Transforming Scientific Practices to Promote Students Interest and Motivation in the Life Sciences: A Teacher Leadership Development Intervention

探索研究K-12项目（DRK-12）旨在通过研究和开发创新资源、模型和工具，显著提高pre -12学生和教师对科学、技术、工程和数学的学习和教学。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工作的基础上，为拟议的项目提供了理论和实证依据。本项目将探讨在地域、语言和文化背景下，专业发展干预对生命科学内容的教与学的影响。这项研究将使教师能够开发课程，使学生能够设计出对国家经济、文化和生态重要问题的解决方案。它将以教师领袖的出现为基础，他们的知识将超越生命科学的内容，包括帮助学生培养有意义的科学身份的策略，理解经济可持续性的文化价值，并接受环境管理的原则。将采用混合方法，通过课堂观察协议、访谈、焦点小组和学生调查，从教师和学生那里获取数据。最终的成果将包括一个完善的教师领导专业发展模式。该模型将作为发展教师领导的框架，同时在更大的国家背景下促进代表性不足的学生的学习。该模型的传播将通过一个开源的在线平台、在国家和国际会议上的正式和非正式介绍以及在能力建设、科学、技术和工程技术媒体上的出版物进行。

The Discovery Research K-12 program (DRK-12) seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering and mathematics by preK-12 students and teachers, through research and development of innovative resources, models and tools. 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 investigate the influence of a professional development intervention on the teaching and learning of content in the life sciences in the context of place, language, and culture. The research will enable teachers to develop lessons that will allow students to design solutions to problems of economic, cultural, and ecological importance to the state. It will build on the emergence of teacher leaders whose knowledge will extend beyond content in the life sciences to include strategies for helping students develop meaningful science identities, understand the cultural values of economic sustainability, and buy into the principles of environmental stewardship. A mixed methods approach will be used to capture data from teachers and students through classroom observation protocols, interviews, focus groups, and student surveys. The end products will include a refined teacher leadership professional development model. The model will serve as a framework for developing teacher leaders while promoting learning for underrepresented students situated within the larger state context. Dissemination of the model will occur through an open source online platform, formal and informal presentations at national and international meetings and conferences, and publications in capacity-building STEM media outlets.