Seattle Pacific University Project Report 2007
Early Teaching Experiences
Successes
- Students in our LA pedagogy course were required to visit a K12 science classroom and carefully observe the learning environment.
- The majority of the students in the Science Methods courses were able to teach at least one science lesson during their Methods Quarter.
Challenges
- In classroom observation, we did not want teachers to feel that the LAs were critically analyzing and judging their teaching.
- Some cooperating teachers do not model science instruction that is consistent inquiry.
Sustainability Physics Department Buy-In
- This coming year we will explore ways to include K12 teaching experiences as part of the LA pedagogy course.
- This year we will follow-up elementary classroom teacher recommendations provided by Seattle Science Program Leadership to set up visitations with these exceptional teachers for students in our science content course.
Lesson Learned
- It is critical that students focus their observations on the learning environment in a classroom rather than attempting to evaluate the instruction.
- If there is an expectation that the preservice teachers will present a science lesson during their methods work, most are able to do it.
Activity Summary
- We initiated an LA Pedagogy course, modeled on the course developed by Valerie Otero and Steve Iona at UC Boulder.
- Students in the LA pedagogy course were required to do a scheduled observation of a K12 physics or physical science class. The student used a portion of the RTOP which focuses on the classroom learning environment rather that the explicit actions of the teacher.
- The majority of the students in the Science Methods courses were able to teach at least one science lesson during their methods course.
