ABSTRACT:In this quantitative study, we compare the efficacy of Level 2, guided inquirybased instruction to more traditional, verification laboratory instruction in supporting student performance on a standardized measure of knowledge of content, procedure, and nature of science. Our sample included 1,700 students placed in the classrooms of 12 middle school and 12 high school science teachers. The instruction for both groups included a week long, laboratory-based, forensics unit. Students were given pre-, post-, and delayed posttests, the results of which were analyzed through a Hierarchical Linear Model (HLM) using students' scores, teacher, level of school, Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP) scores, and school socioeconomic status. Overall, compared to students in traditional sections, students who participated in an inquiry-based laboratory unit showed significantly higher posttest scores; had the higher scores, more growth, and long-term retention at both the high school and middle school levels, if their teacher had stronger implementation of inquiry methods (as measured by RTOP scores); and tended to have better outcomes than those who learned through traditional methods, regardless of level of poverty in the school. Our findings suggest that Level 2 inquiry can be an effective teaching approach to support student learning as measured through standardized assessments.C 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Sci Ed 94: 577 -616, 2010

Inquiry is seen as central to the reform of science teaching and learning, but few teachers have experience with scientific inquiry and thus possess very naïve conceptions of it. One promising form of professional development, research experiences for teachers (RETs), allows teachers to experience scientific inquiry in the hopes that these experiences will then translate to inquiry in the classroom. As intuitively pleasing as these programs are, scant evidence documents their effectiveness. For this study, four secondary science NO SILVER BULLET FOR INQUIRY 323teachers were followed back to their classrooms following a 6-week, marine ecology RET. The research employed qualitative and quantitative data collection to answer these questions: What were the teachers' initial conceptions and enactment of classroom inquiry, and how did they change after the RET?; How did changes in the nature and use of questions highlight changes in inquiry enactment?; and How were the teachers' changes linked to the RET and are there changes that cannot be explained by the RET experience? Teachers who entered the program with more sophisticated, theory-based understanding of teaching and learning were more apt to understand inquiry as a model and to use classroom-based inquiry throughout their teaching following the program. Implications for professional development are discussed.

It is well established that many teachers are resistant to take up the messages of reform if these messages require them to substantially shift their teaching practices. What accounts for this resistance? One well established explanation is that teachers lacks the selfefficacy required to attempt something new in their teaching-they simply do not feel capable of effectively enacting the messages. However, there are a host of studies describing teachers with high self-efficacy who remain resistant to messages of change. The purpose of this article is to address the gap in the application of self-efficacy to understand the change or lack of change of science teachers' practice through the introduction of a related construct, pedagogical discontentment. This construct reflects a state of cognitive conflict that exists when an individual recognizes a mismatch between her/his science teaching pedagogical goals and classroom practices. One potential result of this mismatch is that a teacher problematizes her teaching practices, prompting an increased receptivity to reform messages. Building on existing literature, we present vignettes of four hypothetical teachers who exemplify variations of pedagogical discontentment. When combined with self-efficacy, pedagogical discontentment provides a useful lens to understand teachers' consideration and adoption of messages of reform.

Following the argument that an explicit focus on teacher thinking is an important outcome for professional development (Capps, Crawford, & Costas, 2012; Desimone, 2009), the research presented here examines the impact of one form of professional development, Research Experiences for Teachers (RETs), has in shaping teachers’ beliefs and affect related to inquiry in the classroom. By examining two distinct forms of RETs, this study incorporates 5 years of data collected from more than 100 RET participants, which include elementary, middle, and high school teachers. Evidence was drawn from analysis of multiple instruments measuring science teachers’ self‐efficacy (STEBI), pedagogical discontentment (STPD), teachers’ beliefs about teaching and learning (TBI), and Contextual Beliefs about Teaching Science (CBATS). The results indicate that both RET programs were successful in shaping teachers’ beliefs and affect—particularly in decreasing pedagogical discontentment and enhancing beliefs about reform. However, the RET program that focused mainly on teacher practice was more successful in shaping teachers’ beliefs and was the only program to show an influence on teachers’ practice.

Transforming science learning through student-centered instruction that engages students in a variety of scientific practices is central to national science-teaching reform efforts. Our study employed a large-scale, randomized-cluster experimental design to compare the effects of student-centered and teacher-centered approaches on elementary school students' understanding of space-science concepts. Data included measures of student characteristics and learning and teacher characteristics and fidelity to the instructional approach. Results reveal that learning outcomes were higher for students enrolled in classrooms engaging in scientific practices through a student-centered approach; two moderators were identified. A statistical search for potential causal mechanisms for the observed outcomes uncovered two potential mediators: students' understanding of models and evidence and the self-efficacy of teachers.

The aim of this research is to describe the development of the Science Teachers’ Pedagogical Discontentment Scale, an instrument that measures the discontentment that arises in teachers as they recognize a mismatch between their own pedagogical beliefs and goals and their actual classroom practices. From a conceptual change perspective, we explore the meaning of pedagogical discontentment and discuss its role in shaping teachers’ receptivity to messages of reform. We present an instrument that can be used to measure teachers’ pedagogical discontentment, an instrument that will allow science educators to better describe the affective states of teachers as they enter professional development experiences. The items for the initial instrument were derived from a series of interviews with practicing teachers; from these interviews, a group of 42 items were designed around a group of five subscales. The final instrument, revised after two rounds of field testing, includes 21 multiple‐choice items clustered around six subscales (subscales derived from interviews with science teachers). The processes used to develop the items and to refine instrument are discussed. Uses for this instrument to inform professional development experiences are explored as well as implications.

A quiet revolution is occurring in the learning goals that scientists and science educators have set for students. Scientific literacy, an ambiguously defined construct, has given way to the goal of students becoming proficient in science, which involves more than an understanding of important concepts; it centers on being able to do science. From this vantage point, doing science focuses on students engaging in productive sense making about the natural world (National Research Council [NRC], 2014). With that goal, the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) are performance expectations that integrate three dimensions of science learning: core ideas, scientific practices, and crosscutting concepts (Krajcik, Codere, Dahsah, Bayer, & Mun, 2014). These performance expectations are meant to reflect the disciplinary practices of science to engage students in productive sense making as a vehicle to support science learning (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, & Medicine [NAS] 2015). Indeed, a central component of the NGSS in terms of vision of science learning is that students' science learning is intimately tied to their engagement in investigations involving phenomena. If learning science is to result from productive sense making, there must be a "fundamental change in the way science is taught" (NAS, 2015, p. 1) and envisioned by teachers. If teachers are to support students in framing their role in science classrooms as one of sense making instead

1. Behavioral thresholds were obtained from cats, first with only their right ear and right dorsal, intermediate, and ventral acoustic striae (DAS, IAS, and VAS, respectively) intact, and then again with only their right ventral acoustic stria intact. 2. Using usual definitions of "threshold" the loss of the dorsal and intermediate acoustic striae results in no measurable deficit in the detection of noises or tones on a silent background. 3. In sharp contrast, even partial damage of the ventral acoustic stria (i.e., trapezoid body section) results in marked deficits in sound detection. 4. Therefore, the ventral acoustic stria is both necessary and sufficient to maintain normal acoustical sensitivity. 5. However, loss of the dorsal and intermediate striae seems to result in a degradation of reliability in the detection of suprathreshold sounds--perhaps akin to a deficit in listening.