To help high school students gain a solid understanding of invasive plant species, university faculty and students from the University of Wisconsin-Stout (UW-Stout) and a local high school teacher worked together to develop the Invasive Plant Species (IPS) Education Guide. The IPS Education Guide includes nine lessons that give students an…

In this article we examine a teacher-authored narrative in which Steve Mann (2002), an English as a second language teacher, critically reflects on how his teaching beliefs were transformed as a result of participating in "cooperative development" (Edge, 1992, 2002). Cooperative development is an inquiry-based approach to professional development…

This paper provides a critique of academic experiences of neoliberal economic reform at a New Zealand (NZ) university. The authors engaged in a collaborative inquiry that was based upon a developing theoretical perspective of the reform process and how this affected their academic lives. We were keen to develop an understanding of liberal…

Take plant lessons outdoors with this engaging and inquiry-based activity in which third-grade students learn how to apply soil conservation methods to growing plants. They also collect data and draw conclusions about the effectiveness of their method of soil conservation. An added benefit to this activity is that the third-grade students played…

This study examines the effectiveness of using scholarly descriptions of inquiry-based teaching as a professional development strategy aimed at improving elementary teachers' social understandings (i.e., how teachers perceive their own and their students' social roles and relationships in the context of inquiry-based science instruction). The…

Learning, as Aboriginal people have come to know it, is holistic, lifelong, purposeful, experiential, communal, spiritual, and learned within a language and a culture. What guides their learning (beyond family, community, and Elders) is spirit, their own learning spirits who travel with them and guide them along their earth walk, offering them…

A field-based environmental geochemistry course was developed at Western Michigan University for undergraduate geosciences and environmental studies students to (1) improve student understanding of complex environmental systems, specifically targeting lake systems; (2) facilitate student development of professional-level, field- and…

In July 2008, a new professional development program called Satellites, Weather and Climate (SWAC) began at the University of Vermont. Its goal was to enhance the competency of in-service K-12 science and mathematics Vermont teachers in the atmospheric, climate, and geospatial sciences. The pilot program ran until 2010, during which time 14…

Poor science achievement has been an educational issue for a number of years. Students with disabilities have traditionally fared worse. Research suggests that students with disabilities may respond better to instruction using an inquiry-based approach vs. traditional textbook instruction when measuring science achievement on standardized…

Engaging students in inquiry-based learning is viewed by the science education community as the cornerstone of science education reform. Pre-service teachers often enter science methods courses in teacher education credential programs with significant trepidation of science, a lack of strong science content knowledge, a lack of confidence in…

Background/Context: Over the past decade, a growing chorus of educational stakeholders has called for the recruitment of more Black men into the American teaching profession, casting these men as ideal surrogate father figures for Black youth who may lack adult male role models in their families or communities. Although a small body of scholarly…

"Becoming a Teacher" revisits the concept of Teacher Lore (Schubert and Ayers, 1992), by providing a cross-disciplinary approach linking elements of narrative theory to all aspects of pre- and in-service teaching. In essence, it embraces the notion that what teachers say matters. The rationale behind this text is the idea that narrative can not…

Although teacher educators have successfully helped K-12 teachers' develop adequate views of NOS, their views have not been transferred to their students. It is evident that K-12 students' understanding of NOS still does not align with the recommendation of the reforms document, indicating that holding an adequate view of NOS is…

The study of teaching and learning during the period of translating ideals of reform into classroom practice enables us to understand student-teacher-researcher symbiotic learning. In line with this assumption, the purpose of this study is threefold:(1) observe effects of the "Common Knowledge Construction Model" (CKCM), a conceptual…

This study investigated the impact of an inquiry-based science program on the critical thinking skills, science process skills, creativity, and science fair achievement of middle school students. Although research indicates the connection between inquiry and achievement, there is limited empirical research relating specific inquiry-based programs…