This interpretive study focuses on issues relevant to teacher-learning and enhancement of science education at a developing Professional Practice School (PPS) site (Holmes, 1990; Levine, 1992). In a previous study undertaken at the same school, (Dana, 1991/1992), action research resulted in the emergence of teacher-voice. Teachers desiring to continue their professional development collaborated with the researcher to develop the Southside PPS. / The researcher met with a group of 9 teachers in the first year, 1991-1992, and thereafter began working with various other teachers until May, 1994. The study is based on use of qualitative data sources including: transcripts of afterschool meetings, school documents, interviews, field notes, and the researcher's personal journal. Narratives provide a context (Connelly & Clandinin, 1994) for holistic representation of the research experience and have been deconstructed to render six thematic findings. / The six themes relate issues relevant to the sociocultural context of teaching at the school, conditions for teacher-learning, and teachers' personal and social practices of science. Teachers' dialogue about teaching and learning revealed a strong orientation for feminine epistemology (Harding, 1987). A situation which could have served as a science experience involving inquiry about educational practices (e.g. evaluation) denied teachers' ways of sense-making. In terms of school-wide science practice, events such as the annual Science Fair and teaching science from kits were perpetuating teachers' senses of disenfranchisement from science. Current perspectives of science are, for the most part, grounded in traditional views of Western science and may exclude those with other epistemological and ethical orientations in science learning. / One implication of the study calls for science educators to be aware of their own lenses for framing science as they endeavor to enhance science education. Secondly, consideration for how teachers construct themselves as knowers and co-learners may be a critical beginning point from which educators can begin to negotiate their science practices and construction new visions for science teaching. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 56-01, Section: A, page: 0153. / Major Professor: Kenneth G. Tobin. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1994.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_77331 |
| Contributors | Nichols, Sharon Elizabeth., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 201 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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