PlantingScience: Digging Deeper Together - A Model for Collaborative Teacher/Scientist Professional Development

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。这个项目将为高中生物教师设计、开发和测试一个新的专业发展(PD)模式，重点放在植物生物学上，这是一个教师觉得没有准备好教授的生物学领域。新的PD模式将使教师和科学家面对面和在线地结合在一起，指导学生进行真实的科学调查，并反思教学实践和学生的学习。该项目还将开发和测试教师暑期学院和一个网站的成果，该网站将支持在线辅导学生和教师的专业发展。该项目的成果将包括开发教师专业发展模式的促进指南、支持学生指导和教师专业发展的网站、供教师和科学家与学生合作的一系列资源，以及新的专业发展模式成功的经验证据。这项全面的研究和发展项目将采用测试前/测试后控制小组设计，以测试高中生物教师专业发展模式的有效性。专业发展模式以行动理论为基础，前提是当教师与科学家和学生在技术支持的学习社区中互动时，学生将表现出比使用更传统的教学材料和方法的学生更高的成就水平。干预后结果测量的方法将在整群随机试验中在治疗组和对照组之间进行比较，教师将被随机分配到治疗组。这项研究将在全国范围内招募样本，以确保参与者代表广泛的地理和人口背景，优先考虑第一名学校。研究问题是：a)深入挖掘教师和科学家社区的参与在多大程度上影响教师的知识和实践？B)参与深入挖掘教师和科学家社区对科学家的影响有多大？导师和教学的质量？C)学生对在线课程的使用和与科学家导师一起参加学习社区对学生学习的影响有多大？将开发或调整工具，以衡量相关的学生和教师知识、学生动机和教师实践。在研究过程中，将使用计算机中介的语篇分析来跟踪学生、教师和科学导师之间的在线互动。

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 design, develop, and test a new professional development (PD) model for high school biology teachers that focuses on plant biology, an area of biology that teachers feel less prepared to teach. The new PD model will bring teachers and scientists together, in-person and online, to guide students in conducting authentic science investigations and to reflect on instructional practices and student learning. The project will also develop and test the outcomes of a summer institute for teachers and a website that will support the online mentoring of students and the professional development of teachers. Outcomes of the project will include the development of a facilitation guide for the teacher professional development model, a website to support student mentoring and teacher professional development, a series of resources for teachers and scientists to use in working with students, and empirical evidence of the success of the new professional development model.This full research and development project will employ a pre-test/post-test control group design to test the efficacy of a professional development model for high school biology teachers. The professional development model is grounded in a theory of action based on the premise that when teachers are engaged with scientists and students in a technology-enabled learning community, students will demonstrate higher levels of achievement than those using more traditional instructional materials and methodologies. The means of post-intervention outcome measures will be compared across treatment and comparison groups in a cluster-randomized trial where teachers will be randomly assigned to treatment groups. The study will recruit a nation-wide sample to ensure that participants represent a wide array of geographic and demographic contexts, with preference given to Title 1 schools. The research questions are: a) To what extent does participation in the Digging Deeper community of teachers and scientists affect teacher knowledge and practices? b) To what extent does participation in the Digging Deeper community of teachers and scientists affect scientists? quality of mentorship and teaching? And c) To what extent does student use of the online program and participation in the learning community with scientist mentors affect student learning? Instruments will be developed or adapted to measure relevant student and teacher knowledge, student motivation, and teacher practices. Computer-mediated discourse analysis will be used over the course of the study to track online interactions among students, teachers, and science mentors.