This study examined the impact of an inquiry based Next Generation Science Standard aligned science unit on elementary students' understanding and application of the eight Science and Engineering Practices and their relation in building student problem solving skills. The study involved 44 second grade students and three participating classroom teachers. The treatment consisted of a school district developed Second Grade Earth Science unit: What is happening to our playground? that was taught at the beginning of the school year. Quantitative results from a Likert type scale pre and post survey and from student content knowledge assessments showed growth in student belief of their own abilities in the science classroom. Qualitative data gathered from student observations and interviews performed at the conclusion of the Earth Science unit further show gains in student understanding and attitudes. This study adds to the existing literature on the importance of standard aligned, inquiry based science curriculum that provides time for students to engage in science practices.

Differentiated instruction is a pedagogical method used by classroom teachers to enhance student learning. Researchers have described how students benefit from differentiated lessons, but have not explored the relationship between teachers' perceptions of differentiation and student success. This gap is problematic because teachers' instruction directly affects student achievement. The purpose of this hermeneutic phenomenological study was to explore how elementary (K-5) teachers define, familiarize, use, and perceive differentiation. The conceptual framework was rooted from a synthesis of ideas found in current refereed literature, and the educational concepts and constructionist theories of Piaget and Vygotsky. Purposeful sampling identified 12 participants for individual or focus group interviews. Data were analyzed through an interpretative analysis of open, axial, and selective coding; interpretations were subject to member checking to bolster trustworthiness. The findings revealed that teacher participants understood the textbook definition of differentiated instruction and focused on student grouping to create differentiated classrooms. Despite that understanding of differentiation, participants perceived differentiation as time consuming and challenging due to a lack of materials and diverse populations. Implications for social change focus on mindset and instruction. Administrators and teachers may use these findings to broaden the definition of differentiation. Furthermore, teachers may use this study to gain insight of their personal perception of differentiation, identify materials, and commit to improved pedagogical practices that focus on its versatility in classrooms and improve student learning. Teachers may consider the participants' experiences and change their own existing classroom environments, thus improving student successes.

Online courses of distance learning programmes at universities are designed considering the characteristics and needs of their adult learners. Basically, there are two types of learners in an online course: individual learners and collaborative learners. Designing for learner satisfaction and learning effectiveness for both types of learners is challenging. In fact, previous research has noted that many online courses fail due to poor design. As a solution, researchers have identified instructional design principles that can guide the design of successful online courses. However, these principles lack detailed information to apply them in contexts different from where they had been identified. This consideration raises a question: how does one adapt the existing design principles to design online courses that promote both individual and collaborative learning, particularly in contexts where online courses are supposed to be conducted with minimal teacher support? In the present research, this question is addressed via two sub-research questions: (1) which course components and their design features can promote learners’ satisfaction, perceived learning, and learning effectiveness, and (2) which course components and their design features can stimulate inquiry-based learning and peer-teaching? The research was carried out in the field of educational design research with sets of students and instructional designers of a virtual learning environment prepared for a university-level degree programme in Sri Lanka. Referring to the findings of this research, the thesis discusses how to design online courses that promote both individual and collaborative learning. Further, based on the findings, the thesis presents a set of design principles and guidelines to promote both individual and collaborative learning in online courses that are on information technology related subjects and prepared for distance learning programmes. / SIDA Funded National e-Learning Centre Project at the University of Colombo School of Computing, Sri Lanka

Les travaux pratiques représentent une composante incontournable de l'apprentissage. Toutefois, leur mise en œuvre au sein de laboratoires physiques requiert des infrastructures souvent coûteuses pour les institutions de formation qui peuvent ainsi difficilement faire face à la forte augmentation du nombre d'étudiants. Dans ce contexte, les laboratoires virtuels et distants (VRL) représentent une alternative pour assurer le passage à l'échelle des activités pratiques à moindre coût. De nombreux travaux de recherche ont émergé au cours de la dernière décennie en se focalisant sur les problématiques techniques et technologiques induites par ces nouveaux usages, telles que la fédération, la standardisation, ou la mutualisation des ressources de laboratoires. Cependant, les récentes revues de littérature du domaine mettent en exergue la nécessité de se préoccuper davantage des facettes pédagogiques liées à ces environnements informatiques innovants dédiés à l'apprentissage pratique. Dans cet objectif, nos travaux exploitent les traces issues des activités réalisées par les apprenants lors de sessions d'apprentissage pratique pour mettre en œuvre les théories socio-constructivistes qui sont au cœur de l'apprentissage exploratoire, et ainsi favoriser l'engagement et le processus de réflexion des étudiants. À partir de la littérature traitant des relations sociales entre apprenants, nous identifions dans un premier temps un ensemble de critères pour la conception de systèmes d'apprentissage pratique engageants. En s'appuyant sur une architecture de cloud computing, nous avons ensuite réalisé Lab4CE, un environnement web pour l'enseignement de l'Informatique capable de masquer la complexité des tâches de gestion des laboratoires, mais surtout d'exposer des capacités éducatives avancées. En effet, Lab4CE repose sur les Learning Analytics pour supporter différentes formes d'apprentissage telles que la collaboration, la coopération ou l'entraide entre pairs, mais également pour fournir des outils d'awareness et de réflexion visant à promouvoir l'apprentissage en profondeur pendant et après les activités pratiques. Plusieurs expérimentations en contexte d'apprentissage réel et présentiel montrent une évaluation positive de Lab4CE par les apprenants en terme d'utilisabilité, qu'ils s'appuient de manière significative sur nos outils d'awareness et de réflexion, mais que des artefacts supplémentaires sont nécessaires pour accroître leur engagement spontané dans des interactions sociales d'apprentissage. De plus, ces expérimentations soulignent l'existence d'une corrélation significative entre l'engagement des étudiants dans la plateforme et les stratégies d'apprentissage qu'ils mettent en œuvre d'une part, et leur performance académique d'autre part. Ces premiers résultats nous permettent d'affirmer que les théories socio-constructivistes sont un levier à l'engagement et à la réflexion dans les VRL. Ils nous invitent à confronter notre approche à d'autres modalités d'apprentissage, mais aussi à intégrer de nouvelles sources d'informations pour approfondir nos analyses du comportement et ainsi renforcer nos contributions à une meilleure prise en compte de l'apprentissage pratique dans les EIAH. / Practical activities, used in exploratory learning, represent a major component of education: they make learners acquire not only knowledge, but also skills and attitude, and they help them bridging the gap between theories and the real world within they are applied. However, the physical laboratories hosting these activities rely on expensive infrastructures that make very difficult for institutions to cope with the high increase of the students' population. Within this context, virtual and remote laboratories (VRL) bring an affordable alternative to provide practical activities at scale. Numerous research works have come up for the last decade; they mainly focused on technological issues such as the federation of remote laboratories, their standardization, or the pooling of the resources they provide. Nevertheless, the recent literature reviews highlight the need to pay more attention to the educational facets of these innovative learning environments. With that purpose in mind, our works make use of the learners' traces collected through their practical learning sessions to sustain socio-constructivist theories, on which practical activities rely on, and thus to engage students in their learning tasks and further their reflection. Starting from the study of scientific research, we identify as a first step a set of criteria required to design practical learning systems that support social interactions between learners. We then developed Lab4CE, a web-based environment for Computer Science education. This environment relies on a cloud computing architecture to provide learners with their own virtual resources, and hides the complexity of the inherent management tasks while offering advanced educational capabilities. Indeed, Lab4CE builds on learning analytics to enable different forms of learning such as collaboration, cooperation, or peer assistance, but also to supply learners as well as teachers awareness and reflection tools that aim at promoting deep learning during and after practical activities. We carried out several experimentations in authentic and hands-on learning contexts. They stressed the fact that learners evaluate positively the usability of Lab4CE, and they significantly rely on our awareness and reflection tools. However, extra artifacts are required to increase their spontaneous engagement in social learning interactions. Moreover, theses experimentations suggested a significant correlation between, on the one hand, student's activity in the environment and the learning strategies they apply and, on the other hand, their academic performance. These first results allow us to assess that socio-constructivist theories leverage engagement and reflection within VRL. They also invite us to put our approach into practice in other learning settings, but also to extend the sources of information to deal with our behavioral analyses in depth, and thus to enhance our contributions regarding the adoption of practical learning within technological environments.

The thesis Water is Life describes the natural science project realized over seven years at elementary school in Chrudim. The theoretical part is dedicated to comparison of the transmissive and constructive-based teaching. It also defines the terms: project, project- based teaching, projective method and research-based teaching. Further chapters deal with contrasting the project-based teaching with integrated theme-based teaching and implementation of the topic Water in the Framework Education Programme for Elementary Education. The analytical part of the thesis describes the process of realization of the Water is Life project from the methodology to the final evaluation. It also employs critical analysis of the project with emphasis on "projectivity" of the projects and necessity of following the basic criteria for the project-based teaching. The main aim of this thesis is to describe the problematic parts and the possible alterations of the described project. KEYWORDS Project teaching, cross-curricular relationships, water, project analysis, observation, inquiry-based science education

Pour de nombreux pays européens, ces dernières années ont été marquées par l’introduction des Enseignements Scientifiques Fondés sur l’Investigation (ESFI) dans les programmes scolaires. Deux objectifs sont poursuivis : offrir une image « plus conforme » de l’activité scientifique et éveiller l’intérêt des élèves en mettant l’accent sur leur rôle actif dans le processus d’apprentissage. Parallèlement à l’introduction de ces démarches, la mise en œuvre d’évaluations formatives ouvre une voie prometteuse pour répondre à ces objectifs. Elles sont en effet susceptibles de développer l’autorégulation des apprentissages des élèves et de constituer une aide pertinente pour les enseignants afin de réguler leur enseignement (Allal & Mottier Lopez, 2007 ; Clark, 2012 ; Wiliam, 2010). Cette recherche doctorale traite des impacts de différentes modalités d’évaluation formative sur l’autorégulation des apprentissages des élèves dans le cadre spécifique des ESFI. Deux enjeux ont guidé ce travail. Le premier, empirique, concernait l’analyse des pratiques évaluatives des enseignants et de leurs effets sur les processus d’autorégulation. Le second visait la mise au point d’une méthodologie qui permette d’analyser les variables étudiées. Pour ce faire, nous avons procédé par enregistrements vidéo de séances de classe et construit des grilles d’indicateurs nous permettant d’analyser les processus in situ. Différentes situations d’enseignement ont été comparées. La première correspondait aux évaluations formatives telles que les enseignants la mettent en œuvre dans leurs pratiques quotidiennes. La deuxième concernait les pratiques évaluatives mises en œuvre par les mêmes enseignants l’année suivante, après qu’un retour réflexif sur leur séance ait été conduit. Nous montrons un meilleur équilibre dans l’usage des différentes modalités d’évaluation formative dans la deuxième situation, notamment vers une plus grande responsabilisation des élèves et mise en avant des pairs en tant que ressource. Les élèves font aussi preuve d’une autorégulation de leur comportement plus efficace au regard d’un temps passé à produire des stratégies de résolution plus important et d’un meilleur engagement dans la tâche. Des manques sont néanmoins relevés quant à la façon d’intégrer formellement l’outil d’autoévaluation à l’activité des élèves. Des pistes d’action pour combiner efficacement l’évaluation aux différentes tâches d’apprentissage sont alors proposées. / Since a few years, in many European countries, Inquiry-Based Science Education (IBSE) has impacted science curriculums. Two goals are at stake: to provide an image of scientific activity more consistent with the actual activity of scientists, and to arouse students' interest by emphasizing their active role in the learning process. With the introduction of these measures, the implementation of formative assessments opens a promising way to meet these goals. They are in fact likely to develop students’ self-regulation and to provide relevant feedbacks for teachers to regulate their teaching (Allal & Mottier Lopez, 2007; Clark, 2012; Wiliam, 2010). This doctoral research focuses on the impacts of different modalities of formative assessment on students’ self-regulation in the specific context of IBSE. Two issues have guided this work. The first one, of empirical nature, aimed at analyzing the evaluation practices of teachers and their effects on the self-regulatory process. The second one was the development of a methodology to analyze the variables at stake. To do this, we proceeded by recording videos of class sessions and constructed an indicator grid which allowed us to analyze in situ process. Different teaching situations were compared. The first corresponded to formative assessments such as teachers implement it in their daily practices. The second concerned the assessment practices implemented by the same teachers the following year, after a workshop where teachers were invited to reflect on their practice. Our results show a better balance in the use of different formative assessment methods in the second situation, especially towards a greater empowerment of students and better taking account peers as resources. Students also demonstrate more efficient self-regulation of their behavior in the light of a greater time spent to produce solving strategies and a better commitment to the task. The question of how to formally integrate the self-assessment tool to student activity is still pending. Some ideas to effectively combine the evaluation with different learning tasks are thus proposed.

The aim of the diploma thesis was to create educational presentation for grammar school students according to the inquiry-based education principles and used in the classroom for teaching the thematic unit Water regime of plants, its application in teaching process and inclusion of inquiry-based education into plant physiology lessons at grammar school. A comparative survey which included 90 students was carried out in three first grade parallel classes. The level of students´knowledge was compared on a basis of the achievement test some students attended lessons including educational presentation completed with a worksheet, other students attended lessons providing the same topic in a way of frontal teaching and without the presentation. The goal of this research was to find out if inquiry-based education affects the level of acquired knowledge and if it leads to its permanent preservation. The results were statistically evaluated and clearly classified into tables and graphs.

This thesis deals with teaching methods that can be used when working with pupils of primary school and it focuses on the possibilities to use inquiry-based science education (IBSE).The thesis analyses the literature and choice of topics that may be suitable for IBSE. The thesis proposes and presents four IBSE themes or comprehensive tasks respectively. All these tasks are focused on invertebrates occurring in the garden. Usability of one of these tasks was tested during science instruction in primary school. Results of this testing are presented. The individual teaching and learning procedures and particular tasks for pupils are prepared and arranged to develop their independence and desire to explore and discover. Proposed educational themes and tasks are available for IBSE in primary school.

The diploma thesis on the topic of Subject Matters for Inquiry Based Education of Biogeography in Educational Programmes for ZOO Ohrada in Hluboká nad Vltavou consists of two parts theoretical and practical. The theoretical part is formed by research of literature, in which the author of the thesis discusses literature which was used as a source of information for further processing. The diploma thesis also describes methods used in the theoretical part and for creation of own teaching materials. The author describes importance of extracurricular teaching in ZOO Ohrada Hluboká nad Vltavou and characterizes Inquiry Based Education. The practical part focuses on description and realization of the educational programme as such. Three subject matters of educational programme were made in total. Topics of the programmes are based on the concept of Educational programme in ZOO Ohrada in Hluboká nad Vltavou and characterize representatives of animal groups of snakes, birds and predators. Concept of all the programmes is the same. Each programme includes four parts presentation, practical activity of pupils, competition and working sheets for home.

The purpose of this thesis is to develop a comprehensive educational program involving student activities related to the biotope of the garden pond. The theoretical part deals with general issues of inquiry-based education and the utilization of school gardens. The main contribution of the thesis is the creation of a concrete educational program, comprising seven activities which employ the environment of a garden pond. It is designated for biology and geography classes at middle/secondary schools. Each activity portfolio consists of a methodological sheet for teachers and a work sheet for students. Most activities can be carried in the environment of any water tank; some activities can be also done in the school building. The training program was pilot tested with elementary school teachers and subsequently with sixth and seventh grade students. Concurrently, an evaluation of the program's effectiveness was implemented in the form of written tests. The thesis discusses the findings from this evaluation as well as the practical verification of the suggested program that was carried out on teachers and on students.