Sarah Earle

Supporting teachers with formative assessment in primary science

Contact Author: Dr Sarah Earle (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)

School of Education, Bath Spa University, Bath, UK

BACKGROUND AND AIMS

The formative use of assessment information to support children’s learning in primary science can be difficult to enact in the classroom, with limited lesson time, accountability pressures and for many, a lack of confidence in teaching and assessing science. The difficulties encountered with implementation of formative assessment indicates a need for further professional learning and exemplification of manageable ways to embed formative assessment in teaching. Utilizing training and resources from the Teacher Assessment in Primary Science (TAPS) project, with its Design-Based Research approach (Davies et al., 2017), this study seeks to explore how such professional learning can impact formative assessment practices.

Su-Chi Fang^a, Lihua Xu^b, Linda Hobbs^b

Do teachers need a shared vision of STEM? Comparing Australian and Taiwanese teachers’ conceptions and implementation

Contact Author: Su-Chi Fang (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)

^aGraduate Institute of Science Education, National Taiwan Normal University, Taipei, Taiwan

^bSchool of Education, Deakin University, Melbourne, Australia

BACKGROUND AND AIMS

While the STEM agenda has been advocated internationally, each country has formulated own approaches to STEM-focused national statements, curricula and resources. Whether these differences lead to country-specific implementation practices and different conceptions of the role of STEM in education is unclear. To effectively support teachers’ professional development for STEM education, it is critical to understand current STEM conceptions and practices in schools.

This study adopted a cross-cultural comparative approach to investigate the current status of STEM education (including the existing curriculum frameworks, teacher conceptions and implementation) across two culturally distinctive settings: Australia and Taiwan. Understanding country-specific similarities and differences could help to identify opportunities and challenges associated with current STEM practices within and across the two settings, and highlight promising approaches to quality STEM implementation and teacher professional development.