Workshops
Summer 2010 Professional Development Workshop
Summer 2009 Professional Development Workshop Follow-Up
Summer 2009 Professional Development Workshop
With the establishment of a STEM middle school and other initiatives, the Springfield, Massachusetts Public School System (SPS) has made a commitment to excellence in Technology/Engineering instruction for all of its 5700 students. To support this commitment a partnership between the Springfield Middle Schools, Springfield Technical Community College (STCC), and Smith College has been funded through an NSF MSP-Start Partnership Grant. The overall goal of the grant is to enable teachers to reach and inspire students typically outside of the engineering “pipeline”. Fundamental to the project is supporting teacher professional development that is based upon the research from the learning sciences. In particular, the research shows that effective instruction requires teachers to have both a deep understanding of the subject area and an understanding of how students develop their understanding.1 Recognizing the need for a sustained and multi-faceted commitment, our approach to teacher education includes workshops, developing an on-line learning community and a variety of strategies for directly supporting teachers in the classroom.
The inaugural workshop was held at Smith College for two weeks in summer 2009 with 16 SPS middle school technology/engineering teachers attending. To allow time for in-depth learning, the workshop focused only on the Construction Technologies strand of the Massachusetts Curriculum Framework. The workshop began with an “appreciative inquiry” to identify the essence of teachers’ strengths and needs as well as to nurture a community of learners. Recognizing the importance of context in both effective engineering and in the learning process, teachers learned about the fundamentals of engineering mechanics through hands-on activities that they could use in their own classrooms and within a variety of contexts that included the design process, an ethics case study, and the history and esthetics of bridge design. Fundamental principles from the learning sciences and the research on educating under-represented minorities were also discussed and modeled throughout the workshop. Examples include the use of conceptual frameworks and narratives for making engineering concepts relevant to grade 6-8 students in an urban, diverse, and challenged community. Teachers applied what they learned during the workshop by developing and sharing curricula for their own classrooms. As a result of the workshop, ongoing activities to develop the Partnership, such as an electronic learning community and STCC/Smith student mentors in SPS classrooms were agreed upon and are underway.
[1] National Research Council Commission on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience and School, National Academy Press, Washington D.C. (2000
To view the presentations, download any of the powerpoint files below:
