Charles J. Eick

Job sharing their first year: a narrative of two partnered teachers’ induction into middle school science teaching

Abstract This paper is a narrative of the induction of two middle school science teachers as partners in a job sharing arrangement. The partners began paired teaching in lieu of student teaching. The author retells the womens story of how they worked together, supporting each other in attempting to implement student-centered practices. His past experiences as a beginning science teacher guided his understanding of their story. Their mutual support in this story is likened to partners in a marriage. These two women mentored each other through the difficulties of their first year through ongoing dialogue on practice, supportive assistance, and modeling.

Use of the Outdoor Classroom and Nature-Study to Support Science and Literacy Learning: A Narrative Case Study of a Third-Grade Classroom

A case study of an exemplary third grade teacher’s use of the outdoor classroom for meeting both state science and language arts standards is described. Data from the researcher’s field journal, teacher lesson plans, and teacher interviews document how this teacher used nature-study to bridge outdoor classroom experiences with the state science and language arts curriculum. This teacher’s early life experiences supported her strong interest in science and nature in the outdoors and experiencing it with her children. Children interacted with the outdoor classroom throughout the day as a context for science and literacy learning. All but one child successfully met Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) goals in reading at the end of the school year.

Coteaching in a Secondary Science Methods Course: Learning Through a Coteaching Model that Supports Early Teacher Practice

Coteaching as a form of situated learning supports early induction into science teaching. A coteaching model for secondary science methods students and what has been learned from this model is described. Secondary science methods students in pairs were placed with a science teacher to begin teaching as peripheral participants. A cooperative inquiry method was used to study this model. In-depth learning about the model and how to make it work effectively came from a process of “research cycling” over multiple semesters. This learning has been put in practical form as a primer for cooperating teachers and methods students participating in coteaching. Constraints and limitations of this coteaching model are discussed.

Tailoring National Standards to Early Science Teacher Identities: Building on Personal Histories to Support Beginning Practice

Individual recommendation plans (IRP) for student teaching practice were co-constructed with two methods students based on the select application of National Science Teachers Association’s National Standards for Science Teacher Preparation. Methods students completed a resume, an interview on pedagogical preferences, and a learning styles survey to determine the reform-based standards and pedagogical approaches that better fit their personal histories and identity formation as science teachers. Each case was unique with one student better meeting the Standards of “Issues” and “Science in the Community” and the other student better meeting the standards of “Inquiry” and the “Nature of Science”. Student teachers planned and taught lessons based on their IRP and were mostly successful in meeting their prescribed standards and utilizing their preferred pedagogies. However, their success in use of specific strategies supporting their approach was highly dependent upon classroom context. The use of the IRP process as a reflective tool strengthening identity formation and early practice is discussed.

Providing Bottom-Up Support to Middle School Science Teachers' Reform Efforts in Using Inquiry-Based Kits.

Middle grades science teachers need professional support in practice as they implement new inquiry-based science. Professional development schools can provide this bottom-up support through connecting preservice and inservice teacher education programs in classroom practice. In this study, coteaching arrangements with secondary science education majors provided additional teachers in the classroom to support a materials-rich curriculum and the needed associated pedagogies. Science education majors provided needed assistance in troubleshooting difficulties with the new curriculum. They also provided needed content knowledge to support inquiry, along with creating moments and space for teachers to reflect on inquiry practice. Ongoing assistance by preservice teachers allowed inservice teachers to progress from logistical concerns in implementing kit curriculum to concerns regarding student learning and the supporting professional development.

Dispositions Supporting Elementary Interns in the Teaching of Reform-Based Science Materials

Dispositions supporting the teaching of science as structured inquiry by four elementary candidates are presented. Candidates were studied during student teaching based on their positive attitudes toward teaching science with reform-based materials in their methods course. Personal learning histories informed their attitudes, values, and beliefs about the teaching and learning of science through structured inquiry. Supportive dispositions included curiosity and questioning, investigating first-hand, learning together, and active learning. These dispositions supported early science teaching despite candidates limited science content knowledge, and may contribute to candidates’ further learning of science.

Summer Methods in Summer Camps: Teaching Projects WILD, WET, and Learning Tree at an Outdoor Environmental Education Center

Elementary and secondary science preservice teachers teach environmental education (EE) to summer camp children during their first science methods course. Local children in grades K-6 attend a week-long, summer day-camp at the university’s outdoor EE education center. Preservice teachers receive training in the use of the environmental curricula including Projects WILD, WET, and Learning Tree, from a Cooperative Extension Specialist. Information on the development of these curricula is also presented. Preservice teachers collaborate with the camp director and staff to plan and coteach lessons from these environmental curricula to rotating groups of campers. A typical day at the camp is described. Elementary preservice teachers report in written journals an increase in their confidence and abilities to teach environmental science and its related interdisciplinary subjects in the outdoors.

Teaching Youth Again: Reflecting on Renewal

Most of the professors contributing to this book had spent several years away from teaching children and adolescents, and they yearned to return to K-12 teaching to prove to themselves that they could (still) be effective teachers of youth. They could not move forward as credible people of reform and reform-based practices without putting into practice with K-12 students what they espoused as science educators. The preservice and in-service teachers with whom they worked needed to know, for example, that inquiry learning could be supported in the context of their schools and with their students (Lunenberg et al. 2007). By teaching again, they also aspired to updating and strengthening knowledge and skills in practice, practical knowledge for leading productive learning environments for science (Van Driel et al. 2001). Most of the contributing authors sought to regain credibility with fresh experiences teaching youth of diverse backgrounds and in schools with twenty-first-century technology and high-stakes testing. More boldly, a few ventured into teaching science for the first time, working with learners in grades below their prior teaching experience.

A Sabbatical as a Middle Grades Science Teacher: Building New Practical Knowledge for Practice

Few science teacher educators take the plunge into full-time K-12 classroom teaching again while on sabbatical leave from their college or university. Dr. Charles Eick did just that and shares his experience in preparing for classroom teaching again and what he learned about himself and teaching in implementing a new reform-based curriculum to eighth graders. He approaches his story of teaching physical science from the perspective of building on his personal practical knowledge as a progressive teacher from 10 years ago for today’s twenty-first-century science classroom. Technology became a primary vehicle for teaching and learning a new curriculum through guided inquiry. His blend of new techniques learned in professional development with those from his past teaching experiences created a new learning environment. His new emphasis on inquiry for learning through conceptual change often excluded his past practical knowledge of other effective science teaching approaches based on the learning cycle. What he learns and relearns in authentic practice using guided inquiry adds great credibility to his teaching, research, and outreach today.