This research brief highlights findings from the proof of concept pilot year of the Child Trends News Service project. It explores what we have learned regarding best practices for communicating with and engaging Latino parents through short messages on research-informed parenting practices. The findings are grounded in research that substantiates the need to amplify access to child development research, particularly among low-income Latino families; and in communication science research that demonstrates the value of the news media as an information source for child development research.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Alicia TorresSelma CaalLuz GuerraAngela Rojas
When it comes to STEM education, the nation’s K–12 public schools cannot do it all. The nature of 21st century proficiency in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics is too complex for any single institution. The good news is that schools do not have to do it alone. Museums, zoos, nature centers, aquariums, and planetariums are among the several thousand informal science institutions in the United States that regularly engage young people in observing, learning, and using STEM knowledge and skills. Providing a richness of resources unavailable in any classroom, informal science
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Community for Advancing Discovery Research in Education (CADRE)
Bang, Warren, Rosebery, and Medin explore empirical work with students from non-dominant communities to support teaching science as a practice of inquiry and understanding, not as a “settled” set of ideas and skills to learn.
The past 50 years have seen a change in how science is perceived, from an “unproblematic accumulation of facts that describe the world” to a much messier enterprise involving building and revising models and theories. In an effort to bring this new understanding to science teaching and learning, this foundational article presents a conceptual framework of how inquiry can be driven by cognitive tools that support disciplinary knowledge. The authors use rubrics to help students gain a deeper understanding of their work and of the inquiry process.
Researchers asked 5,000 Norwegian college-level students of STEM about the sources of inspiration for their educational choices. The most influential people were teachers and parents—the people who knew the young people best. The findings suggest that the most effective STEM role models are individuals who have a personal connection with the young person making education and career choices.
Existing (and essentially school-based) approaches to assessment involve recording the extent to which learners gain particular knowledge or skills. In informal settings, outcomes depend on the participant’s own agenda. Michalchik and Gallagher propose an approach to assessment—of both individuals and programmes—that focuses on learner behaviour instead of on pre-determined objectives.
How does a past learning experience get integrated into a present moment? How does a memory make individuals feel about what they are learning now—and then remember it? The influence of a past event or memory can significantly affect the learning going on in a present moment. In this paper presenting a theory of transfer, Nemirovsky argues that past emotions, past physical movements, and cognitive memories—which he calls collectively "episodic feelings"—are evoked in a present moment and contribute to an individual’s learning.
This paper explores how science-aspiring girls balance their aspirations and achievement with societal expectations of femininity. In-depth interviews revealed two models that the girls tended to follow, termed feminine scientist or bluestocking scientist, and the precarious nature of both of these identities. Archer et al. suggest ways that practitioners can better support girls in their balancing acts.
This article describes how two inquiry games promoted student science skills in a museum setting while minimizing demands on teachers, fostering collaboration, and incorporating chaperones. Students who played these games engaged in more scientific inquiry behaviors than did students in control groups.
The aim of the work reported here has been to give an overview of the support that the informal sector provides for learning and engagement with science. In addressing this goal, we have taken the view that engagement with science and the learning of science occur both within and without schools. What is of interest is not who provides the experience or where it is provided but the nature and diversity of opportunities for science learning and engagement that are offered in contemporary UK society. Thus in approaching the work we have taken a systems perspective and looked at informal
In this article Bell, Tzou, Bricker, and Baines describe how formal and informal educational experiences can merge through three case studies of youth engaged in science and technology. The theory of “cultural learning pathways” reframes our understanding of how, why, and where people learn over time and across spaces that have varying cultural values, everyday practices, and hierarchies of privilege and marginalization.
This Barron and Bell article provides a foundational overview for how “cross-setting learning” can equitably engage all youth across formal and informal educational contexts. The paper offers: 1) a review of research; 2) descriptions of supports and challenges to cross-setting learning, including learner interest and identity; and 3) suggestions for research and assessments that capture learning for underrepresented youth.