Teaching science through stories : mounting scientific enquiry

Early years science curriculum in England requires teachers to incorporate scientific enquiry in their classrooms. However, teachers perceive science teaching to be challenging because of their lack of subject knowledge. This paper aims to develop an understanding of science as an enquiry rich subject rather than a plethora of scientific knowledge. In this paper, I will present a model of Enquiry Based Learning (EBL) that can be introduced in early years teaching and learning practices. This presentation of the EBL model will then lead to a discussion on the benefits of using children’s stories to scaffold the process of scientific enquiry. Finally, I will present three example scenarios from the stories of Curious George, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Wizard of Oz, to support early year practitioners to include scientific enquiry practices as an integral part of their day-to-day planning and delivery of lessons

Mentoring for developing scientifically literate citizens

There is considerable research available that shows the need for scientifically literate people in the world. What exactly constitutes a science-literate citizen? Is it, for example, a person who ‘applies scientific habits of minds’ (Huxley, 1882, p.4); one who develops scientific attitudes and exhibits ‘open-mindedness, intellectual integrity, observation, and interest in testing their opinions and beliefs’ (Dewey 1934, p.3); who can communicate between two cultures – science and arts - that results in an understanding and learning of science among families, cultures and societies (C. P. Snow, 1959)? Or is it someone who can engage in ‘self-directed learning in science and technology beyond the school years’ (Rennie, Stocklmayer & Gilbert, 2019). Along these lines, we see scientifically literate people as everyday people who may not be working in any science specialist fields (such as a marine biologist or astrophysicist), but are learners who can accumulate and grasp aspects of science while solving everyday problems. They can, for instance, exhibit abilities to research and critique facts on social media, acquire scientific vocabulary so that they can understand if they are hurt or ill, listen to a BBC Radio 5 Science podcast or appreciate the science content in the daily news. As a framework for this chapter, we ask you first to analyse two stories of non-science professionals. For this, you need to bring your own - and your mentee(s) – personal experiences to bear in deciding what constitutes a scientifically literate person - and how, as science teachers, you might support, develop, advise and guide such people. The second, and longer, part of the chapter provides you with text-based science ideas about mentoring - ideas you can use as they are, or adapt and develop further to support and empower beginning teachers in embedding scientific literacy as a part of their everyday teaching and learning practices. The ambition here is that beginning teachers will help pupils, especially those pupils who are unsure or not interested in continuing with the study of science subjects, to see the learning of science not as an obstacle created by arcane facts, theories and laws, but a highly useful way to live a better and globally informed life

Making scientists: developing a model of science identity

This thesis was submitted for the award of Doctor of Philosophy and was awarded by Brunel University LondonThis study is an analysis of a three-phase study with twelve professional scientists and non-scientists (Phase One), one-hundred and twenty-three science and non-science university students (Phase Two) and thirty secondary school girls (Phase Three), to illustrate their ‘science lives’. I have used identity theories and transformational learning theory (TLT) to illustrate transformation or movement of learners towards, or away from, science. The understanding of these models and theories have led me to design a theoretical model of science identity (Sci-ID) that represents the global forces (GF) experienced by learners, the social agencies and agents (SA) that embody those forces, the transformational learning (TL) experiences (events, triggers and interventions) that shape personal meaning, and the inclinations and individual internal agency (IIA) that impact upon individuals’ subject and career choices. I have adopted semi-structured ‘narrative’ styled interviews, a descriptive questionnaire and science ‘intervention evaluation’ approaches from the three cohorts. The data generated has been analysed in several ways, including the use of synoptic analysis to construct individual stories about the participants, in third-person voice, from their responses. These stories and the broader, aggregated, thematic, outcomes have been used to examine the Sci-ID model. These outcomes stress three main themes related to the study (or not) of science, that include (i) progressive transformational learning and smooth transformation, (ii) progressive transformational learning and wavering transformation and (iii) reconstructive transformational learning and wavering transformation. These themes indicates that people in life accept and reject certain TL experiences that either ‘go with their IIA’ or ‘go against it’. The majority find their way, choose and select TL experiences exhibiting small or medium movement towards or away from science. However, very few people exhibit large movement accompanied by regressive TL experiences. This study also reveals the existence of two very broad kinds of people (i) people who demonstrate stable pro-science or anti science and (ii) ‘fluid’ people who populate the centre-ground between pro-science and anti-science people. The fluid group caught my attention because their IIA shows greater ambivalence and the impact of GF, SA, incorporating events, triggers and interventions appear to have more impact than on those with a more stable science identity. Therefore, through six science education-based interventions I was able to work with – and influence - more ‘fluid’ kinds of secondary school girls. I used a number of mini-transformative experiences that led them to gain appreciation of science-based education and possible future science careers

Models of scientific identity

This chapter examines a series of key science identity-based research models. Our purpose is to discuss the interplay of individual agency and social interaction through the lens of transformative learning. We critique those current identity-based models based on the importance given to either social structures and/or agency separately. We also review contemporary research on transformational learning and identity change, illustrating transformation or movement of learners towards, or away from, the study of science. The chapter is a contribution to the debates concerning the considerable impact of identity construction on learning, and the construction of ‘science-identity’ in particular. With this in mind, we examine the central issues in the light of the teaching and learning of science in schools and universities, as well as in the population at large. Our core argument is that an understanding and analysis of these models and theories leads to the design of a conjugated theoretical model of ‘science identity’ (Sci-ID) consisting of seven main interconnected and interlinked ‘slices’. These seven slices represent the (i) global forces (GF: such as gender, ethnicity, race and class) experienced by learners, (ii) social agencies and agents (SA: such as schools, other institutes, parents and teachers) personifying global forces, (iii) transformational learning (TL) experiences (accidental and/or planned events, triggers and interventions) shaping (iv) personal preferences, (v) meaning, and (vi) individual internal agency (IIA) directed by the inner most (vii) central core impacting upon individuals’ subject and career choices. Our concluding summary encompasses: (a) identities that are fluid and stable – with the journey towards stability depends on factors such as, for example, age, experiences, relationships, events, triggers, etc. (b) identities that are not entirely fluid, where there are forms of stability, a kind of internal force or agency that empowers people in accepting or declining the influences from the external forces; and (c) the ways in which one’s identity depends on the strength of certain GF, SA, TL experiences (events, triggers, interventions) and the strength of one’s IIA that goes with it or against it

‘STEAM success stories’: refocusing the framework of intersectionality

In this article, we first explore the metaphor of wearing culture, drawn from the work of Anne Phillips, which challenges some of the precepts underpinning theories of intersectionality. We then go on to celebrate successes rather than failures, a departure from the broad ethos of intersectionality and illustrate how wearing of STEAM culture can be enacted throughout women’s ‘STEAM lives’, employing a pedagogy for success. We make use of phenomenographic approaches to gather and present women’s ‘STEAM success stories’. Autobioracy is the term we coin here, in contrast to autobiography, to describe our capture of these oral accounts. We use data from three cases – Fatima, Su-Li and Anna-Maria – to illustrate their adult re-engagement with elements of STEAM, having long since disengaged from early formal school-based science and technology. We finally resist a template process for the interpretation and presentation of their storied accounts and adopt, instead, a montage approach to place instances and descriptions side by side to illuminate their complex, often contradictory and unpredictable ways of knowing

A pedagogy for success: two stories from STEM

This paper aims to debate the need to change our discussions from the pedagogy of success to pedagogy for success. In justifying the prepositional shift, we discussed our understanding of success and pedagogy using some relevant literature, followed by the five key features which formulate our pedagogy for success. These features are the web of relations with people, learning objectives established subjectively (or not), the flow from knowledge patterns and streams, the experiential texture and the self and/or situationally ascribed evaluative tone. Each of the five features exhibits no set recipe of particular proportions that a teacher, student or professional can use to become successful in STEM or a toolkit that has certain STEM-based specific skills, abilities and knowledge leading to a successful STEM life. Instead, the pedagogy for success challenges the set criteria of success, by highlighting the ideology of personalised non-hierarchal successes from a variety of sources and spaces. Practically, using the five-featured theoretical framework, we have showcased the STEM stories of Amna and Samreen from our 2021 qualitative, entre-deux, autobioracy-styled data collection. Finally, discussing pedagogy for success using five crosscutting themes that exhibit a non-linear and long-lasting acquisition of a successful STEM life

Intersectionality as personal : the science identity of two young immigrant Muslim women

This paper studies intersectional multiplicity by encompassing the ways individuals shape relationships between social structures and their science identity. We discuss the science lives of two sixteen-year-old British South-Asian Muslim women studying in a single-sex independent school in London, both of whom aspire to science careers. Adapting McCall’s ‘intracategorical complexity’ in favouring a case study approach, we present the multiplicity of our participants’ relationships with exclusion and inequality, discrimination and privilege within their lived social settings, and how these relationships shape their identities and ambitions to become scientists. Our findings reveal that despite their similarities in their societally ascribed intersectional makeup, Ayesha and Hanya differ in viewing their intersections as challenges and/or opportunities. They both portray agentic control towards ‘going against the grain’ as future women scientists by negotiating their intersections as they develop their science identity

Supporting beginning science teachers to teach and evaluate their lessons

This chapter aims to highlight some mentoring strategies when working with beginning teachers who are at different developmental stages of teaching. For example, a beginning teacher you are mentoring might be observing and practising some basic teaching skills, but not yet teaching a full lesson, or they might have started to incorporate a range of teaching strategies in lessons, but these strategies are not specifically focusing on promoting pupils’ learning and so on. Therefore, you should use your judgement and knowledge about the beginning teacher to identify the best mentoring strategy to use at any one time. The chapter starts with a brief description of the stages of development using Maynard and Furlong’s (1995) model of a beginning teacher’s development concerning basic teaching skills, teaching strategies and teaching styles. Next, some characteristic behaviours of an effective teacher are presented. A range of mentoring steps to support the beginning teacher’s journey of becoming an effective teacher, starting from ‘early idealism’ then ‘survival’, ‘recognising difficulties’, ‘hitting a plateau’ and finally to ‘moving on’ stages of development are then given. The chapter closes with a discussion on how to support a beginning teacher to self-evaluate their lessons by using lesson debriefs (called post lesson discussions in Chapter 8) and pupils’ feedback. Objectives At the end of this chapter you should be able to: 1. Recognise that it is a mentor’s responsibility to identify a beginning teacher’s stages of development and support them towards becoming an effective teacher; 2. Support a beginning teacher to develop the characteristic behaviours of an effective teacher; 3. Assist a beginning teacher to be able to identify and develop basic teaching skills, teaching strategies and a pupil-centred teaching style; 4. Encourage a beginning teacher to self-evaluate their lessons with the aid of lesson de-briefs and pupils’ feedback

Supporting beginning teachers with lesson planning

The planning and teaching of lessons are integral to the role of a teacher. In our experience as teacher educators and school-based mentors, a series of lessons which are carefully planned and clearly articulated by the teacher are the ones that are most successful for pupils’ learning. Our experience aligns with the quote allegedly by Benjamin Franklin, ‘If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail.’ However, as experienced teachers, we know that not all lessons go according to plan. As a mentor, you need to be resilient and accepting of the fact that a beginning teacher could ‘fail’ due to insufficient understanding of the long-term effect of planning on pupils’ learning. As a consequence, you need to have well developed strategies in place to support a beginning teacher to cultivate understanding of advanced practices of lesson planning. This chapter addresses issues that a beginning teacher might have with lesson planning. It draws on strands from Chapter 4 on reflective practices by adapting Kolb’s learning cycle (Kolb, 1984) to the planning process, exploring potential strategies that you can implement to support a beginning teacher. Using Daloz’s mentoring model (Daloz, 2012) (see Chapter 1) and Rogoff’s (1995) adapted model, this chapter explores when and how you can support and challenge a beginning teacher to become autonomous in planning for pupils’ learning. Additionally, using perspectives from cognitive psychology on learning, the chapter frames how you can facilitate a beginning teacher to plan lessons that support a long-term curriculum plan

Decolonising curriculum in education: continuing proclamations and provocations

There is no denying the importance and increased significance of interest in decolonisation in education and the wider social sciences. This article aims to bring a continuing contribution to an evolving and important discussion. The methodology of this work allows a range of academics from different cultural contexts to voice their decolonising proclamations. The authors of the article are a combination of White, Black, Asian and mixed-race academic researchers in higher education who have come together to proclaim their viewpoints. They draw upon their research and apply professional practice in relation to differing aspects of generally decolonising education and specifically decolonising curricula. As a group, we believe that the notion of decolonising applies to all sections of education – not only to primary schools, but also to nurseries, secondary schools, colleges and universities. We hope this article will encourage more research, advocacy and action within education and interdisciplinary contexts into the complexity of decolonising the curriculum