The effectiveness of a project day to introduce sixth grade students to science competitions

Background: Science Olympiads and science fairs are effective instruments to foster interested and talented students. However, at most schools competitions are not systematically integrated into the school mission statement so that students are unaware of these opportunities. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of a newly designed competition day in terms of willingness to participate in a science competition and to learn more about students’ reasons for a prospective participation. Programme description: A project day (called ‘competition day’) for students in sixth grade was designed to encourage and motivate more students to participate in science competitions. The theoretical foundations for the design are self-determination theory and an adapted version of Holland’s RIASEC-model. Sample: The sample consisted of 474 German sixth grade students from six secondary schools. Design and methods: A pre-post-follow up-study was conducted with two intervention groups; both groups participated in the competition day and either entered a fictive competition or worked on the same tasks in school lessons. One control group not participating in the competition day was also investigated. Results: The results provide information regarding students’ interests, as well as reasons for and against participating in competitions. Furthermore, the effectiveness of the competition day is shown. Conclusions: The competition day is an effective way to introduce students to competitions and raise their willingness to participate in science contests. Combining the competition day with science competitions showed even better results. This supports the call for continuous fostering strategies

Implementation of Context-Based Teaching and Learning in Chemistry

Im Projekt "Chemie im Kontext" wird eine Unterrichtskonzeption mit Hilfe einer Implementationsstrategie realisiert, bei der schulübergreifende Gruppen aus Lehrkräften mit der Unterstützung von Wissenschaftlern und Vertretern der Bildungsadministration kontextorientierte Unterrichtseinheiten entwickeln und erproben (Lerngemeinschaften). Berichtet werden Ergebnisse aus einer Befragung der teilnehmenden Lehrkräfte am Beginn und am Ende des ersten Projektjahres. Von 102 Teilnehmern lagen zum ersten Zeitpunkt 95 Fragebögen vor, zum zweiten Zeitpunkt 57 Fragebögen. Ein weiterer Fragebogen, der die Qualität der Kooperation in den Lerngemeinschaften erfasst, wurde von 66 Lehrkräften bearbeitet. Insgesamt liegen 36 vollständige Datensätze vor. Den Zielen der Konzeption entsprechend wurden am Ende des ersten Projektjahres vielfältigere Methoden im Unterricht eingesetzt. Zudem stieg die fächerübergreifende Zusammenarbeit in den Kollegien der beteiligten Schulen. Die Relevanz der Setkooperation hing mit der Steigerung der wahrgenommenen Praktikabilität zusammen, die Intensität der unterrichtsbezogenen Kooperation mit der Erweiterung des Methodenspektrums im Unterricht. Je relevanter die Kooperation in den Lerngemeinschaften eingeschätzt wurde, desto eher erlebten die beteiligten Lehrkräfte auch, dass sie ihre Kompetenzen durch die Teilnahme am Projekt erweiterten. (ZPID)The project „Chemie im Kontext" („CHiK") realizes a „symbiotic strategy of Implementation" on the basis of a context-based approach for teaching and learning chemistry. This strategy is characterised by the foundation of „learning communities", consisting of teachers, researchers and school administrators, who discuss, develop and realize context-based teaching units co-operatively. This study presents first results of a teacher\u27s questionnaire, answered at the beginning and at the end of the first year of the project. The first research question looks for changes which might be the result of a successful implementation of CHiK. According to the aims ofthe project, the variety of teaching and learning methods increased. Furthermore, co-operation with teachers of other subjects was enhanced within the participating schools. The second question was aiming at the analysis of correlations between the quality of co-operation in the learning communities and the change of teaching and learning processes: The perceived relevance of the group meetings correlates significantly with the enhancement of the feasibility of CHiK. The perception of activities and co-operation dealing directly with teaching and learning goes ahead with the enlargement of the variety of teaching and learning methods. Additionally, the higher the perceived relevance of co-operation within these learning communities is, the higher is the perception of a teacher\u27s own growth of competence. (DIPF/Orig.

CONCEPTUAL CHANGE TEXTS IN CHEMISTRY TEACHING: A STUDY ON THE PARTICLE MODEL OF MATTER

ABSTRACT: This study explores the effect of a conceptual change text on students' awareness of common misconceptions on the particle model of matter. The conceptual change text was designed based on principles of text comprehensibility, of conceptual change instruction and of instructional approaches how to introduce the particle model. It was evaluated in an empirical study with 214 students. Students' learning was measured with a pre-post-test design. Item response theory was used for analysing students' answers. We found that reading the criteria-based text fostered students' awareness of common misconceptions about the particle model and yielded overall improved results as compared to reading a traditional tex

Naturwissenschaften im Kontext

Die Projekte Biologie, Chemie und Physik im Kontext gehen der Frage nach, wie sinnstiftender, alltagsnaher Unterricht in den Naturwissenschaften gelingen kann. Sie verfolgend dabei das Ziel, naturwissenschaftliche Konzepte, Arbeitsweisen und Strategiewissen bei ihrer Vermittlung im Unterricht so in ausgewählte Kontexte einzubetten, dass die Schülerinnen und Schüler damit gezielt in ihrer Kompetenzentwicklung unterstützt werden. Den Lernenden werden Anknüpfungspunkte an ihr Vorwissen und ihre Alltagserfahrungen geboten sowie wissenschaftliche Anwendungsfelder vermittelt. In den Projekten wird die symbiotischen Implementationsstrategie realisiert, bei der schulübergreifende Gruppen aus Lehrkräften in Zusammenarbeit mit Wissenschaftlern und Vertretern der Bildungsadministration Unterrichtseinheiten entwickeln, erproben und optimieren (Konzept der "learning communities")

Scientists' perceptions on the nature of nanoscience and its public communication

Some level of understanding of and about nanoscience and nanotechnology (NST) has been suggested as being relevant in up-to-date scientific literacy for all. Research scientists working in these fields are central in current efforts to inform and engage the public in NST. Earlier research has shown that scientists can contribute to authentic science learning, but communication always entails roles that affect the choice of content. This study investigated NST researchers’ views on the nature of their research and their preferences in NST communication. Eight experienced professors working in various fields of NST were interviewed. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews focused on the scientists’ views on 1) the nature of their research, and 2) aspects of NST that should be communicated to the public. Qualitative content analysis of the interviews revealed that the themes the interviewees highlighted when describing their research (interdisciplinarity, size scale, methods, objects, nature of NST in general) were somewhat different from the ones they considered as important for communication to the public (applications and products, risks and benefits, visualizations). The results problematize the simplistic notion that exposure to real scientists would unquestionably enhance the authenticity of science learning. This study gives insight for research and development of science communication, especially scientists’ role and training in it.Peer reviewe

Evaluation report 1: Teacher Professional Development Programme

IRRESISTIBLE Deliverable D5.

Exploring teachers' concerns about bringing Responsible Research and Innovation to European science classrooms

The European Union pushes science education to orient toward the concept of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI; i.e., socially and ethically sensitive and inclusive processes of science and technology). Schools should further understanding on how science interacts with society and increase students’ engagement in science. This exploratory study analysed concerns of 67 active, forward-looking teachers from 10 European countries using a questionnaire based on the concerns-based adoption model (C-BAM) and open-ended questions regarding the adoption of RRI into teaching. In the context of an international professional development programme on RRI, a pre/post comparison was also carried out for 29 of the teachers. The results showed that the forerunner teachers were willing to find information and collaborate on RRI teaching and believed that RRI can engage students and be a worthwhile part of the curriculum. Yet the respondents voiced personal concerns about their ability to teach RRI, and only a few concerns were resolved during the professional development period. Teachers need extended support and networking to contextualise RRI into their science lessons. On the basis of the results, we discuss the possibilities of teaching RRI implicitly rather than explicitly in order to foster students’ own reasoning about RRI-related values. Our results also demonstrate that the customary questionnaire used with C-BAM gives a consistent picture of teachers’ concerns but does not differentiate teachers enough in order to formulate a statistically sound clustering of concern profiles. We argue that with proper adjustments the questionnaire can provide more diverse and informative profiling of teachers’ concerns.Peer reviewe

Scientists of the future: an analysis of talented students' interests

Background: Nowadays, scientists not only need to be creative, resourceful, and inventive regarding their research questions and need to understand their field and research methods, but also need to know how to teach, how to catalog, how to fill out proposal forms, and much more. The main goal of this study was to investigate and compare science interest profiles of different groups of students, focusing both on successful participants in science competitions and on possible gender differences. We expected that successful participants in science competitions would generally have greater interests in scientific activities than non-participants but were especially interested in such areas we expect from successful scientists today, thereby helping us judge the design of successful enrichment measures. Results: Significant mean differences in interest in science activities between participants and non-participants of science competitions were found on six of seven dimensions as well as regarding in-school activities, activities in enrichment measures, and vocational interests. The differences were especially large concerning investigative, social, enterprising, and networking activities. Moreover, we found differences between girls and boys on the social and artistic dimensions, meaning that girls were significantly more interested in science activities which also had an artistic and creative aspect such as drawing or a social aspect such as teaching. Conclusions: We not only found overall differences to-be-expected favoring the participants, but also could also identify specific profiles. Especially large differences were consistently found in those areas which could be regarded as especially important for most researchers. Our findings might help developing measures and activities to foster the interest in science activities for “regular” students as well as for especially talented students

Teaching Magnetoelectric Sensing to Secondary School Students-Considerations for Educational STEM Outreach

A major challenge in modern society is the need to increase awareness and excitement with regard to science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) and related careers directly or among peers and parents in order to attract future generations of scientists and engineers. The numbers of students aiming for an engineering degree are low compared to the options available and the workforce needed. This may, in part, be due to a traditional lack of instruction in this area in secondary school curricula. In this regard, STEM outreach programs can complement formal learning settings and help to promote engineering as well as science to school students. In a long-term outreach collaboration with scientists and engineers, we developed an outreach program in the field of magnetoelectric sensing that includes an out-of-school project day and various accompanying teaching materials. In this article, we motivate the relevance of the topic for educational outreach, share the rationales, objectives and aims, models and implementation strategies of our program and provide practical advice for those interested in outreach in the field of magnetoelectric sensing