A Maryland school district and the Smithsonian Institution have become partners in outdoor science education. Working together, they have developed a series of activities for students in grades 1-8 that are an integrated part of a total unified science curriculum, meeting the need of teachers and students alike.
This seminal book describes the nature and extent of science learning in America with particular attention to the innumerable sources of science education existing outside the formal education system.
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Institute for Learning InnovationJohn H Falk
This brief synthesis presents the main points of agreement between Dawson and Jensen's article, “‘Towards a ‘Contextual Turn’ in Visitor Studies: Evaluating Visitor Segmentation and Identity-Related Motivations” (this issue) and Falk's reply, “Contextualizing Falk's Identity-Related Visitor Motivation Model” (this issue), and it highlights important considerations for future research.
Six studies on school field trip learning are reviewed. Among the findings reported are those indicating that students' perceptions of the novelty of the trip affects what they learn, and that imposed learning will be inhibited in settings where novelty is either extremely great or small.
Describes an instrument developed to quantitatively evaluate the participation levels of students on outdoor education activities. From photographs taken at two minute intervals, students are assigned values for their observed behaviors. The correlations of values assigned by several judges are shown.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR) MinnAqua program educates the state's youth about angling and aquatic resources. In 2001, MinnAqua developed a Leaders' Guide so educators could carryout MinnAqua activities in their own setting. As part of the development process, a formative evaluation was undertaken to answer the questions: (a) To what extent are MinnAqua's rewrite guidelines addressed in individual lessons and the Leaders' Guide as a whole?, and (b) To what extent does the Leaders' Guide meet the educational needs of intended users in both formal and informal
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Amy Grack NelsonMinnesota Department of Natural Resources
I-CLEEN, a project led by the Museum of Science of Trento (Italy), has developed and currently manages an information gateway of Earth system science educational resources. The aim of the project is to support Italian science teachers in setting up Earth science student-centred lessons. To do so effectively, the gateway exhibits the following key features: it adopts a bottom – up approach to resource development that relies on strong cooperation between science teachers and professional researchers (who also act as resource referees); it is subject–oriented and enhances the multi- and interdisciplinary traits that characterize geosciences; it embraces the concept of open source, through the technological tools (LifeRay) used and copyright policies adopted. A service usability study was performed after the first launch of the gateway and the results were used to develop the second release, which is currently online. During the preliminary phase of the project, as well as the development and set-up of the gateway, valuable insight was gained in various different fields: On the current situation in geoscience education in Italy – where teachers are encouraged to take up a student-centred approach, experiential education and learning initiatives, but currently opt for academic teaching methods because they lack the support and the tools needed. On the educational resource gateways currently available online, on the materials they provide and on the role of ICT in Earth science education. On the results achieved and the tools developed during previous science communication activities that involved teachers and students in research projects.
The January 2013 issue includes articles and features on crowdsourcing, partnerships in natural history museums, communicating science through art, theater as climate change education, case studies on informal science education-related projects like gigapixel imaging and museum educators collaborating with scientists to engage visitors, and more.