Inquiry-based science education (IBSE) has been a key element in science education for the past decade and should therefore be a key element of pre-service teacher (PST) education as well. This study aims to explore how IBSE is implemented in teacher education for primary and lower secondary levels (years 1-10) to prepare PSTs for their…

This study explored how preservice teachers engaged in collaborative inquiry with elementary students to facilitate social justice and equity in science education. By inviting elementary students as key stakeholders into collaborative inquiry, we examined how preservice teachers uncovered critical problems of science education in underserved…

One major implication of the Next Generation Science Standards is the need to integrate inquiry and practice and incorporate engineering into science education. To support teachers' change efforts in a time of heightened science, technology, engineering, and mathematics standards for all students, effective professional development (PD) is…

The overall purpose of this multifocused study was to explore how participation in genuine mentored scientific research experiences impacts in-service science teachers and the knowledge and skills needed for their own science teaching. The research experiences resulted from a partnership between the University of Nebraska at Omaha and the Omaha…

While many studies focus on why teachers leave the classroom, there remains a need to study why teachers persist in teaching. One area to study is the beliefs of teachers, which may impact persistence in the field. This 5-year mixed-methods study explored whether 35 beginning secondary science teachers' beliefs were related to their persistence in…

This study investigated the effects of a 1-year professional development (PD) based on a cognitive apprenticeship model of research experiences on inservice teacher self-efficacy of science teaching, motivation, knowledge calibration, and perceptions of inquiry of 19 secondary earth science and biology teachers. The PD facilitator, who serves a…

Prior research has mainly focused on what makes professional development effective from the program design perspective. However, there is a lack of understanding about what teachers need for improvement in the context of educational reforms and curricular changes. This study used the pedagogical content knowledge framework to examine teachers'…

The purpose of this study was to investigate high school teachers' beliefs about inquiry instruction and determine how their beliefs influenced their use of inquiry after a professional development program. Thirty-six high school science teachers participated in this study. The professional development program consisted of a 2-week summer…

Anecdotal accounts from science educators suggest that few teachers are teaching science as inquiry. However, there is little empirical evidence to support this claim. This study aimed to provide evidence-based documentation of the state-of-use of inquiry-based instruction and explicit instruction about nature of science (NOS). We examined the…

In order to provide a picture of how inquiry is practiced in everyday science classrooms, the articles published in "The Science Teacher" from 1998 to 2007 were analyzed for explicit evidence of features of inquiry. Inquiry was operationally defined by the essential features detailed in "Inquiry and the National Science Education Standards" (NRC…

This study describes the influence of a secondary science methods program on secondary science preservice teachers' views and enactment of nature of science and inquiry-based instructional practices. Built into the structure of this program were three cycles of practice teaching and reflection in which the preservice teachers focused on key…

This study assessed the influence of guided inquiry and explicit reflective instruction on K-6 teachers' views of nature of science (NOS). Using the Views of Nature of Science Elementary School Version 2 (VNOS-D2), and associated interviews we tracked the changes in NOS views of teacher participants prior to and following a summer professional…