The Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project (NEBP) engaged 53 teams of students from across the United States to fly experiments on high-altitude balloons for the 2023 annular and 2024 total solar eclipses. By many measures, NEBP was a successful project. However, the teams did encounter challenges. To better understand what could be improved for similar future projects, this study engaged project partners in examining strengths, challenges, and recommendations across four topics: project structure, education and research approach, broadening participation, and funding. Analysis of the topics was completed through written comments followed by remote focus group discussions. The project director and evaluator then synthesized the written and focus group comments to provide the results shared here. Identified strengths included a project structure facilitating regional-scale collaboration within a national network and a focus on providing undergraduate students with innovative, mission-based experiences. Partners also identified challenges including, for example, making in-depth engagement with analyzing project data and drawing scientific conclusions accessible to undergraduate students. Key recommendations include the need for real-world interdisciplinarity, a leadership group that reflects team types, a robust communication platform used at all levels, a modular approach for participation levels and time lengths, and flexibility in funding choices.

This article reports analyses of data from a design-based implementation project focused on middle- and high-school science teaching. Drawing on teacher interviews and surveys as well as student learning evidence, we examined the relationships between teachers' pedagogical reasoning and their students' three-dimensional learning. Most teachers were similar in their reasoning about the importance of facilitating students in active learning-what we call active-learning pedagogies. There were also important differences between two groups of teachers, though. Teachers of lower learning-gains classrooms reasoned that they should use investigations and hands-on experiences as means to engage students in a variety of interesting activities. Teachers of higher learning-gains classrooms reasoned that they should engage students in science learning activities including asking questions, carrying out practice-driven investigations, and constructing explanations to support students' sustained scientific engagement with phenomena-what we call three-dimensional pedagogies. The findings suggest the potential benefits of enacting professional learning that attends to and engages with teachers' reasoning about their purposes, their students, and their instructional practices. For example, teachers may benefit from reasoning collectively about how to simultaneously satisfy both commitments to meeting expectations of students, parents, and administrators (which privilege active-learning pedagogies) and commitments to supporting students' sustained scientific engagement (which privilege three-dimensional pedagogies).

Computational models are employed to study and respond to pressing environmental issues such as groundwater contamination. This use of computational models, which often involves algorithms and uncertainty that are hidden to the public, has implications for environmental science literacy. This study applies a design-based research approach to explore how technology-infused science instruction can scaffold secondary students in developing proficiency with computational modeling of groundwater contamination as a facet of environmental science literacy. Descriptions of research-based, technology-infused learning experiences situated within a groundwater contamination issue–based context are shared, and evidence of students’ subsequent learning is presented. Findings suggest that student learning may be supported by enacting instructional experiences that scaffold students in (a) developing first concrete then increasingly abstract understanding of groundwater system structure, function, and dynamics; (b) building conceptual connections between multiple types of models and representations of a system; and (c) explicitly engaging with and judging uncertainties associated with system models, model outputs, and associated arguments. Insights are shared concerning how instructional technologies including physical models, two-dimensional representations (e.g., maps and cross-sections), and computational models may be employed in science teaching to support students in developing computational modeling competencies needed for participating in debates and discussions about socioenvironmental problems like groundwater contamination.

The Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project (NEBP) is a student-centered and team-based STEM initiative that leverages the October 14, 2023 annular eclipse and April 8, 2024 total solar eclipse for authentic learning opportunities. Its nationwide fractal network establishes multidirectional communication, enabling the program to meet its goals and objectives. The NEBP has the potential to serve as a scalable model for similar STEM- and NASA-related initiatives. To share the project model and associated lessons with other interested STEM leaders, we have formatted this article as an "NEBP toolkit" that describes our approach to building capacity in NASA-mission-like hands-on experiences through a targeted STEM network (in this case, around scientific ballooning), broadening student participation, establishing a leadership model, and integrating diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility (DEIA) practices.

This article reports on analyses of the instructional practices of six middle- and high-school science teachers in the United States who participated in a research-practice partnership that aims to support reform science education goals at scale. All six teachers were well qualified, experienced, and locally successful-respected by students, parents, colleagues, and administrators-but they differed in their success in supporting students' three-dimensional learning. Our goal is to understand how the teachers' instructional practices contributed to their similarities in achieving local success and to differences in enabling students' learning, and to consider the implications of these findings for research-practice partnerships. Data sources included classroom videos supplemented by interviews with teachers and focus students and examples of student work. We also compared students' learning gains by teacher using pre-post assessments that elicited three-dimensional performances. Analyses of classroom videos showed how all six teachers achieved local success-they led effectively managed classrooms, covered the curriculum by teaching almost all unit activities, and assessed students' work in fair and efficient ways. There were important differences, however, in how teachers engaged students in science practices. Teachers in classrooms where students achieved lower learning gains followed a pattern of practice we describe as activity-based teaching, in which students completed investigations and hands-on activities with few opportunities for sensemaking discussions or three-dimensional science performances. Teachers whose students achieved higher learning gains combined the social stability characteristic of local classroom success with more demanding instructional practices associated with scientific sensemaking and cognitive apprenticeship. We conclude with a discussion of implications for research-practice partnerships, highlighting how partnerships need to support all teachers in achieving both local and standards-based success.

Learning progressions have the potential to bring coherence to curriculum, instruction, and assessment. On their own, however, learning progressions can be difficult tools for teachers to use. Curriculum materials designed based on learning progressions and with educative features for teachers can guide teachers in using learning progressions to bring coherence to curriculum, instruction, and assessment at the classroom level. In this chapter, we describe key components of comprehensive learning progression-based curriculum materials designed to meet the needs of both teachers and students by linking assessment strategies, instructional activities, and pedagogical approaches to support diverse students in achieving rigorous learning goals. These components include (1) formative assessments with educative features to support teachers' use of learning progressions to interpret student thinking; (2) instructional sequences and pedagogical tools for responding to student thinking in ways that support students in achieving higher levels of performance on a learning progression; and (3) language supports to facilitate multilingual students' productive engagement with learning progression-based instructional activities. To illustrate these components, we draw on examples from three related curriculum materials development projects based on a learning progression for water in environmental systems.

This article focuses on uncertainty-ways in which scientists recognize and analyze limits in their studies and conclusions. We distinguish uncertainty from (un)trustworthiness-ways in which scientific reports can be affected by conscious deception or unconscious bias. Scientific journal articles typically include analyses and quantifications of uncertainty in both quantitative forms (e.g., error bars, ranges of predictions, statistical tests) and qualitative forms (e.g., alternate hypotheses, limitations of studies, questions for future research). These analyses of uncertainty are often incorporated into reports from scientific organizations and responsible scientific journalism. We argue that a critical goal of science education should be to help students understand how science may be employed as an uncertain and limited, yet still useful tool for informing decisions about socioscientific problems. When members of the public are insufficiently prepared to understand analyses and quantifications of uncertainty, the consequences are manifest in public skepticism about science and inadequately informed decision-making about socioscientific issues. We describe current design work in science education that includes a worthwhile emphasis on helping students to recognize and leverage uncertainty in their own data and models. Additional important work can enable students to develop proficiency in seeking out and understanding analyses of continuing uncertainty in media accounts of scientific conclusions and predictions.

Nearly a decade ago, the Framework for K-12 Science Education argued for the need to intertwine science and engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas, and crosscutting concepts in performance expectations. However, there are few empirical examples for how intertwining three dimensions facilitates learning. In this study, we used a learning progressions approach to examine how student engagement in computational thinking (science and engineering practice) intertwines with learning about the flow of water through environmental systems (disciplinary core ideas) and understanding of systems and system models (crosscutting concept). We developed three secondary-level curriculum units situated in current groundwater contamination and urban flooding contexts. Units included specially designed NetLogo computational models. Post-assessments measured student performances in computational thinking processes and understanding of hydrologic systems. Using item response theory in our analysis, we identified distinct levels of performance on a learning progression. At the lower end, literal model users interacted with models and manipulated model interfaces to achieve a specified goal. In the middle, Model Technicians used computational models to solve real-world problems. At the upper end, principle-based model users used computational thinking processes and principles related to systems modeling and hydrology to explain how the models worked to predict water flow. Differences between performances of literal model users, model technicians, and principle-based model users reflected shifts in how students made sense of the systems and system models crosscutting concept. These shifts in performances aligned with progress in computational thinking practices and finally with use of hydrology disciplinary core ideas. These findings contribute to understanding of how science and engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas, and crosscutting concepts intertwine during learning; how computational thinking practices develop; and how computational thinking about system models facilitates learning for environmental science literacy.

Read about the results of a partnership that generated a new high school curriculum and teacher professional development program to tackle the challenge of integrating hydrologic learning with computational thinking.

Berta Caceres Flores, a Lenca Indigenous leader from Honduras who led the movement against hydroelectric dams in the River Gualcarque, was assassinated in her home in 2016. Berta, who was awarded t...

There is broad belief that preparing all students in preK-12 for a future in STEM involves integrating computational thinking (CT) tools and practices. Through creating and examining rich “STEM+CT” learning environments, researchers are defining what CT means in STEM disciplinary settings. This interactive session brings together a diverse spectrum of leading STEM researchers to share how they operationalize CT, what integrated CT and STEM learning looks like in their curriculum, and how this learning is measured. It will serve as a rich opportunity for discussion to help advance the state of the field of STEM and CT integration. Motivation and objectives Few argue with the need for integrating computing and computational thinking (CT) as a tool to drive innovation in STEM. The learning sciences community also acknowledges that K-12 STEM learning must become more authentic in the 21st century through the integration of coding and CT. Efforts for “STEM+CT” learning in the US received a fillip with CT listed as a disciplinary practice in the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS; NGSS Lead States, 2013) and modeling emphasized in the NGSS and Common Core Mathematics Standards as a means to critically interrogate phenomena and understand simplifying assumptions. Although past efforts provide exemplars for the productive integration of math and science with computing (diSessa, 2001; Papert, 1980), developing integrated STEM+CT curricula and measuring such learning is seen as challenging, in part because the broader community does not have a unified definition of CT (Grover & Pea, 2013). There is thus a ICLS 2020 Proceedings 1479 © ISLS need to better understand how to achieve productive integration and learning of STEM and CT, how to best involve STEM teachers, and how to assess learning in such integrated contexts. The current landscape of STEM & computing/CT education affords ideal opportunities to convene leading researchers in the field to critically discuss current approaches for integrating STEM & CT. This symposium brings together researchers with a diverse set of approaches tackling this challenge head-on, from a variety of perspectives and pedagogical strategies at all levels of PK-12. In particular, symposium presenters will provide curricular details, examples, and insights into 1) how they operationalize CT, what CT definitions and frameworks guide their work, and how the integration of disciplinary STEM ideas with CT is engendered in their research and curricular approaches; and 2) the methods and measures they use to evaluate changes in students’ STEM & CT learning. Themes include: computational modeling in science and math (Grover et al.; Dickes, Farris & Sengupta; Metcalf et al.); co-design with teachers to modify STEM curricula to integrate CT (Irgens et al., Dominguez et al., Yadav et al.) and designing teacher PD (Lee et al.); CT and systems thinking to understand complex phenomena (Covitt et al., Damelin et al.); and design activities that integrate CT & STEM (Puttick et al.). The symposium serves to showcase similarities in CT operationalization and assessment, curricular approaches (such as modeling), and methods for design and implementation (e.g., co-design with teachers) while also highlighting the diversity of perspectives that comprise a growing landscape of PK-12 STEM+CT integration.

Carbon cycle pool-and-flux reasoning is a critical facet of climate literacy. This article begins with discussion of why this type of reasoning is both challenging and important. Results from two studies are reported. The first describes students' approaches to carbon cycle pool-and-flux reasoning. The second describes and reports results from an instructional intervention designed to scaffold secondary students' model-based pool-and-flux reasoning. Before instruction, most secondary students employed informal reasoning approaches including good versus bad and correlation heuristics to carbon cycle pool-and-flux problems. After instruction, the portion of students employing goal model-based pool-and-flux reasoning increased from 27 to 52 percent. This study builds on previous and current research to offer a promising instructional approach to scaffolding improvements in students' model-based pool-and-flux reasoning.

We designed two NGSS-aligned middle school classroom experiments to investigate the effects of biochar on plant growth and soil respiration. Biochar is a carbon-rich material, produced by heating organic matter under limited oxygen, that is added to soils to improve fertility, to promote plant growth, and as one possible strategy to help mitigate climate change. The experiments offer an ideal case study for students learning fundamentals of soil and plant interactions. Soils and biochar are accessible, are connected to global issues such as agriculture and climate change, and are the focus of ongoing research in soil science. These classroom experiments promote authentic science because students design replicated experiments, collect and analyze data, discuss variability in the data, and interpret their results in the context of recent research.

On a Saturday afternoon last May in Hamilton, Montana, 150 people gathered in a college gymnasium for the Bitterroot Maker Fair. At tables around the room, student educators from the University of Montana (UM) spectrUM Discovery Area guided K–12 students and their families in activities such as jigsaw-puzzle creation and forced-perspective photography. A group of students clustered around a robotics station where they programmed Cubelets; many were already familiar with the modular robotic blocks from in-school making and tinkering experiences co-led by spectrUM educators and local K–12 teachers. Students from Hamilton Middle School's SciGirls Code Club displayed the robots they had created at the school library, and the middle school Science Olympiad team led interactive chemistry demonstrations. Down the hall, visitors toured the Bitterroot FabLab, where they explored virtual reality challenges and learned about rapid-prototyping technologies available for use by members.

The Montana Groundwater Academy is a high school program that integrates classroom and field-based experiences to teach the fundamentals of groundwater science.Display full size

Student learning in science involves developing mastery of scientific genres in speech and writing, including argument, explanation, and prediction. Each of these genres involves uses of language that are rooted in scientific knowledge and practice. However, student learning of these scientific genres is complicated because students also encounter arguments, explanations, and predictions in many other contexts in their homes and communities and in the media. This chapter reports on the development of assessments of students' performance in situations where they are asked to develop or critique arguments, explanations, and predictions that could draw on scientific knowledge and practices. The chapter illustrates how learning progression frameworks, which describe trajectories from less sophisticated, informal discourse to more sophisticated, scientific discourse, and associated assessments can be used to examine students' developing capacity to produce scientific explanations, arguments, and predictions.]

This article reports on a design-based implementation research (DBIR) project that addresses the question: How can classrooms be supported at scale to achieve the three-dimensional learning goals of the Next Generation Science Standards? Inherent in this question are three key design challenges: (i) three-dimensional learning-the multidimensional changes in curriculum, assessment, and instruction required for three-dimensional learning; (ii) scale-the necessity of change at multiple scales in educational systems; and (iii) diversity-achieving rigor in our expectations with responsiveness to the enduring diversity of our students, classrooms, and schools. We discuss findings from the Carbon TIME project, which focuses on teaching carbon cycling and energy transformations at multiple scales. Findings focus on design and knowledge building in three interconnected contexts. (i) Assessment-understanding and assessing students' three-dimensional learning. Learning progression frameworks provide insight into students' reasoning and the basis for efficient and reliable classroom and large-scale assessments that have used automated scoring of constructed responses for over 80,000 tests. (ii) Classrooms-classroom discourse and learning communities. Six Carbon TIME units are based on an instructional model that scaffolds students' engagement with phenomena as questioners, investigators, and explainers. The units support substantial learning and reduce the achievement gap between high-pretest and low-pretest students, but with substantial differences among teachers. (iii) Professional communities-a professional development course of study and research-practice partnerships address issues of organizational resources, conflicting norms and obligations, and building practical knowledge in schools and districts. Project results show continuing advantages for schools with more organizational resources. Overall, results provide evidence that it is possible to measure and achieve three-dimensional learning at scale. However, this accomplishment requires substantial investments in the material, human, and social resources of educational communities of practice.