In this study we describe secondary teachers' reported practices of model use in nanoscale science and engineering (NSE) education after participating in an NSE professional development program. Participants in this study were primarily high school teachers of chemistry, physics, or biology. After incorporating NSE lessons that included models into their classrooms, four distinct ways teachers used models emerged: Models as: (1) tools for visualization, (2) products of student design, (3) representations for student critique, and (4) means for investigation. As some teachers' natural model use choices in NSE were not for investigation, design, or critique, curricula and professional development experiences must support teachers in using models as more powerful tools than visualization alone.
As nanoscale science, engineering, and technology (NSET) becomes more integrated into precollege science curricula, it is crucial for teachers to develop coherent understandings of science principles (e.g., the structure of matter, size and scale, forces and interactions, and size-dependent properties) that allow them to coordinate these understandings from the macro-to the nanoscale. Furthermore, as teachers acquire new NSET content knowledge through professional learning opportunities, it is incumbent upon NSET educators to understand their developing content knowledge. To this end, we report results from a study in which we used a pre-/post-/delayed-posttest design to examine the change in 24 secondary (grades 7 -12) science teachers ' NSET content knowledge as a result of their participation in a year-long professional development program that consisted of a 2-week intensive course and academic year follow-up activities. Participants showed signifi cant gains from pretest to posttest and signifi cant gains on the delayed test compared to the pretest. We also present trends that emerged in teachers ' open-ended responses that provided deeper insight into teachers ' NSET content knowledge. Finally, we discuss issues related to the assessment of teachers ' NSET content knowledge as well as the design of NSET professional development for teachers.
focuses on strategies for design innovations through divergent and convergent thinking as well as through deep needs and community assessments using design ethnography, and translating those strategies to design tools and education. She teaches design and entrepreneurship courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels, focusing on front-end design processes. Dr. Eli M. Silk, Rutgers, The State University of New JerseyEli Silk is an Assistant Professor of Professional Practice in the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. Dr. Seda Yilmaz, Iowa State UniversityDr. Yilmaz is an Associate Professor of Industrial Design. She teaches design studios and lecture courses on developing creativity and research skills. Her current research focuses on identifying impacts of different factors on ideation of designers and engineers, developing instructional materials for design ideation, and foundations of innovation. She often conducts workshops on design thinking to a diverse range of groups including student and professional engineers and faculty member from different universities.
The importance of advancing transportation equity has become more visible as other structural inequities in our society have received increasing attention. Articulating approaches that practitioners use to address equity in their work, including experience-based strategies and research-developed equity metrics, contribute to supporting the achievement of transportation equity goals. However, a gap exists between knowing these approaches and integrating them into regular professional practice, in part because of barriers that span across different transportation-related contexts. To investigate practitioners’ approaches to transportation equity, as well as barriers they encounter in trying to achieve improved equity, interviews were conducted with 59 transportation practitioners from the public, private, non-profit, and academic sectors. Findings revealed that a majority of the transportation practitioners in the study engaged in addressing equity in their work, including through collaborating with other organizations and sectors, integrating non-transportation-related data, and considering the contextual needs of vulnerable communities. They identified key barriers to their implementation of transportation equity approaches, including the lack of sufficient and quality equity-related data, challenges with accessing and collecting data, and a lack of standards and metrics for measuring equity-related outcomes. These findings can guide work that supports the explicit integration of transportation equity approaches into practitioners’ practices.
focuses on strategies for design innovations through divergent and convergent thinking as well as through deep needs and community assessments using design ethnography, and translating those strategies to design tools and education. She teaches design and entrepreneurship courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels, focusing on front-end design processes.
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