, especially in the less frequent and less popular choices of a math or physics major/profile. The findings supported these hypotheses. The discussion stresses that students acquire not only knowledge about science but also about science culture (sensu Aikenhead) in their science classes and that students' image of science teachers can influence their academic choices.

Teacher knowledge guides a teacher's behaviour in the classroom. Teacher knowledge for technology education is generally assumed to play an important role in affecting pupils' learning in technology. There are an abundant number of teacher knowledge models that visualise different domains of teacher knowledge, but clear empirical evidence on how these domains interact is lacking. Insights into the interaction of teacher knowledge domains could be useful for teacher training. In this study, the hypothesised relations between different domains of teacher knowledge for technology education in primary schools were empirically investigated. Subject matter knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, attitude, and self-efficacy were measured with tests and questionnaires. Results from a path analysis showed that subject matter knowledge is an important prerequisite for both pedagogical content knowledge and self-efficacy. Subsequently, teachers' self-efficacy was found to have a strong influence on teachers' attitude towards technology. Based on the findings in this study, it is recommended that teacher training should first of all focus on the development of teachers' subject matter knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge. This knowledge will positively affect teachers' confidence in teaching and, in turn, their attitude towards the subject. More confidence in technology teaching and a more positive attitude are expected to increase the frequency of technology education, which consequently increases teaching experience and thereby stimulates the development of teachers' pedagogical content knowledge. This circle of positive reinforcement will eventually contribute to the quality of technology education in primary schools. (Contains 3 tables and 2 figures.)

The committees for the current Dutch context-based innovation in secondary science education employed teachers to design context-based curriculum materials. A study on the learning of science teachers in design teams for context-based curriculum materials is presented in this paper. In a correlation study, teachers with (n = 5 and 840 students) and without (n = 8 and 184 students) context-based curriculum material design experience were compared on context-based competence. Context-based competence comprises context handling, regulation, emphasis, design, and school innovation. Context-based teaching competence was mapped using both qualitative and quantitative research methods in a composite instrument. Due to the differences in design team set-up for different science subjects, teachers with design experience from different science subjects were also compared on their context-based competence. It was found that teachers with design experience showed more context-based competence than their non-designing colleagues. Furthermore, teachers designing for biology showed more context-based competence than their peers from other science subjects. (Contains 6 tables and 1 figure.)

In the study described in this article, primary school teachers' pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of technology education was measured with a multiple choice test; the Teaching of Technology Test (TTT). The aim of the study was to explore the latent factor structure of PCK, which is considered to be a crucial and distinctive domain of teacher knowledge. As far as known, it is the first time that PCK is approached in this way. Many different components of PCK have been proposed in an attempt to define the concept, but these components have never been statistically confirmed. Three components were selected as the main knowledge components of PCK for technology education in primary schools: (1) Knowledge of pupils' concept of technology and knowledge of their pre and misconceptions related to technology; (2) Knowledge of the nature and purpose of technology education; (3) Knowledge of pedagogical approaches and teaching strategies for technology education. The results of this study gave useful insights into primary school teachers' PCK of technology education. It appeared that the theoretically predefined knowledge components could be indentified as latent factors. Furthermore, PCK could be characterized as a heterogeneous construct. That is, it consists of many intrinsic elements, which are difficult to unravel. Although measurement of PCK with a multiple-choice test has clear-cut advantages compared to qualitative methods and the results of the TTT are promising, further steps should be taken to reach satisfactory psychometric properties for practical application. This article provides ideas on how to (further) develop a multiple choice test to measure PCK. (Contains 4 tables and 4 figures.)

Worldwide, a tendency is visible in which upper secondary science curricula are innovated in the direction of context-based education. Crucial to these innovations is the way teachers interact with newly developed teaching materials and implement them in classroom practice. The focus of our research is to identify characteristics of the interaction between innovative context-based materials and teachers that hinder or facilitate classroom implementation as intended by the designers. Four cases of classroom implementation by four experienced teachers with different degrees of experiences in context-based education, all implementing "Chemie im Kontext" (CHiK) teaching materials, were carried out using a previously developed framework for analysis. It was found that a crucial aspect of CHiK, that of taking students' questions and using them as an orientation as the "focal event" for the following lessons, was difficult to implement. The employed contexts are too general and broad to be effectively applicable as a setting in which activities such as students developing their own ideas and exploring them logically take place. Therefore, it is recommended that extensive teacher professionalization is required on this aspect to show teachers its value and to increase their repertoire of necessary teaching activities. (Contains 4 figures.)

The purposes of this study were to examine how Turkish students perceived their biology classroom environment, how their perceptions compared to those of students in other countries, and what classroom learning environment profiles could be discerned in Turkish high school biology classrooms. Data were gathered from 1,474 high school students in four inner city schools, in Bursa, Turkey. A total of 11 biology teachers participated in the study with 52 of their classes. Data on students' perceptions of their learning environment were collected with the What Is Happening In this Class? (WIHIC) questionnaire. Results indicated that Turkish classrooms were perceived as being low in terms of Teacher Support and high in terms of Task Orientation. Six distinct classroom learning environment profiles were found: the "self-directed learning classroom", "task-oriented cooperative learning classroom", "mainstream classroom", "task-oriented individualised classroom", "low-effective learning classroom" and "high-effective learning classroom". The most common profile was the "mainstream classroom" for which all WIHIC scales had medium-high scores. (Contains 6 tables, 1 figure and 2 footnotes.)

Forming a science-oriented identity is considered a process underlying both interest and achievement in science education. A questionnaire is developed for describing "identities as learners" and evaluating their science orientedness. The instrument (k = 65) focuses on cognitive aspects. An internal coherence of .88 was found. Five subscales were defined that proved interrelated yet distinguishable. A pilot amongst 40 students from Dutch general secondary education showed that preferring science over non-science subjects and relatively high grades for sciences subjects were strongly correlated to science orientedness of the learner identity (r[subscript s] = 0.65; p less than 0.001). The results support the reliability and validity of the questionnaire but also point to the importance of identity as a central concept in studying science education. It is concluded that we made a promising step in constructing an instrument for monitoring the development of cognitive aspects of science-oriented identities during (innovative) science education. (Contains 1 note and 4 tables.)

This literature review reports on the assumed relations between primary school teachers' knowledge of technology and pupils' attitude towards technology. In order to find relevant aspects of technology-specific teacher knowledge, scientific literature in the field of primary technology education was searched. It is found that teacher knowledge is essential for stimulating a positive attitude towards technology in pupils. Particularly, teachers' enhanced Pedagogical Content Knowledge is found to be related to pupils' increased learning and interest in technology. Six aspects of technology-specific teacher knowledge that are likely to play a role in affecting pupils' attitude are identified and schematically presented in a hypothetical diagram. It is concluded that more empirical evidence on the influence of technology-specific teacher knowledge on pupils' attitude is needed. The hypothetical diagram will serve as a helpful tool to investigate the assumed relations between teacher knowledge and pupils' attitude empirically.

We present a framework for analysing the interplay between context-based teaching material and teachers, and for evaluating the adequacy of the resulting implementation of context-based pedagogy in chemistry classroom practice. The development of the framework is described, including an account of its theoretical foundations. The framework needs to be sensitive to the problems specific to the implementation of new context-based science education and the professional development of teachers. An effective procedure is described for the collection and analysis of the data with subsequent focus on the designers' intentions with the context-based teaching materials, the teachers' perceptions of the materials and the resulting classroom practice. The framework's use and value are shown in an empirical study. The framework proved to produce reliable and valid insight into the relations between teaching material and the teachers, and in the classroom implementation. Additionally, results on classroom implementation are presented to illustrate the kind of understanding can be expected when this framework is applied in more extensive multi-case studies. (Contains 1 table and 1 figure.)

Pedagogical content knowledge is found to be a crucial part of the knowledge base for teaching. Studies in the field of primary technology education showed that this domain of teacher knowledge is related to pupils' increased learning, motivation, and interest. The common methods to investigate teachers' pedagogical content knowledge are often complicated, and time and labour consuming. Hence, a challenge in measuring teachers' pedagogical content knowledge is to construct an instrument that is time and labour-efficient, and makes it possible to investigate large sample sizes. This paper illustrates how a multiple-choice test to measure teachers' pedagogical content knowledge in primary technology education was designed and validated. The procedure of test construction and the first results are presented. It is concluded that the systematic procedure that was followed is effective for the construction of a valid test. In addition, statistical analyses showed that test/re-test reliability is moderate. Data collection with larger samples is needed in order to find more statistical support for the psychometric properties of the test. (Contains 1 table and 1 figure.)

This study investigates the changes in mathematical problem-solving beliefs and behaviour of mathematics students during the years after entering university. Novice bachelor students fill in a questionnaire about their problem-solving beliefs and behaviour. At the end of their bachelor programme, as experienced bachelor students, they again fill in the questionnaire. As an educational exercise in academic reflection, they have to explain their individual shifts in beliefs, if any. Significant shifts for the group as a whole are reported, such as the growth of attention to metacognitive aspects in problem-solving or the growth of the belief that problem-solving is not only routine but has many productive aspects. On the one hand, the changes in beliefs and behaviour are mostly towards their teachers' beliefs and behaviour, which were measured using the same questionnaire. On the other hand, students show aspects of the development of an individual problem-solving style. The students explain the shifts mainly by the specific nature of the mathematics problems encountered at university compared to secondary school mathematics problems. This study was carried out in the theoretical framework of learning as enculturation. Apparently, secondary mathematics education does not quite succeed in showing an authentic image of the culture of mathematics concerning problem-solving. This aspect partly explains the low number of students choosing to study mathematics.

In this paper we propose that the unpopularity of science in many industrialised countries is largely due to the gap between the subculture of science, on the one hand, and students' self-image, on the other. We conducted a study based on the self-to-prototype matching theory, testing whether the perceived mismatch between the typical representative of the science culture (the science prototype) and students' self-image is linked to not choosing science as a major. Fifty-four Dutch ninth-grade students currently choosing their subject majors (so-called profiles) completed a Dutch version of a questionnaire previously designed by Hannover and Kessels, which measures students' perceptions of typical peers favouring different school subjects (prototypes for physics, biology, economics, languages) and students' self-image. Students chose a profile to the extent that they conceived of themselves as similar to the typical peer who likes the key subject of that profile. Fifty per cent of variance was explained when using an aggregated science versus humanities distance score and predicting whether a student had chosen a science-related or a humanities-related profile. A comparison of Dutch students' description of the physics prototype with the German data from Hannover and Kessels revealed similar prototypes in both countries. The traits ascribed to the physics prototype were in line with science-related values and the culture of science as described by Merton and Traweek, for example. The relevance of the perceived fit of the culture of science to students' selves for academic choices is discussed. (Contains 5 tables and 2 figures.)

Describes a study that developed formative, self-regulated multimedia self-assessment via the Internet of social-communicative competencies for social work students. Discusses a pilot study that was used to design guidelines for the development of the assessment instrument to incorporate students' perceptions, instructional preferences, and personalities. (Contains 70 references.) (Author/LRW)

Presents a prototype of an instructional task that aims at improved problem-solving skills based on the understanding of domain knowledge. (Author/CCM)