LIGO's Science Education Center is in charge of Education and Public Outreach Component for the LIGO Livingston Observatory. The three prime efforts are: (1) Professional development for teachers utilizing lab facilities and cross-institute collaborations. (2) Outreach to students K-16 (targeting 5- 9th grade), with on-site field trips to the LIGO Lab and Science Education Center, as well as off-site visits & presentations. (3) Outreach to the general public and community groups with on-site tours and Science Education Center Experience, as well as off=site visits and presentations. LIGO's Science Education Center is located at the LIGO Observatory, and has an auditorium, a classroom and a 5000 square foot exhibit hall with interactive exhibits at its disposal to complete its mission. In addition LIGO-SEC staff serve to help press and documentary film makers complete their missions in telling the "LIGO story" and encouraging budding scientists.
NESCent’s Education & Outreach efforts are designed and developed to improve evolution education and public understanding of evolutionary science, expand opportunities for underrepresented groups, and contribute to professional development of tomorrow’s evolutionary biologists. Our programs and initiatives serve a diverse array of audiences (students, faculty, general public) at a variety of levels (K-12, undergraduate/graduate/postdoc, informal science education).
In the recent exhibition project Animal Secrets, we looked at the impact of three strategies for fostering parent-child interactions in an exhibition for young children: environmental design, types of activities, and labels. Results from our study indicate that all three strategies can support parent-child interactions, but environmental design and activity type were more effective than labels overall in promoting parent-child collaboration. Mixed results for exhibit labels suggest the need for further research into how best to communicate with parents of young children in an exhibition.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Karyn BertschiMarcie BenneAnn Elkins
The LTER Network is an innovative platform for training the next generation of natural scientists in collaborative, integrative, long-term research in ecology. An important objective of the network is to share knowledge with other communities. The LTER Network Office addresses this objective by managing a Communication and Outreach program that targets key communities—scientists, policy makers, educators and students, and the mass media as a proxy of the rest of the non-specific audiences—and maintain strategic partnerships and collaborations that provide improved access to these communities.
This proposed four-year effort envisions a new approach to promoting science literacy through science journalism as a subject of study. It is premised on a critical set of assumptions: (a) Most citizens have the need to interpret scientific information found in popular media (e.g., newspapers, magazines, online resources, science-related television programs); (b) science journalism provides reliable, well-researched science information; (c) authentic science writing provides motivation to learn; and (d) standards and rubrics specifically developed for evaluating students' science-related expository text do not exist. Thus, the project approaches science journalism as a means to assist students to investigate and coherently write about contemporary science and to learn to base assertions and descriptions on reliable, publicly available sources. To this end, the project aims to develop, pilot, and evaluate a model of instruction that focuses on the following aspects: (a) Identifying questions of both personal and public interest; (b) evaluating contemporary science-related issues; (c) making available highly regarded sources of information as exemplars (in-print, online, interviews); (d) synthesizing information; (e) assessing information based on fact-checking using the five Ws (who, what, where, when, and why); and (f) coherently explaining claims and evidence. A hypothesis and a set of research questions guide this effort. The hypothesis is the following: If participating students successfully attain the fundamental elements of the proposed model, then they will become more literate and better critical consumers and producers of scientific information. The main guiding research question of the proposed activity is the following: Does the teaching of science journalism using an apprenticeship model, reliable data sources, and science-specific writing standards improve high school students' understanding of science-related public literacy? Secondary questions include (a) Is the teaching of science journalism an efficacious, replicable and sustainable model for improving science literacy?; (b) How useful are science-related standards and rubrics for scaffolding and evaluating students' science writing and science literacy?; and (c) What is the nature of the engagement in science that this apprenticeship invites?
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Alan NewmanJoseph PolmanE. Wendy SaulCathy FarrarAlan Newman
resourceprojectProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The National COSEE Network, primarily funded by the National Science Foundation, is in its thirteenth year. It is comprised of regional and thematic Centers comprised of ocean science research and formal and informal science education institutions. The network has grown to one of the largest organizations of ocean science research and education institutions, with over 280 members. COSEE is currently transitioning to an independent, international consortium. Its dues paying members are continuing to serve as a broader impacts arm for the ocean science community.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Gail ScowcroftWilliam SpitzerAnnette deCharon
resourceresearchProfessional Development, Conferences, and Networks
The "community of practice" (CoP) has emerged as a potentially powerful unit of analysis linking the individual and the collective because it situates the role of learning, knowledge transfer, and participation among people as the central enterprise of collective action. The authors’ surface tensions and highlight unanswered questions regarding CoP theory, concluding that it relies on a largely normative and underoperationalized set of premises. Avenues for theory development and the empirical testing of assertions are provided.
The "places" of learners and practitioners of science from communities of color are increasingly a focus in analyses of science learning and education in the U.S. Typically, these places are defined through the discourse of equity that focuses on representation and the goal of creating learning environments that will allow students of color to perform as well as their white peers. More recently, this focus has shifted from performance to actual knowledge of and the ability to think critically about science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) content. Although critical thinking and
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Megan BangDouglas MedinGregory Cajete
In this article, we present a model for thinking about how learning settings provide resources for the development of the practice-linked identities of participants, drawing on data from a study on an African American high school track and field team. What does it mean to make an identity available in the context of a learning setting? In this article, we draw on current theories in anthropology, psychology, sociology, and sociocultural theory to develop a conceptual frame that might be helpful in addressing these questions. We focus on how individuals are offered (and how they take up)
The Physics and Chemistry Education Technology (PhET) Project is developing an extensive suite of online, highly-interactive simulations, with supporting materials and activities for improving both the teaching and learning of physics and chemistry. There are currently over 70 simulations and over 250 associated activities available for use from the PhET website (http://phet.colorado.edu). These web-based resources are impacting large number of students. Per year, there are currently over 4 million PhET simulations run online and thousands of full website downloads for offline use of the simulations. The goal is that this widespread use of PhET's research-based tools and resources will improve the education of students in physics and chemistry at colleges and high schools throughout the U.S. and around the world. This PhET project combines a unique set of features. First, the simulation designs and goals are based on educational research. Second, using a team of professional programmers, disciplinary experts, and education research specialists enables the development of simulations involving technically-sophisticated software, graphics, and interfaces that are highly effective. Third, the simulations embody the predictive visual models of expert scientists, allowing many interesting advanced concepts to become widely accessible and revealing their relevance to the real world. And finally, the project is actively involved in research to better understand how the design and use of simulations impacts their effectiveness - e.g. investigating questions such as "How can these new technologies promote student understanding of complex scientific phenomena?" and "What factors inhibit or enhance their use and effectiveness?".
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Katherine PerkinsMichael DubsonNoah FinkelsteinRobert ParsonCarl Weiman
Overview of Sustainability Professional Development and Evaluation: As part of the National Science Foundation funded "Sustainability: Promoting Sustainable Decision Making in Informal Education" project, the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) and its partners developed a professional development website and workshop. The goal of this and other project deliverables was to promote sustainable decision making by building skills that allow participants to weigh their choices and choose more sustainable practices. ExhibitSEED (Exhibit Social Environmental and Economic Development) refers
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Oregon Museum of Science and IndustryRenee B. Curtis
This project continues the development, testing, and use of a series of web-based computer simulations for improving the teaching and learning of physics. It expands the number of simulations in physics, creates new simulations addressing introductory chemistry, creates simulations addressing the conceptual understanding of equations in solving science problems, and further refines some existing simulations. It increases, by approximately 35, the 35 online interactive simulations that have been developed for teaching physics. The project produces and widely disseminates on-line supporting materials for use in undergraduate and high school science courses. The supporting materials include: guided-discovery, tutorial worksheets; a list of learning goals; materials to support in-lecture, homework, and laboratory use; assessment instruments; and other user-contributed materials. The simulations being introduced and their effectiveness are being evaluated in at least eight additional courses in physics and chemistry at the University of Colorado and a diverse set of partner institutions. The materials are being extensively tested to ensure that they are easy to use and effective at promoting deep conceptual understanding and positive attitudes about science and technology.
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TEAM MEMBERS:
Carl WiemanNoah FinkelsteinKatherine Perkins