Science Teachers Learning from Lesson Analysis (STeLLA): High School Biology

探索研究K-12计划(DRK-12)旨在通过研究和开发创新资源、模型和工具(RMT)，显著提高K-12学龄前学生和教师在科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)方面的学习和教学。DRK-12计划中的项目建立在STEM教育的基础研究和先前的研究和开发努力的基础上，这些研究和开发工作为拟议的项目提供了理论和经验证明。该项目将开发和测试一个生物教师专业模式，该模式利用对录像课的分析，在实习的生物教师中促进生物内容知识和教学内容知识的增加。专业发展活动的内容将集中在稳定和变化的交叉概念上，这些概念将生物学三个领域的核心思想联系在一起：细胞生物学、遗传和进化。事实证明，这些内容对学生来说很难学，对老师来说也很难教。专业发展模式将包括：a)暑期学院，教师在那里获得新的生物学知识和技能，并学习分析录像带课程；b)在学年期间有机会教授项目开发的课程；c)在学年期间参加学习小组会议，参与教师分析自己教学的视频片段。该项目将设计、开发和测试教师专业发展模式，该模式基于先前开发的方法，已被证明在小学教师中有效。据假设，新开发的计划将对高中生的科学成就产生积极影响，它将改善教师的科学内容知识和课堂实践，并且对学生结果的影响将在学生人口统计变量中公平。为了验证这些假设，该项目将采用准实验研究方法，在队列控制设计中，教师将作为他们自己的对照组。分层线性模型将被用来区分教师教学知识和教学内容知识、学生人口统计变量和学校因素的差异的影响。预计该项目将发现证据表明，拟议的生物教师专业发展方法有可能缩小学生群体之间的成绩差距。

The Discovery Research K-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) by preK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of innovative resources, models and tools (RMTs). Projects in the DRK-12 program build on fundamental research in STEM education and prior research and development efforts that provide theoretical and empirical justification for proposed projects. This project will develop and test a biology teacher professional model that employs analysis of videotaped lessons to promote increased biology content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge among practicing biology teachers. The content of the professional development activities will focus on the crosscutting concepts of stability and change that link core ideas in three areas of biology: cell biology, heredity, and evolution. These are content areas that have been shown to be difficult for students to learn, and difficult for teachers to teach. The professional development model will include: a) a summer institute where teachers gain new knowledge and skills in biology and learn to analyze videotaped lessons; b) opportunities to teach project-developed lessons during the academic year; and c) study group sessions during the academic year where participating teachers analyze videoclips of their own teaching.The project will design, develop, and test a teacher professional development model that is based on a previously developed approach that has been shown to be effective among elementary school teachers. It is hypothesized that the newly developed program will have a positive impact on the science achievement of high school students, that it will improve teacher science content knowledge and classroom practice, and that the effects on student outcomes will be equitable across student demographic variables. To test thee hypotheses, the project will employ a quasi-experimental research approach in which teachers will serve as their own comparison groups in a cohort control design. Hierarchical linear modeling will be used to differentiate the effects of variances in teacher content knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge, student demographic variables, and school factors. It is anticipated that the project will find evidence that the proposed approach to biology teacher professional development has the potential to close the achievement gaps among student populations.