Developing the Science Comprehensive Online Learning Platform for Rural School Science Teacher Development

美国农村学区面临着独特的挑战：小农场社区与世隔绝，社区之间距离遥远，资金微薄，教师工资低。它们还为大量多样化和低收入学生提供服务，这些学生理应公平地获得高质量的科学学习机会。对于在偏远的农村社区工作的教师来说，需要有效的在线专业发展(PD)，在那里，高质量的面对面专业发展对于地区来说可能在经济上是不切实际的。本项目将开发、评估和比较新设计的在线学习平台和传统面对面PD在支持农村高中科学教师实施符合下一代科学标准(NGSS)的现有生物课程方面的有效性。在线学习平台将仿照成功的面对面PD功能：(1)工作嵌入学习发生在教师课堂教学的背景下，(2)协作-教师分享实施新实践的经验，以及(3)具体内容-教师制定支持学生理解科学的学科内容和教学实践。一旦开发和完善，在线PD平台可以在其他上下文和内容领域广泛使用。这个项目将在三年的时间里开发、评估并比较支持农村科学教师实施高中生物学(THSB)课程的在线PD平台和传统的面对面PD。在第一年，研究小组将反复开发在线平台，并将已经开发的用于实施THSB的面对面PD调整为在线格式。利用HT2Labs开发的社交学习平台Curator，项目研究人员将嵌入教师学习，这种学习处于自己的课堂情境中，异步和同步协作，专注于THSB课程内容。在第二年和第三年，将从堪萨斯州西南部招募48名农村中学科学教育者，并随机分配到在线PD(治疗)或面对面PD(对照)。使用混合方法，该项目将检查在教师教学知识、教师使用新实践的自我效能、教师课堂实践和学生学习结果方面的条件之间是否存在差异。它假定，在促进循证科学实践的成功实施和学生成果方面，条件之间应该没有差异，表明在线模式的成功，以支持教师教学实践中深刻的概念变化。此外，在开发和调查科学综合在线学习平台方面学到的经验教训可以为其他学科内容(例如物理、化学、地球和空间科学)以及其他年级和学校背景的应用提供信息。探索研究预科-12课程(DRK-12)旨在通过研究和开发创新资源、模型和工具，显著提高预科-12年级学生和教师的科学、技术、工程和数学(STEM)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经验上的证明。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Rural school districts in the US face unique challenges: isolation in small farm communities, significant distances between communities, minimal funding, and low teacher salaries. They also serve high numbers of diverse and low-income students, who deserve equitable access to high quality science learning opportunities. Effective online professional development (PD) is needed for teachers working in isolated rural communities where high quality face-to-face PD may be economically impractical for districts to offer. This project will develop, evaluate, and compare the effectiveness of newly-designed online learning platform with traditional face-to-face PD in supporting rural high school science teachers' implementation of an existing biology curriculum aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). The online learning platform will be modeled after successful face-to-face PD features: (1) job-embedded - learning occurs within the context of teachers' classroom instruction, (2) collaborative - teachers share experiences in implementing new practices, and (3) content-specific - teachers develop disciplinary content and instructional practices that support students' understanding of science. Once developed and refined, the online PD platform can be used broadly across other contexts and content areas. Over a three year period, this project will develop, evaluate, and then compare an online PD platform for supporting rural science teachers in implementing the Towards High School Biology (THSB) curriculum with a traditional face-to-face PD. In year one, the research team will iteratively develop the online platform and adapt the already developed face-to-face PD for implementing THSB to an online format. Utilizing Curator, a social learning platform developed by HT2Labs, project researchers will embed teacher learning that is situated with their own classroom contexts, is asynchronously and synchronously collaborative, and is focused on the THSB curriculum content. In years two and three, forty eight rural middle-school science educators will be recruited from southwest Kansas and randomly assigned to online PD (treatment) or face-to-face PD (comparison). Using mixed methodology, the project will examine if differences exist between the conditions in regards to teacher content knowledge, teacher self-efficacy in using new practices, teacher classroom practices, and student learning outcomes. It is hypothesized that there should be no differences between conditions in fostering successful implementation of evidence-based science practices and student outcomes, demonstrating the success of an online modality to support deep conceptual change in teachers' instructional practices. Furthermore, lessons learned in developing and investigating a science comprehensive online learning platform can inform application to other disciplinary content (e.g., physics, chemistry, Earth and space sciences) and across other grade level and school contexts.The Discovery Research preK-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. 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 award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.