Preservice elementary teachers need to be able to engage young students in science practices but may not have extensive experiences with those practices. They also may have contrasting beliefs about them, which inform their teaching practice. To understand preservice teachers' beliefs related to science practices, we focus on the connections they…

As part of learning to teach, teachers must learn to use a range of teaching practices. In this longitudinal study the authors explore how novice elementary teachers learn to engage in a set of high-leverage science teaching practices, such as "leading a science sensemaking discussion" and "setting up and managing small-group…

With the shifts in science education emphasizing the integration of science practices with science content, there is a need to know how teachers understand those science practices within their teaching practice. Our primary research question was, "What do novice elementary teachers know about the science practices, in terms of what the…

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), a reform effort "for states, by states," advances ambitious ideals for elementary science teaching, but the fate of these ideals will depend in part on the engagement of state science coordinators (SSCs). This article explores the responses of SSCs to NGSS in a purposeful sample of 18 US…

The purpose of this study was to determine how elementary teachers used scientific language during a whole-class discussion to describe 3 biological phenomena (interactions, dependent relationships, and interdependent relationships) with and without educative curricula. Findings revealed that the ways in which the 6 teachers enacted the discussion…

This article identifies the principles that informed the design of educative curriculum supports for teaching science texts and reports how elementary teachers chose to use the supports, which included identified learning goals, discussion moves to support sensemaking with the text, and narratives of teachers' uses of text in science teaching. The…

The purpose of this study was to identify evidence in student work of teachers' uptake of educative features in educative curriculum materials. These are features in curriculum materials designed with the specific intent of supporting teacher learning and enactment. This study was prompted by previous work on educative curriculum materials and the…

Science education reforms articulate a vision of ambitious science teaching where teachers engage students in sensemaking discussions and emphasise the integration of scientific practices with science content. Learning to teach in this way is complex, and there are few examples of sensemaking discussions in schools where textbook lessons and…

New reform documents underscore the importance of integrating science practices into the learning of science. This integration requires sophisticated teaching that does not often happen. Educative curriculum materials--materials explicitly designed to support teacher and student learning--have been posited as a way to support teachers to achieve…

Curriculum materials serve as a key conceptual tool for science teachers, and better understanding how science teachers use these tools could help to improve both curriculum design and theory related to teacher learning and decision-making. The authors review the literature on teachers and science curriculum materials. The review is organised…

We use a 10-year program of research centered on iterations of one elementary science methods course as a vehicle for exploring three important and interrelated goals for the learning of beginning elementary teachers. These include learning about inquiry-oriented science teaching, using science curriculum materials effectively, and anticipating…

Curriculum materials are a crucial tool with which teachers engage in teaching practice. For preservice teachers to learn to use science curriculum materials in productive ways, they must develop a conception of themselves as elementary teachers in which the use of science curriculum materials is a valued dimension of science-teaching practice. We…

Preservice elementary teachers face challenges in learning to teach science. Educative curriculum materials, designed to promote teacher learning, can provide support for overcoming these challenges. The educative curriculum materials used in this study provide narrative vignettes describing a teacher's decision making with regard to lesson plans.…

Science teachers must adapt curriculum materials, so preservice teachers must develop beginning proficiency with this authentic task of teaching. What criteria do they use when they critique these materials in preparation for adapting them, when they develop the criteria themselves and when they are given a set of criteria from which to choose?…

Critiquing and adapting curriculum materials are essential teaching practices but challenging for many preservice teachers. This study explores the use of educative curriculum materials--materials intended to support both teacher and student learning--to help preservice elementary teachers develop their pedagogical design capacity for critiquing…