In the Classroom
Implementing the Professional Development Standards: A Research Department’s Innovative Masters Degree Program for High School Chemistry Teachers Constance Blasie* and George Palladino Department of Chemistry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104; *
[email protected] Beginning as far back as 1986 with the “Neal Report” (1) institutions of higher education have been urged to build collaborations with other educational institutions, including K–12, in an effort to promote a technically trained, inventive, and adaptable workforce and to have a scientifically literate citizenry capable of making informed decisions regarding technical issues. The National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century, the “Glenn Commission”, in its report Before It’s Too Late (2) reports that the way to meet these goals is “…through teachers who are not only enthusiastic about their subjects, but who are also steeped in their disciplines and who have the professional training— as teachers—to teach those subjects well” and “…Nor is this teacher training simply a matter of preparation; it depends just as much—or even more—on sustained, high-quality professional development.” Professional-development programs as envisioned by the Glenn Commission are clearly defined in the Standards for Professional Development for Teachers of Science in the National Science Education Standards (3). However, as Bretz reported (4), “Existing M.S. programs… [for secondary science teachers] …fail to embrace the professional-development standards…” defined in the National Science Education Standards (3). The traditional choices of a M.S. in Chemistry, with no attention to pedagogical content knowledge or science pedagogy, versus a M.S. in Science Education, with emphasis on science education theory and research but no chemistry specific content, remain the norm for secondary science educators. Youngstown State University has established one solution to this problem (4). The University of Pennsylvania (Penn) approached the problem very differently and created an entirely different solution. A Collaborative Approach The Glenn Commission (2) “…concluded that the most powerful instrument for change, and therefore the place to begin, lies at the very core of education—with teaching itself ”. Penn’s Department of Chemistry—a research department having no chemistry education division—concluded exactly the same thing in 1998. Over the next two years the Penn Chemistry Department established a strong relationship with Penn’s Graduate School of Education and collaborated with regional school districts, especially the school district of Philadelphia (in which Penn is located), to develop a unique program for current secondary science teachers, resulting in the June 2000 implementation of the Master of Chemistry Education (MCE) Program. Consistent with the Glenn Commission, we determined that to improve science teaching, science teachers needed increased science content as well as improved knowledge of sciwww.JCE.DivCHED.org
•
ence pedagogy. However, the Glenn Commission focused most of its attention on the need for improved preservice science education and our initial collaborations and study told us that it was essential to improve the content knowledge and pedagogy of much of the current teacher workforce, especially when the percentage of teachers teaching in the physical sciences without certification is high (5). Through the teachers who will remain in their teaching positions for the next ten to fifteen years we could immediately start making a difference in science classrooms and it is these seasoned teachers who would be called upon to lead curricular reforms. Thus, although the chemistry department did not have a teacher preparation mission, it assumed a mission to provide a professional-development degree for teachers, including those under-prepared in chemistry. The Penn MCE ten-course degree program contains eight especially designed chemistry-content courses taught by chemistry faculty using a classroom inquiry model of teaching and learning. The additional two courses are chemistryeducation courses that include applied research done by each teacher–participant and that are taught by Graduate School of Education faculty and staff. The courses in chemistry are designed for depth of understanding of fundamental concepts and the interconnectedness of these concepts. The content is developed using a classroom inquiry model and emphasizes the secondary-classroom applications of the chemistry content both through classroom discussion and assignments. This combination of content emphasis and presentation model assures the appropriate academic level for these graduate courses yet permits teacher–participants with differing backgrounds to increase their pedagogical content knowledge. This curriculum design is important because it allows the courses the necessary flexibility to respond to the varying needs of teachers in diverse school situations. Neither of these are the case if teachers are incorporated into the general graduate student population. As an illustration, great care is taken in the presentation of group theory in the inorganic chemistry course to emphasize the importance of and the opportunities offered when displaying or drawing images of three-dimensional species. The chemistry and chemistry-education courses work in concert to provide pedagogical content knowledge that is necessary if teachers are to develop the skills they need to implement inquiry-based, deepened content knowledge in their high school science classes. Every effort is made to ensure that the ten courses are well integrated and that they align with the professional-development standards of learning science, learning to teach science, and learning to learn (3). For example, the laboratories done in the first chemistry-education course, which runs concurrently with an organic chemistry course, are chosen based on topics being
Vol. 82 No. 4 April 2005
•
Journal of Chemical Education
567
In the Classroom
discussed in the organic course. Moreover, the labs are actually intended to be implemented in secondary schools and as such are taken from the ACS SourceBook (6). As a part of the chemistry-education course, teachers then suggest modifications for these labs appropriate for their own school situation and share the results with one another, often orally through in-class presentations. This exercise and presentation reinforces the individual’s own content knowledge and extends each participant’s pedagogical content knowledge through the sharing of teaching experiences. Program Design Each summer the MCE program admits cohort classes limited to 20 teacher–participants. The teachers move through the ten-course program together helping to form a close community of learners that has the potential to last well beyond the completion of the program. The cohort classes also help remove the feelings of isolation experienced by teachers both in teaching in their own classroom and in professional development (7). Because of the program emphasis on forming a community of learners, interviews are an important part of the application process. Determining appropriate commitment to secondary-level science education, to the MCE program, and to working collaboratively with colleagues is essential to building a cohesive cohort. Through experience we have learned that making this determination is aided by personal interviews. The cohort design expects students to progress continuously from start to finish. However, when the inevitable, occasional intervention of a personal situation occurs, the program accommodates minor fluctuations and creates an individualized plan for completing the program with a subsequent cohort class. This has happened six times (7%) to date. The 20-teacher limit is in part by pedagogical design, aimed at producing teaching and learning situations more akin to secondary school classrooms and other Socratic environments rather than university lectures. Logistically the 20-teacher limit is set because of the objective to fully fund scholarships for each participant. Without such scholarships, the cost of tuition would inhibit teacher participation. The funding for these scholarships is derived from The National Science Foundation, The Rohm and Haas Company, Bristol-Myers Squibb, DuPont, and Penn’s School of Arts and Sciences. The chemistry-content coursework in the Penn MCE program was established based on the local need of improving the content background of teachers currently being asked to teach chemistry but without “certification” or adequate college-level chemistry coursework preparation. This problem, which mirrors a national one, is commonly referred to as “out-of-field teaching”. About 50% of local chemistry teachers are certified in biology and are teaching chemistry “out-of-field”. Thus the first two MCE courses, taught during the first summer, provide the important bridges to the remainder of the curriculum. In these initial courses graduate-level achievement is reached by course end. The first two courses are, therefore, very intense. For those applicants whose academic background is either out-of-date or inadequate for us to expect successful completion of the first courses, the applicant is required to complete specified courses prior to acceptance. 568
Journal of Chemical Education
•
We had also determined that the knowledge and use of appropriate information technology in the teaching and learning of chemistry was a skill needed by secondary-level science teachers. The initial course in this area is coupled to molecular modeling for content depth and is one of the first two courses provided in the MCE program. The technology taught and introduced here then permeates all further courses. For each of three consecutive summers, teacher–participants spend 8 weeks, 4 days per week on campus studying two chemistry-content courses. Summer mornings are split between the class meetings of the two courses. The afternoons are used for small group workshops (based on the Peer Led Team Learning model; ref 8) led by undergraduate students serving as TAs, individual studying, tutoring, group projects, and so forth. During each of the two intervening academic years the participants travel to campus on 16 Saturdays over the fall and spring semesters where they study one chemistry-content course and one chemistry-education course, alternating between the courses on alternate Saturdays. Placing the chemistry-education courses during the academic year allows those courses to help teachers integrate their learning from the program into their own classrooms and provides the teachers with the opportunity to conduct applied research on topics individually chosen and designed for each unique classroom, school, district, and teacher. Over the course of 26 months, teacher–participants complete ten courses. As a part of one of the final chemistry courses, each teacher–participant prepares a thesis on an independent research project into an everyday chemistry issue. The thesis must include an explanation of both the topic and the underlying fundamental chemistry needed for understanding the topic. An innovative “teaching tool” to be used with secondary-level students based on the topic, possible secondary-level assessment tasks, and a demonstration of the use of the Penn Inquiry Model that could be applied by a secondary-level science teacher using this topic as a unit of study complete the thesis. Our expectation is that the theses will be implemented in the classrooms of the teachers and collected by MCE as a teacher resource for distribution beyond its participants via print, CD, and Web site. The Teaching and Learning Model Employed The inquiry classroom model of teaching and learning used by the chemistry faculty in MCE courses was developed by the MCE program designers (research scientists by training) as they struggled to make sense of the term “inquirybased pedagogy” found in science-education literature. The “Ah-ha moment” came when they realized that doing scientific research is doing “inquiry learning”. With this realization, the model, initially named “The Penn Instructional Model” (PIM) (Figure 1) based on its impending use as “the way we would teach these courses” followed easily: Ask questions and use the information the students already possess to get started. Then reflect and organize this, finding new questions as you go, for which you must gather new information through research or experimentation and reflect and organize more until you are ready to let your peers have a look and ask for feedback on which you reflect and organize more… and keep repeating the process until you have results that survive peer review and therefore make their way
Vol. 82 No. 4 April 2005
•
www.JCE.DivCHED.org
In the Classroom
Initial Question
Existing Information
Results
Reflect and Organize Peer Review Model Accepted?
New Information Needed?
larly teach chemistry with 49% holding chemistry certification. The remaining 27% are teachers certified in other sciences and are occasionally assigned to teach a chemistry class in their districts or schools. While the MCE program is not a certification program, “out-of-field” participants holding a science certificate are eligible to attain chemistry certification upon completion of the MCE program. Given the intense and extensive academic program and the fact that most teachers are not certified in chemistry, attrition is relatively low over the four cohorts (∼13%). The attrition is equally divided between those who experience unacceptable academic difficulties, which usually occurs during the first summer, and those who experience an insurmountable personal issue necessitating their withdrawal. Project Results—Evaluation
Community Knowledge Figure 1. Schematic of the Penn Inquiry Model.
into the scientific community knowledge base. The model takes the standard “scientific method” (9) and adds the peerreview component encountered in modern research as a vital tool for sharing learning and presentation of scientific conclusions. It also emphasizes the cyclical nature of scientific endeavors often missed in the traditional, usually linear, “scientific method” model. A final importance of the PIM is the “ownership” of it felt by the MCE faculty who developed it. Being involved in the development of the model seems to have helped lead to its high rate of usage. Shortly after our initial use of the PIM, it became clear that this was not only a teaching model but also a learning model, now renamed “The Penn Inquiry Model”. And perhaps most importantly, it also became clear that this teaching and learning model was transferable to the secondary classroom (10), once again verifying that the way one teaches is the way one is taught. Project Results—Demographics The first cohort of teachers graduated in October 2002 with 17 completing the degree out of the initial group of 22, which included two Graduate School of Education students. Of the original 22 teachers and GSE students (2) in Cohort 2, 15 graduated in October 2003 and another three are on schedule to complete the degree in May 2004. Cohorts 3 and 4 are currently involved in coursework with selections for Cohort 5 to occur in March 2004. For each cohort there have been approximately twice the number of applicants as openings, resulting in some teachers being selected over a year in advance of their beginning the program. In the first three cohorts, the teacher–participants represent urban (43%), suburban (52%), and rural (5%) schools; 63% are women and 29% are ethnic or racial minorities. The teachers range in age from 24 to 55 years; they have an average of seven years of teaching experience; and they teach combinations of biology, chemistry, physics, physical, earth, and environmental science. Seventy-three percent of the first four cohorts reguwww.JCE.DivCHED.org
•
The internal evaluation of the MCE program is coordinated by Kenneth Tobin of Penn’s Graduate School of Education and, although employing mixed methods, relies heavily on the evaluation methodology of Lincoln and Guba (11). The evaluation goal is to determine what is happening from the perspective of the participants in order to obtain information that is then disseminated to all stakeholders. This ensures that with immediate feedback based on input from the stakeholders, iterations occur quickly. Videotaping of most MCE class sessions, transcription and study of these tapes, participant focus groups and responses to electronic surveys, frequent interviews with faculty and program administrators, and monthly meetings of faculty and internal evaluators ensure that problems are viewed from all perspectives and appropriate solutions are enacted. Additionally, visits to teacher–participants’ classrooms, videotapes from those classrooms and teacher-produced materials used in their classrooms allow an eye into the transfer of learning from MCE program to secondary classes.1 For example, one of the important early outcomes of the internal evaluation being conducted in the teacher classrooms was recognition of the importance of requiring teachers to use the skills and understandings that they were learning from the program with their own students at the earliest opportunity. This provided us with access to rich information about the pedagogical content knowledge needs of the teachers, which were then immediately addressed in the first chemistry-education course. An example was the teachers’ lack of understanding of levels of representation (12) as seen when they presented lessons to their students. The external evaluation is conducted by James Gallagher of Michigan State University. With visits to MCE classes and the classrooms of some of the teacher–participants, copies of all internal evaluation reports, additional focus group meetings, and surveys done during his visits Gallagher reports his findings on a semiannual basis. Findings, based on the initial three years of operation of the MCE program, indicate that the cooperative work of faculty and staff, recruitment of faculty who are interested and skilled in teaching science and science education for understanding and application, and the effective use of internal evaluation data to refine the program, sometimes in real time, all have had a significant positive effect on program quality and effectiveness. For example,
Vol. 82 No. 4 April 2005
•
Journal of Chemical Education
569
In the Classroom
the Fall 2002–Spring 2003 Internal Evaluation Report stated: Although teachers were reporting that the MCE program was having a large impact on their teaching practices, site visits to their classrooms revealed otherwise. For this reason the course (Educ 536) was revised to make the central focus on teachers implementing changes in their classrooms and schools and conducting applied research on those changes.
And from the External Evaluator’s Report of March 7–9, 2002, Gallagher commented on the Saturday courses (one chemistry, one chemistry education) he visited: …In both classroom sessions, a strong connection was made between the content of the course and the practical needs of the participants and their high school students…
In reviewing the progress of the initial cohort, the high level of intellectual development experienced by these teachers over the course of the program becomes apparent. The Summer 2003 Internal Evaluation Report stated: As I worked through aspects of the “Adopt an Enzyme” project (the last summer of cohort 1)…I was forcefully reminded of how much these teacher-learners had grown from their involvement in this program. So much so that tasks such as reading a research paper and using the information to develop lesson plans, making sense of complex three dimensional molecular structures and searching for information in online data bases have become aspects of these teachers’ dispositions.
The program has assisted teachers in developing professional identities as science teachers and encouraged a disposition to inquiry about their own teaching. This is evidenced by participant reports such as a cohort 3 participant who wrote: I was inspired to join the science K–12 curriculum writing committee after reading and discussing “Understanding by Design” by Wiggins and McTigue in class. This could be one of the most important things I have learned so far: how to design the curriculum for a unit by using backward design.
The Fall 2002–Spring 2003 Internal Evaluation Report stated: Other MCE participants are also involved presenting the results of their applied research at national conferences. Eighteen teachers from cohorts 1, 2, and 3 presented their research results or conducted a day-long laboratory as a part of the NSTA national conference that was held in Philadelphia in March 2003.
The program has also equipped teachers with the tools to conduct this inquiry, thus yielding the potential to make them lifelong learners about issues of teaching and learning (13) and with skills and confidence to inquire into their own teaching and the learning of their students in methodical ways. The Fall 2002–Spring 2003 Internal Evaluation Report stated: …students found their roles as teacher researchers to be very empowering. Teachers reported (4.65 on the Likert scale) that the course material was relevant to their teaching practices. In particular they found that the re-
570
Journal of Chemical Education
•
search they were conducting on their own practices in their own classrooms was very catalytic (4.245 on the Likert scale) and many teachers (4.535 on the Likert scale) reported that the research they did in their own classrooms was beneficial to their teaching.
With the presentation of all of the MCE program courses for the second time, the graduation of the first two cohorts, and an ongoing evaluation process that covers all content, pedagogy, logistics, and coordination the MCE program continues to be a work-in-progress. Acknowledgments Support for this project was received from the National Science Foundation, Elementary, Secondary and Informal Education Division, Teacher Enhancement, Award ESI 9911825, Rohm and Haas Company, Bristol-Myers Squibb, DuPont Center for Collaborative Research and Education, and The University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences. Note 1. The University of Pennsylvania’s Office of Regulatory Affairs’ Institutional Review Board has approved the research methodology employed. Appropriate district/building, teacher, parent, and student research subject permission forms are obtained as required.
Literature Cited 1. National Science Board. Role for the National Science Foundation and Recommendations for Action by Other Sectors to Strengthen Collegiate Education and Pursue Excellence in the Next Generation of U.S. Leadership in Science and Technology; National Science Foundation: Arlington, VA, 1986. 2. The National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century. Before It’s Too Late; U.S. Department of Education: Washington, DC, 2000. 3. National Research Council. National Science Education Standards; National Academy Press: Washington, DC, 1996; pp 55–73. 4. Bretz, S. L. J. Chem. Educ. 2002, 79, 1307–1309. 5. Ingersoll, R. M. Educational Leadership 2001, 58, 42–45. 6. ACS Sourcebook, Version 2.1; Orna, M. V., Schreck, J. O., Heikkinen, H., Eds.; ChemSource, Inc.: Philadelphia PA, 1998. 7. Slater, C. L.; Trowbridge, S. Action in Teacher Ed. 2000, 22, 15–22. 8. Gosser, D. K.; Cracolice, M. S.; Kampmeier, J. A.; Roth, V.; Strozak, V. S.; Varma-Nelson, P. Peer-Led Team Learning—A Guidebook; Prentice-Hall, Inc.: Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2001; Chapter 1. 9. Zumdahl, S. S. Chemical Principles, 4th ed.; Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 2002; p 6. 10. Milne, C. In ACS Abstracts of Papers; ACS National Meeting; Chicago, IL, Aug 26 –30, 2001; Abstract No. 413. 11. Guba, E. G.; Lincoln, Y. S.; Fourth Generation Evaluation; Sage Publications: Newbury Park, CA, 1989. 12. Gabel, D. J. Chem Educ. 1999, 76, 548–629. 13. Milne, C.; Scantlebury, K.; Otieno, T. In ACS Abstracts of Papers; ACS National Meeting; Boston, MA, Aug 18–23, 2002; Abstract No. 312.
Vol. 82 No. 4 April 2005
•
www.JCE.DivCHED.org
