Date of Award
2005
Degree Type
Dissertation
First Advisor
Sandy Jean Hicks
Abstract
The purpose of the study is to examine the effectiveness that a systematic, content specific professional development program has on K-8 teachers' attitudes, content preparedness, pedagogy preparedness, teacher efficacy, and their knowledge of standards and classroom practice. The Northeastern LSC program in this study is a project that uses inquiry-based, hands-on science kits that have been designed to help K-8 students comprehend science content and processes that are outlined by the various science standards such as the National Science Education Standards (NSES, 2001). Teachers were stratified according to the number of professional development hours they encountered and the types of science courses that they took in order to make comparisons between teachers with few hours of professional development and those with many hours of professional development. The study utilized archival teacher data that was collected using teacher questionnaires, interviews and classroom observations. The content of a secondary analysis of teacher surveys, teacher interviews and classroom observation was acquired from a study of 196 teachers in 1998-1999, 267 teachers in 1999-2000 and 243 teachers in 2002-2003 from seven school districts. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was used to compute group differences in teachers' attitudes toward teaching, content preparedness, pedagogy preparedness, beliefs, rating on quality of professional development, traditional teaching practices, investigative culture, investigative practices, teachers' efficacy, and teachers' knowledge of national science standards. Qualitative analysis was also conducted using the teacher interview and classroom observation data. Quantitative findings suggested that there was no predictive relationship between the dependent variables of teachers' years in teaching, the number of hours focused on the Northeastern LSC professional development and the types of science courses taken during college and the independent variables mentioned above. Qualitative data indicated that the majority of the teachers involved in the Northeastern LSC program used student-centered instruction in their classroom. It also demonstrated that the number of Northeastern LSC professional development hours and teachers' years in teaching are not predictors of a teachers' preparedness to teach science using student-centered instruction.
Recommended Citation
Siliezar, Diana Catalina, "Restructuring school: Improving K-8 science teaching and learning in schools through systematic professional development" (2005). Open Access Dissertations. Paper 2032.
https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/oa_diss/2032
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