Collaborative Research: Adapting and Implementing a Geospatial High School Course in Career and Technical Education Clusters in Urban Settings

这是一个合作项目，提交给学生和教师创新技术经验(ITEST)成功项目扩展和传播(传播)计划(计划征集NSF 17-565)，以促进更好地了解和推广实践，提高学生在科学、技术、工程或数学(STEM)领域追求职业的动机和能力。目标是通过调整和实施先前开发的地理空间学期(GSS)为期一年的双学分课程，重点发展解决地理空间问题的技能，并将这些技能应用于学生选择的问题，扩大和传播支持高中一级空间思维的战略。GSS由入门练习组成，目的是培养学生使用地理信息系统分析空间问题的基本技能，支持学生从空间角度提出有意义的问题，确定和组织相关的空间数据集，分析其空间数据作为提出问题解决方案的证据，并公开展示其结果。GSS目前在弗吉尼亚州的高中与詹姆斯·麦迪逊大学合作教授。GSS的核心是空间思维技能的发展，这种技能对STEM领域的成就、坚持性和成就具有很强的预测力，即使在考虑到其他相关变量后也是如此，例如数学和语言能力。因此，这项研究的中心目的是在芝加哥公立学校(CPS)的六个职业与技术教育(CTE)群中调整和实施GSS高中课程。该项目将从目前在STEM职业中任职人数不足的已确定群体中挑选参与者。通过GSS课程，学生将参与跨多个学科的相关STEM、社会科学和CTE主题，并参与相关实践，包括科学数据收集、分析、建模和解释。该项目将采用基于设计的实施研究(DBIR)方法，根据芝加哥CTE方案采用和调整GSS的核心要素。这项研究将使用传播和规模的框架来调查扩展和传播课程的战略，以及背景因素如何影响成功的可能性。它将解决两个研究问题，即GSS是否以及如何能够适应教授各种CTE相关技能的大型城市地区的需求：(1)大型城市学区如何在没有开发者直接支持的情况下开发必要的基础设施来实施GSS？(2)我们能否开发基于课堂的空间推理评估，具有与过去研究中使用的基于研究的措施的收敛有效性？为了解决前者，该项目将与芝加哥城市学院合作，提供双重招生学分，并与教师共同设计，开发一种适合CPS的CTE课程并得到持续专业发展实践支持的实施模式。为了回答后者，该项目将与教师共同设计，以开发空间思维的课堂评估，并验证它们与基于研究的措施的相关性程度。该项目将使用这些评估来调查芝加哥的GSS适应是否提供了与弗吉尼亚州既定的GSS实施相媲美的结果。数据来源将包括课堂观察、对学生工作成果的评分、教师访谈、学生人口统计数据以及学生在测试前和测试后评估中的表现增长。将使用汇报例行程序来解释已经发生的情况，并为下一个执行阶段规划预期事件。将采用混合方法对学生的学习情况进行量化分析。在地理信息系统研究方面，该项目将：(A)在研究人员和从业者之间建立伙伴关系，从多个利益攸关方的角度关注长期存在的实践问题；(B)通过由地理信息系统教育者、心理学家、实施研究人员、大型城市地区和社区学院组成的多方利益攸关方伙伴关系，重点关注空间推理作为科学、技术、经济和环境管理实践基础的重要性；(C)通过全球空间科学系统教师领袖和芝加哥城市学院地理信息系统新课程，培养维持系统变革的能力。该项目将通过以下途径编制新的共同设计的课程材料：(A)试行材料测试(1-2年级)；(B)实地测试材料(3年级)，重点放在专业发展、实施研究(以检查该方案在各种学校环境中成功实施的程度)，以及对实地测试结果的分析；(C)测试专业发展和课程实施与技术教育行动的结合情况，包括分析空间思维课堂评估的有效性和质量。这一努力的主要成果将是通过共同设计过程开发一个以高中地理信息系统为重点的CTE课程原型，以及以解决地理空间问题为重点的DBIR。外部咨询委员会将对计划的实施提供持续、独立和批判性的审查，以评估进展情况，包括形成性和总结性进展。

This is a collaborative project submitted to the Successful Project Expansion and Dissemination (SPrEaD) strand of the Innovative Technology Experiences for Students and Teachers (ITEST) program (Program Solicitation NSF 17-565) to advance efforts to better understand and promote practices that increase student motivations and capacities to pursue careers in fields of science, technology, engineering, or mathematics (STEM). The goal is to expand and disseminate strategies to support spatial thinking at the high school level by adapting and implementing the previously developed Geospatial Semester (GSS) one-year, dual-credit course focused on developing geospatial problem-solving skills and applying those skills to student-selected problems. GSS consists of introductory exercises to develop students' basic skills in using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for analyzing spatial problems, supporting students in framing a meaningful problem from a spatial perspective, identifying and organizing relevant spatial datasets, analyzing their spatial data as evidence for proposing solutions for their problem, and making a public presentation of their results. GSS is currently taught in high schools in Virginia in partnership with James Madison University. At the core of GSS is the development of spatial thinking skills, which are strongly predictive of achievement, persistence, and attainment in STEM fields, even after accounting for other relevant variables, such as mathematical and verbal aptitude. Thus, the central purpose of the study is to adapt and implement the GSS high school course in six Career and Technical Education (CTE) clusters in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS). The project will select participants from identified groups currently underrepresented in STEM occupations. Through the GSS course, students will engage with relevant STEM, social science, and CTE topics that cut across multiple disciplines, and engage in relevant practices, including scientific data collection, analysis, modeling, and interpretation. The project will adopt and adapt the core elements of the GSS for the context of Chicago CTE programs using a design-based implementation research (DBIR) approach. The study will use a framework of spread and scale to investigate the strategies for expanding and disseminating the course and the ways in which contextual factors influence the likelihood of success. It will address two research questions regarding whether, and how, the GSS can be adapted to the needs of a large, urban district teaching a variety of CTE-related skills: (1) How can large urban school districts develop the necessary infrastructure to implement GSS without the direct support of the developers?; and (2) Can we develop classroom-based assessments of spatial reasoning that have convergent validity with the research-based measures used in past research? To address the former, the project will partner with the City Colleges of Chicago to provide the dual enrollment credit, and engage in co-design with teachers to develop an implementation model that is tailored to CPS's CTE curriculum and supported by continuing professional development practices. To answer the latter, the project will engage in co-design with teachers to develop classroom assessments of spatial thinking and validate the extent to which they correlate with research-based measures. The project will use these assessments to investigate whether the adaptation of GSS in Chicago provides outcomes that are comparable to those of the established GSS implementations in Virginia. Data sources will include classroom observations, ratings of student work products, teacher interviews, student demographics, and growth in student performance on pretest and posttest assessments. A debriefing routine will be used to interpret what has happened and plan prospective events for the next implementation phase. A mixed-method approach will be employed to incorporate quantitative analysis of student learning. As DBIR research, the project will (a) form partnerships between researchers and practitioners focused on persistent problems of practice from multiple stakeholders' perspectives; (b) focus on the importance of spatial reasoning as foundational for STEM practice through a multi-stakeholder partnership of GIS educators, psychologists, implementation researchers, a large urban district and community college; and (c) develop capacity for sustaining change in systems through GSS teacher leaders and new courses in GIS at City Colleges of Chicago. The project will develop new co-designed curriculum materials through (a) pilot testing of materials (years 1-2); (b) field testing of materials (year 3) with emphasis on professional development, implementation research (to examine the extent to which the program is successfully implemented across a variety of school contexts), and analysis of field-test results; and (c) testing the integration of the professional development and course implementation into the CTE operations, including analysis of the validity and quality of spatial-thinking classroom assessments. The main outcome of this effort will be a high school GIS-focused CTE curriculum prototype developed through co-design processes, as well as DBIR focused on geospatial problem-solving. An external advisory board will provide ongoing, independent, and critical reviews of the implementation of the program to evaluate progress, both formative and summative.