Transcript What Kind of Teacher Will I Be? Science Teacher Candidates’ Teaching

What Kind of Teacher Will I
Be?
Science Teacher
Candidates’ Teaching
Practices and Learning
Charles W. Anderson, Gail Richmond, Kelly
Grindstaff, Ajay Sharma, In-Young Cho, and
Shinho Jang, Michigan State University
Angelo Collins, Discussant
Paper set presented at the
annual meeting of the National
Association for Research in
Science Teaching, Vancouver,
BC, April, 2004
This work was supported in part by grants from the
Knowles foundation and the United States Department
PT3 Program (Grant Number P342A00193, Yong Zhao,
Principal Investigator). The opinions expressed herein do
not necessarily reflect the position, policy, or endorsement
of the supporting agencies.
Informants
• 10 prospective secondary science teacher
candidates
• Life, earth, and physical sciences
• Urban, suburban, rural schools
• Middle school and high school
• Intern years: the fifth year of our teacher
preparation program
Research Questions
1.
2.
3.
Patterns of practice: What were the teacher candidates
really doing in their school placements? How can we
compare, contrast, and analyze the practices of
different teachers?
Learning from experience: What were their
aspirations? What kinds of teachers did they hope to
be? What were they learning about science teaching,
and how were they learning it?
Influences on practice and learning: How were their
practices, aspirations, and learning affected by a
variety of factors, including their own experience,
knowledge and values, the teacher preparation
program, and their mentors and school placements?
Data Sources
• Lesson and Unit Plans and Reports
• Teaching Investigation (Inquiry Cycle)
assignment
• Videotapes of two lessons taught during the
internship year (Fall, Spring)
• Intern Journals
• Intern Interview
• Mentor Teacher Interview
• Field Instructor Interview
Research Question 1: Describing
and Comparing Patterns of Practice
• Teaching practice as unit of analysis
• Practices located in teaching cycles:
planning, teaching, assessment, reflection
• Hierarchy of teaching practices: individual
practices, problems of practice, patterns of
practice
• Practices differ with respect to intentions
and execution
Hierarchy of Teaching Practices
• Individual practices (e.g., grading, managing
class discussions, teaching problem solving)
• Problems of practice
–
–
–
–
Science content and learning goals
Students and assessment
Classroom environment and teaching strategies
Professional resources and relationships
• Patterns of practice: Each candidate developed
his or her own pattern of practice
Comparing Candidates’ Intentions
Problem of Practice
Science content and
learning goals
Paper 1
School Science
Logical, well organized
learning of facts and
skills
Transitional
Science Teaching
John Duncan
Lisa Barab
Reform Science
Teaching
AND relating data to
theories through
application and inquiry
Mike Barker
Students and
assessment
Paper 2
Motivating students to
work conscientiously
and grading them fairly
Lynn Aster
Angie Harris
Kathy Miller
Classroom environment
and teaching strategies
Paper 3
Well organized
classroom where
students practice facts
and skills
Lynn Aster
Jared Alford
Professional resources
and relationships
Learning from mentors
as role models
Paper 4
Jared Alford
AND understanding
students’ reasoning to
engage them in scientific
sense-making
AND a learning
community where
students are apprentices
in scientific reasoning
Jim Minstrell
Sheila Walters
Kendra Wallace
AND seeking resources
and relationships that
support reform science
teaching
Candidates’ Intentions: School Science
and Reform Science Teaching
• These are alternate visions of GOOD
science teaching (no one intends to teach
poorly)
• The relationship is additive (school
science forms the basis for reform science
teaching) more than differing philosophies
• In our program, we did not focus on the
transitional “middle column”
Candidates’ Intentions
Candidates’ Execution
Expert
Novice
School Science
Transitional Science
Teaching
Reform Science
Teaching
End of Program
Learning Trajectories of
Individual Candidates
Beginning of Program
Figure 1: Teacher Candidates’ Learning Trajectories
RQ 2: Learning from Experience
Principles of Learning
• WYDIWYL: What you do is what you
learn.
• Motivational Zones of Proximal
Development: Learning is affected by our
choices of mentors and practices that we
work to improve.
• Designated identities: Learning is affected
by our aspirations for the future.
Candidates’ Execution
Expert
Novice
Candidates’ Intentions
School Science
Transitional Science
Teaching
Reform Science
Teaching
School and mentor
ZPD
Program
Current
practice
Figure 2: Influences on Candidates’ Current Practices and
Motivational ZPD’s
Research Question 3: Influences
on Practice and Learning
• Factors influencing practice and learning
– The candidates’ own experience, knowledge
and values;
– The teacher preparation program; and
– The candidates’ mentors and school
placements
• Situated decisions link factors to practices
and learning
Candidates’ Execution
Expert
Novice
Candidates’ Intentions
School Science
Effective Science
Teaching
Excellent Science
Teaching
Jim Minstrell
Mark
Jared
Kathy
Sheila
John
Lisa
Kendra
Angie
Lynn
Figure 3: Intentions and Execution of Different Interns
Paper 1: Prospective Teachers’
Understanding of Science
Content for Teaching
By In-Young Cho, Charles W. Anderson
Michigan State University
Research Questions
• How did each candidate approach the
content and learning goals problem of
practice?
• What factors influenced their situated
choices?
Informants
Mike Barker:
- chemistry major and mathematics minor.
- taught urban high school chemistry and mathematics
- had been manager of R& D Technology for over 15 years in chemical
engineering company
- received presidential award from the company for the development
of a new material.
Lisa Barab:
- chemistry major and mathematics minor
- taught chemistry and mathematics in a suburban high school
- entered the program as an honors student with a near-4.0 grade point
average in chemistry
- an intense, lively student who had a close relationship with her father,
also a chemist.
Informants(continued)
John Duncan:
- physical science major and mathematics minor
- taught a combined earth and physical science course in a
suburban high school
- had spent six years as a civil and environmental engineer
before entering the program
Problem of Practice: Relearning
Science Content and Developing
Goals for Students’ Content Learning
Common Practice:
Teaching Problem-solving and Engaging
Students in Data Analysis
Mike Barker:




Teaching Hess’s Law, Mike showed mathematical method of
calculating ∆H for a number of different reactions.
never mentioned during the whole lesson about the conservation of
energy in that we can never expect to obtain more or less energy from a
chemical reaction by changing the method of carrying the reaction.
did not use or explain the meanings of enthalpy diagram that each line
represent balanced chemical reaction and relative distance of each line
must reflect the enthalpy difference between reactants and products
and is relatively proportional.
did not give explanations of physical changes of matter between the
lines.
Lisa Barab:
 When a student, showing the result of a gas law problem on her
worksheet, asked why the pressure goes so big when the volume changed
in a constant temperature, Lisa gave an example that if we put a crushed
ball on top of the warm torch, the ball gradually returns to its original
shape with increased volume because of the gaseous pressure increase
inside the ball and explained collision theory.
 Lisa also coached students to use dimensional analysis and algebraic skill
to manipulate the key variables: temperature, pressure, volume, and
number of moles of gases. When a student asked if her answer was
correct, Lisa treated problem solving procedure as how we represented
chemical ideas with numbers and units and how the relationship of the
parameters is denoted in equations.
John Duncan:
 when he taught “prevailing wind” by creating “wind
rose diagram”, he spend most of the time to give
every detailed directions of drawing the diagram
with whole class demonstrative lecture rather than
discussion about the phenomena and interpretation
of the diagram.
Patterns of Practice:
Teaching Problem-solving and Engaging
Students in Data Analysis
Mike Barker
•Algorithmic
procedural display
and mastery of
terminologies
•Variables as
symbols to be
manipulated
correctly
Lisa Barab
John Duncan
•Meaningful
understanding of
chemical principles
behind equations,
representational
symbols and physical
parameters
•Students can use
patterns in
experience to find
relationships among
variables
•Explanation of
causal relations and
meanings of basic
earth science
concepts
•Data to be analyzed
and find patterns
Patterns of Practice:
What kinds of resources did they look for?
Mike Barker
•Finding more
problems and
strategies for
teaching accurate
problem-solving
Lisa Barab
•Vivid experiences
that connect to
principles
John Duncan
•Well organized data
sets on the internet
Situated decisions: epistemological and
pedagogical perspectives and goals for
science content teaching
Mike Barker
Lisa Barab
John Duncan
•School science as a
replication of
authoritative scientific
knowledge and
procedures
•Mastery of
algorithmic problemsolving skill is the
primary goal of
science learning
•Belief in the power
of students’ inquiry
based on supportive
teaching strategies
• Effective school
science teaching
incorporates
experiences to
scientific knowledge
and promotes critical
thinking skills by
scientific inquiry
•Scientific
knowledge can be
obtained
experientially by
hands-on activities in
school science
•Knowing data
representation is the
primary goal of
students’ learning
Discussion
•
•
•
•
•
Prior science learning experience matters
Content knowledge background
Importance of mentoring
School placement effect
Teacher education program need to be more responsive to
candidate’s actual needs
-professional development of in-service teachers (mentors)
Paper 2: Understanding
Students and Learning to
Teach Science
By Kelly Grindstaff, Gail
Richmond, and Charles W.
Anderson
Problem of practice:
Students and Assessment
Research Questions
 What did candidates feel they needed to
understand about students? Why? (What were
their intentions for their practice with regards to
understanding students?) How did they try to find
this out?
 What student activities and attitudes did the
candidates value? Why? (How do their intentions,
and the context, which affects its execution, shape
what they want students to do and care about?)
How did they attempt to shape these?
Problem of practice:
Students and Assessment
Each candidates’ choices about what they
sought to understand about their students, how,
and what they wanted their students to do was
revealed in these common practices:
• how they tried to motivate or engage
students in classroom work,
• the approaches they took to helping
students learn, and
• how they assessed and graded
students.
Participants & Contexts
• Angie Harris completed a biology major and a chemistry minor. She
spent her intern year at the same suburban high school where she
had been placed as a senior the year before, teaching biology. Her
mentor was very committed to her learning, was very supportive and
also demanding. Both saw their match-up as a good one.
• Lynn Aster completed a biology major with a minor in mathematics.
She had returned to school to pursue a teaching degree after four
years working as a technician in a cytogenetics lab. For her
internship she taught a lower-track biology class in a large urban
school. Her mentor was not a good match for her, and thus was not
an influential resource for her learning.
• Kathy Miller completed a biology major and a chemistry minor. Her
internship was with two mentors, one in biology and the other in
chemistry. She was placed in a very affluent suburban district in her
home town, where she hoped to secure a job. She perceived her
primary mentor, in biology, as a support and as a pressure.
Angie: Situated Choices about Practices
•
•
•
Motivating and engaging students
– Challenging, authentic & relevant content
– Student-centred & active lessons
– Encouraged student curiosity
Helping students learn
– Science teaching as helping students in “inquiry & application”
– Needed to understand how they are making sense of the content, how
they learn
– Provided lots of feedback and individual attention
– Developed relationships with students
Grading and assessing students
– Enjoys assessing student thinking
– Students learn from assessment tasks
– Used information about student learning to inform teaching
– Focused on big ideas, inquiry & application
– Liked mentor’s low-stakes “mastery learning” approach
Angie:
Understanding Student Thinking
I enjoy assessing the student thinking.
I dislike evaluating or grading student work.
I enjoy figuring out what went wrong through the unit and how
to re-teach concepts.
I struggle with motivating students who performed poorly to
come in for extra help or make-ups.
I struggle writing assessments that appropriately challenge all
students.
I struggle with writing good, clear questions that allow me
to really understand what the students are thinking.
(Journal Response, spring semester, 2003)
Lynn: Situated Choices - Practices
• Motivating and engaging students
– Communicated high expectations
– Demonstrated care for and developed relationships with
students
– Consistent enforcement of clear rules
– Tapped into student interest, questions, & prior knowledge
– Infectious teacher enthusiasm
• Helping students learn
– Used lots of activities & attempts at inquiry & application
– Used information about student learning to inform teaching
• Grading and assessing students
– Confident in analyzing student understanding
– Wanted students to learn from mistakes
– Rewards effort and understanding
Lynn:
Engaging Students in Learning
We’ve all walked into a class and thought I cannot
stand this teacher, but they were just so darn nice
and so positive and just kept going every day that
you ended up looking forward to that class and
learning so much. …I am dying to be that
teacher that is so positive and so excited about
science that you don’t need to scream at your
students, they are just going to naturally hop on
that train. But I’m finding that just wanting to be
that teacher doesn’t get me there. (interview with
Lynn, spring semester, 2003)
Kathy: Situated Choices about Practices
• Motivating and engaging students
– Used relevant, real-world content
– Employed elements of student choice
– Friendly surveillance
– Developed rapport with students
• Helping students learn
– Lessons planned around textbook
– Clear & explicit expectations
– Assisted students in completing work
• Grading and assessing students
– Explicit criteria for grading very important
– Rewards effort and understanding
Kathy:
Assessing & Grading Fairly
If you respect them, they will respect you. …I tell
them what I expect; that is what I grade them on;
that is what I evaluate them on. They know what is
coming from me. …It is important to me that my
students respect me. … I need them to respect
me. (interview with Kathy, fall semester, 2002)
Situated Choices - Learning
Angie
• learning from the program was her priority
• felt efficacious in learning from mistakes (working toward intentions)
• questioned how students made sense of the content
• MSU program, her mentor and her students and their thinking were major resources
Lynn
• learning from the program was her priority
• felt efficacious in learning from mistakes (working toward intentions)
• questioned the content students needed & how to engage them in it
• MSU program and her students and how they engage in and make sense of the content
were major resources for her learning
Kathy
• performance in the program was her priority
• felt most efficacious in performing well for mentor (execution)
• less questioning how her students made sense of the content or why they responded in
ways that they did
• perceived MSU program and her mentors as much as constraints as resources
Paper 3: Science Teacher
Candidates’ Classrooms:
Psychological Safety,
Participation, and
Communication about Science
By Ajay Sharma and Charles W.
Anderson
This paper focuses on the problem of
practice of developing classroom learning
environments and teaching strategies.
Research Questions
 Describe and compare the different patterns of practice
of an experienced teacher and two teacher candidates in
terms of the different ways they chose to manage the
tensions between teacher script and school science on
one hand and students’ counterscripts and their own
discourses on the other.
 We also consider how those patterns of practice were
affected by the teachers’ knowledge, values, and
teaching circumstances, and how their practices and
priorities were likely to affect their learning to teach.
Conceptual Framework

Social Spaces:
(a) Official social space: Teacher script; School science discourse.
(b) Unofficial social space: Students’ counterscripts; Students’ everyday
discourses.
(c) “Third Space”: Dialogic interaction of the official with the unofficial.

Scripts:
(a)
(b)

Teacher script.
Students’ counterscripts.
Discourse:
(a) School science discourse.
(b) Students’ everyday discourses.
(Gutierrez et al, 1995; Moje, 2001)
Methods
 In order to give a thick description of the different patterns of
practice teacher candidates developed, the paper presents detailed
stories of two of our teacher candidates that are fairly
representative of the types of patterns of practice our focus group of
teacher candidates have tended to exhibit.
 As an analytic counterpoint, video recordings of classroom teaching
of Jim Minstrell, a renowned and expert science teacher, were also
analyzed, and his patterns of practice was compared with those of
the two chosen teacher candidates.
 Discourse analysis was used to analyze and interpret classroom
teaching data.
 Focus on one typical class for each teacher.
Participants
 Jared is an Earth Science major with a minor in History. Teaching
was his first career. Jared aspired to teach in a suburban school,
and as so happened he got to intern in just such a school with a not
particularly diverse student population.
 Lynn is a biology major with a minor in mathematics. She had
worked in a cytogenetics lab as a technician for four years before
she decided to return to school to pursue a teaching degree. Lynn
interned in a large urban school with a diverse student population
where she taught a lower-track biology class.
 Jim Minstrell was a high school teacher from Mercer Island,
Washington. Holds a Ph.D. in science education and is a winner of
the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science Education (1985).
Results: Jared
An Episode From the Class:
• J: All right! Who wants to read the first paragraph.
• Couple of hands go up.
• J: Mr. G you had the hand first, then it will be Lisa, and then Dave.
Do go ahead Mr. G. (sitting on his chair)
• G (reading from the text): Lasers have uses in medicine,
manufacturing, communications, ( ), entertainment, and even
measuring distance to the moon. Lasers are used in audio and video
discs, computers and printers. In the future, lasers may be used to
produce almost limitless supply of energy from nuclear ( ).
• J: Perfect. Thank you.
• G: There is ‘printer’ down there.
• J: Yup! You are right. There is printer down there.
• J: (pointing to another student) There. You go.
Results: Jared (contd.)
 Set up learning environments that were very
much dominated by school science and the
teacher’s script.
 The tension between teacher’s script and
underlife was managed by letting the school
science discourse hegemonise the official
space, and ensuring that students’ counterscripts, voices and everyday discourses
remained in the unofficial space.
Results: Lynn
An Episode from her Class:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
L: (taking cognizance of one student who had been raising his hands) What’s that?
The student: The natural selection, is it like it just randomly chooses each of each scenario or is it separately for
each scenario?
L: That is a good question. Cleveland is asking if natural selection is always the same. Let me rephrase your
question to see if I have got it right, are you saying that it is always good to be a tall giraffe?
The student: I am saying that in a case of a tall giraffe, is it always going to be specific type of natural selection?
Another student: No, it is not always going to be a tall giraffe.
L: Ok, I still do not … I am still trying to understand Cleveland’s question.
The first student: Ok, spiders. What kind of selection was there?
L: (repeats the question) What kind of selection was the spider’s? That was called ‘stabilizing’.
The student: Will it ever be the same type of situation or a different kind of natural selection?
L: Yes. There could be another type of selection on the spider. Say … This is an excellent question. Let’s say there
are birds eating me and I am a spider. So, there is a stabilizing selection going on because it is not good to be big
and it is not good to be small. So I am at an advantage if I am in the middle. But, say, to attract a mate, and have
babies, that is survival. It is good, only if you are big. The big spiders – only they are the ones that get to have
girlfriends and have babies. So there can be different kinds of selection. If you a big spider in that kind of situation,
you have advantage for mate selection, but you are at a disadvantage for predator selection. Right!
Results: Lynn (contd.)
 While the teacher script tended to hegemonise official social space
in Lynn’s classroom, Lynn did encourage her students to dialogically
engage with the scientific discourse and take the classroom
dialogue in unscripted albeit productive directions whenever she felt
safe or confident enough to do so.
 The nature of the classroom discourse in her class fluctuated rather
capriciously between the extremities of traditional school science
and reform science.
 Lynn clearly aspired for a reform science oriented classroom
learning environments but both her circumstances and limited skills
and knowledge often militated against her success.
Results: Minstrell
An Episode from his Class:
( Jim points everybody’s attention to a diagram on the white board depicting a book kept on a table.)
•JM: Does it make sense to everybody that the table is exerting an upward force on the book? (Pauses a
bit). No? (No response from the students) OK, you wanna argue against it?
•Student 1: What is it? I don’t understand why that would be a force?
•JM: Why that would be a force?
•Student 1: A force is when you are pushing something. But the book is just there. The table is only
keeping it from falling down. The table is not doing anything.
•JM: All right! So the table is not doing something. It is just … there.
•Student 1: It is not pushing it up; it is just holding it up. It is just there. So it is not applying any force.
•JM: OK.
•Student 2: My conception of force is too that it is something active, like pushing or pulling, or something
that is equivalent of like gravity. It is hard to conceive something that is just being there as exerting a
force. Because people think of force is like (makes a upward moving gesture with hands) lifting
something. And the table is not lifting anything. You know there has to be something there that is
preventing it from falling down.
•JM: OK. So how many of you at this point are really struggling with, questioning the idea of whether we
want to think of something like table as exerting an upward force? (Some hands go up.) OK. So several
of you are still wrestling with that. Mike could you hold your hand like that please? (asks Mike to hold his
hand up with palms outstretched, and puts a book on Mike’s palm) How about that situation? (Then JM
brings a big bundle of books to keep it on Mike’s palm. Laughs.) So, Is Mike exerting a force?
Everybody laughs.
Results: Minstrell (contd.)
 Managed the tension between different
discourses animating the classroom, and
harnessed it productively to build classroom
learning communities where students learned
science with understanding.
 Enacted a teacher’s script that actively invited,
included and re-voiced students’ counter-scripts.
 The official social space was large and inclusive
enough to encompass third space within itself.
Discussion
 Teacher candidates responded to the difficult challenge of managing the
tensions between different scripts and discourses in different ways.
 The patterns of practice they evolved reflect their best efforts to manage the
tension between the teacher’s script and the underlife of the classroom,
given the socio-cultural context they found themselves in while learning how
to teach, and the resources, attitudes and perspectives they had at their
disposal.
 Both the school science and the reform science approaches to managing
classroom discourse and activity are difficult and challenging, but the reform
science approach is more so.
 The situated choices teacher candidates make in response to the problem
of practice of developing classroom learning environments have obvious
consequences for the learning of students in their classrooms.
 Developing reform science oriented classroom learning environments is a
challenge most novice teachers are ill prepared to meet.
 Need for a better appreciation of this challenge in the way teacher
education programs prepare teacher candidates for their vocation.
Paper 4: Prospective science
teachers’ learning from
professional resources and
relationships
By Gail Richmond, Shinho Jang,
and Charles W. Anderson
Purpose of Study
To develop a detailed understanding of
•how prospective secondary science teachers identify,
use and adapt material resources
•how prospective teachers learn from individuals who
might potentially serve as mentors
Research Questions
1. What human and material resources did
candidates choose as they developed their
practice as teachers?
2. What factors determined these situated
choices?
Participants
• Jared Alford completed a major in Earth Science and a minor in
History. His senior-year field placement was in an urban high
school earth science classroom; his internship placement was in
a suburban/rural middle-school general science classroom.
• Kendra Wallace completed a major in General Science and a
minor in Theatre. She did her senior-year fieldwork in a
suburban high school earth science classroom; her internship
was divided between earth science and chemistry (under the
guidance of the same mentor teacher) in another suburban
district.
• Sheila Walters completed a major in Chemistry and a minor in
Earth Science. Sheila’s senior-year field placement was in a
suburban junior high school general science classroom; she did
her internship in a general science classroom in a middle school
in the same district.
Analysis
We examined data sources for evidence of
a) how Jared, Kendra, and Sheila went about
planning and teaching their lessons
b) what they reported their priorities to be in their
developing practice
c) who and what they considered to be influential
in their developing practice
d) how others positioned as potential mentors
perceived the interns’ strengths & priorities
Results
Jared Alford
• Teaching practice
–
–
–
–
–
Lecture-driven lessons
Confirmatory lab exercises
Little opportunity for model-based reasoning
Significant teacher presence
Fact-driven assessments (worksheets, chapter tests)
• Priorities regarding resources
Lessons planned around textbook
– Significant use of textbook-related resources
– No use of resources suggested for inquiry-oriented lessons
– No response to instructor feedback on drafts of teaching-related
assignments
–
Jared (continued)
• Priorities regarding relationships
– Considered his experienced mentor teacher most important resource
– Experienced tensions with field instructor and course instructors who
promoted reform-based teaching
– Peers mattered little in helping to shape his practice
Sheila Walters
• Teaching practice
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
Lecture-driven lessons
Confirmatory activities
Emphasis on student engagement
Less significant teacher presence
Emphasis on safe, inviting classroom environment
Fact-driven assessments
Emphasis on generating student ideas
• Priorities regarding resources
–
–
–
–
Lessons planned around textbook
Lots of activities (including physical model-building)
Little use of resources suggested for inquiry-oriented lessons
No response to instructor feedback on drafts of teaching-related
assignments
Sheila (continued)
• Priorities regarding relationships
– Considered mentor teacher very important (experience and
support)
– Considered course instructors who provided emotional and
professional support significant, not those who promoted reformbased teaching
– Did not consider her field instructor significant (little specific,
constructive feedback provided)
– Peers mattered if they provided ideas for engaging activities or
emotional support
Kendra Wallace
• Teaching practice
–
–
–
–
Inquiry-driven lessons
Lessons characterized by discussion rather than lecture
Multiple objectives addressed in each lesson
Lessons & units centered on engaging problems related to key
ideas
– Teacher facilitation rather than domination
• Priorities regarding resources
– Aligned lessons with Big Ideas rather than textbook content or
organization
– Sought out problems or cases from diverse sources to promote
engagement and provide real-world contexts
– Responded to instructor feedback on plans/drafts of all
assignments
Kendra (continued)
• Priorities regarding relationships
– Actively sought out individuals for support of reform-based
teaching and for emotional support (select course instructors,
field instructor, mentor, peers)
– Did not place high priority on those who offered professional
guidance, as she already felt confident/prepared in these areas
Discussion & Implications for
Teacher Education
Candidates’ Intentions
Expert
School Science
<Jared>
Program
School and mentor
ZPD
Current
practice
<Sheila>
Novice
Excellent Science
Teaching
School and mentor
ZPD
Program
Current
practice
Candidates’ Execution
Effective Science
Teaching
School and mentor
ZPD
Current
practice
Program
<Kendra>
RQ 2: Learning from Experience
Principles of Learning
• WYDIWYL: What you do is what you
learn.
• Motivational Zones of Proximal
Development: Learning is affected by our
choices of mentors and practices that we
work to improve.
• Designated identities: Learning is affected
by our aspirations for the future.
Conclusion and Implications
• Moving toward a practice-based curriculum for
teacher education
• The role of personal efficacy in candidates’
situated decisions
– School science as a way to feel successful and
efficacious in teaching
– Tradeoffs between reform science intentions and
successful execution
– Tradeoffs between near-term success and learning
for the long term
• Our agenda: Finding and supporting personally
rewarding forms of transitional practice