Becoming an effective science teacher at the Department of Curricular Studies, University of Strathclyde

In an article for the International section, Allan Blake, Colin Smith and Jim McNally from Strathclyde report on the start of a very important EU-funded project, involving 15 countries, which looks at how ‘inquiry-based science’ can be promoted in science teaching and the significance for teacher education. In their view, inquiry-based science is more about open-endedness and uncertainty of outcome than routine (prescribed) practical work. STE will keep track of this important project and we will report on its progress and outcomes in future issues

Business Cycle Theory and Econometrics

We outline in turn criticisms made by econometricians of the methods used in empirical business-cycle research and then criticisms made by business-cycle researchers of some methods used by econometricians. The aim is to clarify and in some cases correct these criticisms. Overall there is no conflict in using rigourous statistical procedures to study modern dynamic stochastic general equilibrium models. We also provide a concise bibliography of recent research on statistical methods for business-cycle models.business cycles, time-series econometrics

Promoting Inquiry in Science Classrooms in European Schools : a Handbook for Tutors

In Scotland, PISCES stands for Promoting Inquiry Skills for a Curriculum for Excellence in Science. It is a CPD module for teachers of science, which has been developed in Scotland with the support of the S-TEAM project. However, this Handbook uses our international acronym in which PISCES stands for Promoting Inquiry in Science Classrooms in European Schools . It is, we believe, potentially equally as successful across Europe as it was designed around the idea of empowering teachers to think for themselves how to make their practice more-inquiry based, wherever they are. It is recognised that some school, social, policy and cultural environments may be more supportive of the idea of ‘more inquiry-based practice’ than others. PISCES empowers teachers to make small or large changes to their practice, according to those sorts of contextual factors, their own aims and how they perceive the needs of their pupils. You will note that we have been careful to use the word ‘more’ in ‘more inquiry-based.’ As befits the idea of empowerment to adapt to one’s own context, there is no single model of inquiry being ‘pushed’ here. Indeed, we count it as a measure of success of PISCES that the teachers who have participated did very different things in making their practice more inquiry-based. Strathclyde University is a leading partner in S-TEAM. Members of Strathclyde University, along with the Development Officer for Curriculum for Excellence for East Lothian, successfully developed and delivered a pilot version of PISCES as a module to a group of East Lothian teachers, in 2010/11. The module resulted in successful ‘experiments in practice’ and increased awareness of the benefits of inquiry-based teaching and learning. The same group of teachers have also taken part in a follow-up course (ARIES: Advanced Resources for Inquiry and Evaluation in Science). PISCES is a high quality CPD programme, valued by teachers and supportive of their professional self-development. It can be applied to both primary and secondary teaching, in all science subjects. Pupils benefit from learning experiences, which develop scientific inquiry skills. Feedback from participating teachers has been consistently positive

The indicators of pupil opinion and teacher interactivity for inquiry-based science teaching

In order to establish those practices which underpin a science teaching performance that combines pupil enthusiasm and creative classrooms, it will be necessary to uncover evidence of inquiry-based learning experiences in science that can provide a warrant for theory and practice that will assist new science teachers in recognising and developing opportunities for investigative activity. Remaining aware, however, of the recurring theme in contemporary educational research which suggests that learning to teach has an important affective dimension associated with developing relationships and the formation of a teaching identity – a model of development which thus transcends atheoretical checklists of professional standards or pedagogical steps – the nature of that evidence will necessarily be in the area of the formative development of new teachers’ professional knowledge and understanding

Online Learning and Experimentation via Interactive Learning Resources

Recent trends in online learning like Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and Open Educational Resources (OERs) are changing the landscape in the education sector by allowing learners to self-regulate their learning and providing them with an abundant amount of free learning materials. This paper presents FORGE, a new European initiative for online learning and experimentation via interactive learning resources. FORGE provides learners and educators with access to world- class facilities and high quality learning materials, thus enabling them to carry out experiments on e.g. new Internet protocols. In turn, this supports constructivist and self-regulated learning approaches, through the use of interactive learning resources, such as eBooks

Promoting inquiry skills in Curriculum for Excellence in Science: conceptualising inquiry to improve practice

This paper describes a Scottish initiative (arising out of a EU funded development project) involving university researchers, a local authority curriculum development officer and a group of teachers interested in developing more inquiry based approaches in science education. The project is not one in which the researchers bring prescriptions from research. Rather, it is seen as a joint effort aimed at solving practitioners' conceptual and practice issues. The overall question for the teachers was, How do I (we) make our practice more inquiry based? The question for the researchers was, How do we help you (the interested science teachers) to make your practice more inquiry based? This has two sub-questions: How do we help you to conceptualise the issues? How do we help you to solve the practice problems? As it turned out, the particular group of teachers we worked with did not ask for help with practice issues, so we have not made much progress in answering the second question. Therefore, this paper will focus on the first. We seem to have been successful in helping the teachers to acquire some useful conceptual tools for thinking about and changing their practice in ways that they valued for themselves. Perhaps the answer to the second question is that researchers can help teachers to solve their practice problems by helping them to conceptualise the issues