Building Awareness Needs, Opportunities, and
Best Practices in Pre-Service Teacher Education
Rick Pomeroy
University of California, Davis
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Student Teacher Conversation
Insert joke here
Education is a Black Box
Input Output
Garbage in Garbage out
Carbon
Charcoal
Coal
Graphite
Diamonds
Education
Prior Experiences
Informed populace
Scientists
Teachers
Instruction
Education
Prior Experiences
Trained Workforce
Instruction ?
Education
Learning
Building Awareness Needs, Opportunities,
and Best Practices
in Pre-Service Teacher Education
Guiding Questions
• Are there different approaches necessary for elementary and secondary science teachers?
• How can we mitigate science phobia among elementary teachers?
• What are the key areas of space science content knowledge for pre-service teachers?
Needs
• 17-28% of Science Teachers lack full certification– Greater numbers of elementary teachers
lack science certification or understanding
• Anticipated shortfall of science teachers– Programs to increase science teachers
include loan forgiveness, bonuses, second and third career applicants
Overview of Pre-Service Education
• Who is teaching science?• What does it take to become a certified
teacher?• How long do science teachers stay in the
profession?• How can we address science phobia? • How can the EPO community participate in
Pre-Service TE?
Opportunities K-12
• To promote engagement
• To increase career interest
• To promote engagement • To increase career interest• To take the opportunity to focus on learning
Opportunities-Undergraduate
• To increase interest
• To promote career potential
• To increase interest• To promote career potential• Take the opportunity to improve teaching
and learning
Opportunities Pre-Service
• Promote activity based science instruction
• Improve teacher content knowledge
• Promote activity based science instruction
• Improve teacher content knowledge
• Collaborate to improve student learning through theoretically sound pedagogy
Best Practices
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Best Practices
• What can we put into the box?
• Specifically, how can the EPO Community work with Pre-Service Education to make diamonds instead of charcoal?
What can we do?
• Start with what “students” know• Engage “students” (at all levels) in
challenging, pedagogically sound instructional techniques.
• Promote authentic Inquiry• Use formative assessment to guide
instruction• Carefully determine what “students” have
learned
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• And why do you think they are very smart?
• They do well.• What do you mean by they do well? Why
do you think that?• Why? • You said that they participate. So if I
participate would that make you think I am doing well?
• They have more confidence.• It sounds like doing well is related to
having some sort of interaction with you.
How do we know???
• Which students are doing well?• Ahh, Nico, Ryan, and ahhh Jason are
doing well, I get a lot of participation from them
• So because they participate they are doing well?
• No, But for some reason those stand out, Alexis and Kelly are very smart too.
How do we know???
• Which students are doing well?• Ahh, Nico, Ryan, and ahhh Jason are
doing well, I get a lot of participation from them
• So because they participate they are doing well?
• No, But for some reason those stand out, Alexis and Kelly are very smart too.
• And why do you think they are very smart?
• They do well.• What do you mean by they do well? Why
do you think that?• Why? • You said that they participate. So if I
participate would that make you think I am doing well?
• They have more confidence.• It sounds like doing well is related to
having some sort of interaction with you.
Black Box Theory
Prior Experiences
Informed populace
Scientists
Teachers
Instruction ?