Incorporating Cultural Models Into Community-Based Professional Development: Impact on Teachers’ Practices, Knowledge, and Professional Networks

• In Event: Reframing Informal Science Education in Light of Diversity, Equity, Democracy, and Critical Science Literacy

Abstract

1. Purpose
This research explores the outcomes of 19 P-12 teachers’ efforts to connect school learning to community and culture-based “funds of knowledge” (p. 134, Moll, Amanti, Neff, & Gonzalez, 2001) over a 9-month professional development program that explicitly provides cultural and community-based resources for science learning. Four questions are addressed: 1) How do teachers’ instructional repertoires change? 2) How do teachers assess changes in their knowledge? 3) How do teachers informal and formal professional networks changed? 4) How does professional development in out-of-school settings affect teachers’ ability to engage underrepresented Native Hawaiian students and other culturally diverse students in science?
2. Theoretical framework
Guided by sociocultural learning theory in the context of Native Hawaiian culture, professional development takes place in a series of communities of practice (Author, 2008; Wenger, 1998). The notion of culturally shaped mental models (Craik, 1943; Maly, 2001; Nisbett & Norenzayan, 2002) guides the design of professional development modeled on the traditional Hawaiian makahiki na o Lono, the annual island-wide circuit that gathered information across each ahupua‘a (sustainable socioecological unit) and role of konohiki, resource managers who monitored and maintained sustainable practices within each ahupua‘a (Abbott, 1992).
3. Methods
This action research is grounded in a geographical unit or ahupua‘a. For 5 days, teachers visit sites from coast to mountains to learn from teachers and resource managers, most Native Hawaiian, ways to monitor and restore local ecosystems. Teachers and hosts exchange cultural protocols and engage in service learning. Teachers then research the cultural, historical, and ecological changes in the ahupua‘a in order to develop place-based science lessons oriented to active science literacy and sustainable social ecosystems. Subsequent classes support teachers’ development of culture-science knowledge and enable sharing of lessons and student learning.
4. Data sources
Teachers’ writings, field notes, and photographs and videotapes are primary sources of data. Documents include teachers’ evaluations of professional development activities, lesson plans, instructional activities, reflective writings, comments on peer writings, and e-mails over the course of the 2011-2012 school year. Field notes, researcher journals, photographs, and videotapes provide data on professional development activities, instructor reflections, and participants’ instructional activities.
5. Results
Preliminary results suggest that professional development providing Hawaiian models of resource managers supports cultural identification. A preschool teacher who teaches Native Hawaiian children wrote: “I need to find out what my kuleana (responsibility) is….how am I gonna make a positive impact in my classroom and community. I would like to learn more about native plants that grow in Nanakuli/Waianae because I lack that knowledge and I would like to try and grow those things in the māla (planting area)…planting natives gives me a positive feeling of contribution to the environment.” She named 3 community resources at the top of her paper.
6. Scholarly significance
The study suggests that out-of-school, professional development provides models of culture and science that inspire teachers to teach in ways that incorporate resources in their Native Hawaiian students’ cultures and communities, validating the worth of individuals from non-dominant cultures (OECD, 2010).

Author

• Pauline W.U. Chinn, University of Hawaii - Manoa