Congratulations to Cheryl Spada who on Thursday, April 3, 2025, successfully defended her dissertation proposal. The title of Cheryl’s dissertation is: “COLLECTIVELY MAKING THE SHIFT: TEACHING NEXT GENERATION SCIENCE STANDARDS AFTER PARTICIPATION IN PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE.”
The purpose of this proposed qualitative multiple case study is to articulate changes in K–12 science teacher classroom pedagogical practices when implementing the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) three-dimensional model of learning after participation in a year-long professional development community of practice. The planned study will seek to understand, from the teacher’s perspective as participants in this type of professional development, what their experiences were as members of communities of practice and to elaborate how their participation impacted their pedagogical content knowledge, teacher self-efficacy, and development of teacher expertise. These three concepts, when viewed through the lens of teacher development practices, ultimately should lead to changes in teacher classroom pedagogical practices that support the implementation of the three-dimensional learning model of the NGSS with fidelity. A qualitative multiple case study design will be employed via two semi-structured interviews coupled with analysis of classroom documents focusing on the experiences of four primary (grades K-6), and four secondary science teachers (grades 7-12). Situated learning theory, as described by Lave and Wenger (1991) is employed as the theoretical framework for this qualitative research study as a way of exploring learning as a domain of social practice, situated in the context in which it is acquired.
DISSERTATION COMMITTEE CHAIR:
Dr. Peter Troiano
DISSERTATION COMMITTEE MEMBERS:
Dr. Yiping Wan
Dr. Angela Pagano
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