Pea, R., Lindgren, R., & Rosen, J. (2006). Computer-supported collaborative video analysis. Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS). Bloomington, Indiana. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Andrew Meltzoff presented to an audience of 200 members of Seattle’s Science & Technology Roundtable, in a talk entitled “Minds, Brains and How Children Learn.” The audience was comprised of business CEOs, educators, museum directors, community leaders, and government leaders. The talk shared ideas about the promise and limits of building interdisciplinary bridges between neuroscience, cognitive science, developmental psychology, and education.
On March 14-15, 2006, the LIFE Center presented a K-12 How People Learn (HPL) Workshop to the Kenan Fellows, a prestigious group of K-12 science teachers. Other audience members included William Tucci, Director of K-12 programs for the Kenan Institute for Engineering, Technology, & Science and Samuel Houston, President and CEO of the North Carolina Science, Mathematics, and Technology Education Center. The workshop was held at the Friday Institute on the grounds of North Carolina State University.
LIFE Center PI, John Bransford kicked off the workshop with an interesting and informative discussion of How People Learn principles and the LIFE Centers’ aims and goals. The rest of the first day was facilitated by Stacy Klein, a faculty member at Vanderbilt University and a high school science teacher. She presented the Legacy Cycle, a curriculum design model based on some of the How People Learn principles, to the Kenan Fellows. She then tasked them with developing a Legacy Cycle experience for their students.
On the second day of the workshop, participants were given time to work on their Legacy Cycle lessons and then volunteers shared their drafts for feedback. After the feedback sessions, participants learned about Tapped In, a web-based learning environment designed by SRI International to support teacher professional development. Participants will use Tapped In to post their Legacy Cycle lesson drafts and any comments about how the lessons performed in their classrooms.
At the end of the workshop, participants were asked to give the LIFE Center feedback about the workshop and about how the LIFE Center can disseminate research findings to a K-12 audience. For example, participants were asked what conferences they attend, to which organizations they belong, and what they would like to learn about learning. The participants’ feedback will serve as data for the LIFE Center as it explores how to best engage with K-12 STEM teachers.
The LIFE Center is planning more K-12 STEM teacher collaborations. Continue to watch the LIFE web site for future announcements and collaborative possibilities.
The Miami Museum of Science & Planetarium, in partnership with Miami-Dade County Public Schools, the University of Miami, the LIFE Center and SRI International, proposes to design and test a research-based model of professional development, building the capacity of early childhood educators to increase school readiness among low-income preschool children in Miami-Dade. Informed by recent research from the fields of developmental science, psychology, cognitive science, neuroscience and linguistics, the proposed project will enhance the quality of professional development available to early childhood educators at participating schools, building their knowledge of the research base and enhancing their ability to translate emerging research findings into practice, improving children’s ability to succeed in school. Titled CHISPA, which in Spanish means “spark,” the project will provide a series of intensive professional development experiences and sustained classroom support for participating early childhood educators that will help them, in turn, to spark a sense of wonder and a love for learning in their children as they explore the world around them.
The Pacific Centre for Scientific and Technological Literacy is one of five Centres for Research in Youth, Science Teaching, and Learning (CRYSTAL) funded by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada. Pacific Crystal is located at the Faculty of Education at the University of Victoria. The Centre is conducting collaborative research studies in science literacy and education with the Faculties of Science, Engineering, Social Sciences, Humanities, and Education at the University of Victoria, Simon Fraser University, Malaspina University-College, BC School Districts, and numerous non-governmental agencies.
Philip Bell, LIFE Lead in Informal Learning, serves as a member of the Pacific Crystal Centre’s advisory board. On March 10, 2006, the advisory board was presented with an overview of the research and outreach activities underway in the Centre’s first year. The board offered advice to Pacific Crystal Centre faculty and staff on the interdisciplinary science and center management. Possible collaborations between the LIFE and Crystal Centers were discussed related to how youth learn to be scientifically literate.
Andrew Meltzoff, a LIFE Strand Leader in Implicit Learning & the Brain, has been invited to give a special lecture to the Science & Technology Roundtable (STRT) on March 10, 2006. The lecture brings visibility to the LIFE research and outreach missions. The STRT consists of 200 leaders in the business, education, and government who want to stay on top of important science and technology advancements being made in Washington state, on a national level, and internationally. STRT lectures highlight “breakthrough developments” in science and technology by convening the country’s finest researchers.
Dr. Meltzoff’s talk is entitled “The Scientist in the Crib: Minds, Brains and How Children Learn” and is based on his research conducted at the UW Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences. The talk discusses both the promise and also the clear limits of attempting to build interdisciplinary bridges between neuroscience, cognitive science, developmental psychology, and education. The remarkable advances that scientists around the world have made in understanding early learning will be highlighted. Further information can be found on the STRT web site, along with other highlights of the series.
Bell, P., Bricker, L. A., Lee, T. R., Reeve, S., & Zimmerman, H. T. (2006). Understanding the cultural foundations of children’s biological knowledge: Insights from everyday cognition research. Paper to be presented at the Seventh International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS). Bloomington, Indiana: LEA.
Members of the LIFE Center’s Education, Collaboration, and Outreach team met with Suzanne Burns, Director of Research and Sponsored Projects at California State University Stanislaus (CSUS), a Title V Hispanic Serving Institution in California’s Central Valley. After several faculty from CSUS attended the LIFE Summer Institute in Summer, 2005, Dr. Burns requested that LIFE provide a similar workshop onsite in Stanislaus for a greater number of faculty; this is scheduled to occur in Summer or Fall, 2006. Dr. Burns also indicated interest in pursuing joint funding for a project to increase minority retention in STEM programs.
Reed Stevens, a LIFE Strand Leader in Informal Learning, is the creator of Video Traces, the groundbreaking new learning technology and research tool that connects educators and researchers across time and distance. Through two presentations at Western Washington University on March 1, 2006, Professor Stevens demonstrated how Video Traces allows educators in different places to work together to help teachers and students in high needs schools reach their full potential. He presented and discussed cases of how committed educators are using Video Traces to transform learning in some of our most challenging classroom environments.
