Abstract:

Teaching science in primary education is a challenge in the Netherlands as many teachers lack background knowledge in science, have limited pedagogical content knowledge and low self efficacy.

Integrating language education and science education is a potential way to bring science education into the classrooms (Howes, Campos, & Lim, 2004). To prepare both language as well as science teacher educators for teaching integrated language and science education to their students, we developed a professional development program (PDP) . The PDP was a blended learning program and was designed according to the principles of design based research.

In developing the PDP, various design criteria were used:
1. results of a review study concerning professionalization (Van Veen et al, 2010),
2. the use of effective multimedia solutions (Mayer, 2017) and
3. key components of language oriented science education (Smit, Gijsel, Hotze & Bakker, 2018).

The design was systematically evaluated for practical usability (Doyle & Ponder, 1977-1978) by members of the design team, a language expert and the participants and was optimised on that basis. Formative evaluations of the PDP showed that the participants positively evaluated its practical usability. In particular, they appreciated the user-friendliness.

Subsequently, the impact of the PDP has been studied by using a mixed method design with a pre and post questionnaire (16 participants) and a multiple case study with interviews. The questionnaires have been analysed by a Wilcoxon Signed Rank test and the interviews have been transcribed and coded according to the model of Clarke and Hollingsworth (Clarke & Hollingsworth, 2002). The results indicated that teacher educators of both language and science became more aware of the relationship between language and science, did acknowledge the importance of integration of language and science and had acquired new knowledge about language-oriented science education. This latter result was reflected in their teaching; they integrated language and science in their lessons (via co-teaching for example) and even in some cases they taught their students how to enact language oriented science lessons in their lessons at their internship schools. Nevertheless, results indicate that students themselves do not yet enact language oriented science lessons.

References:
[1] Clarke, D., & Hollingsworth, H. (2002). Elaborating a model of teacher professional growth. Teaching and Teacher Education, 18, 947-967
[2] Doyle, W., & Ponder, G. (1977-1978). The practical ethic in teacher decision making. Interchange, 8, 1-12.
[3] Howes, E.V., Campos, J., Lim, M. (2004). Learning from children about science teaching and learning in an urban school. Ethnography in Education Research Forum, Philadelphia, (PA).
[4] Mayer, R. (2017). Using multimedia for e-learning. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.111/jcal.12197/epdf.
[5] Smit, J., Gijsel, M., Hotze, A., & Bakker, A. (2018). Scaffolding Primary teachers in Designing and Enacting Language-Oriented Science Lessons. Learning, Culture and Social Interaction, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2210656117302246
[6] Van Veen, K., Zwart, R., Meirink, J., & Verloop, N. (2010). Professionele ontwikkeling van leraren. een reviewstudie naar effectieve kenmerken van professionalieringsinterventies van leraren:. Leiden: ICLON/Expertisecentrum Leren van Docenten.

Keywords:

Teacher education, language oriented science education, blended professionalization.