Lessons of Researcher-Teacher Codesign of an Environmental Health After-School Club Curriculum

• In Event: Enhancing Teacher Efficacy Through Program and Instructional Reform

Abstract

This paper addresses the impact of teachers’ beliefs about argumentation and their community-of- practice-framed views of teaching on co-designing an afterschool club curriculum with researchers. Our team collaborated with a group of middle school teachers, asking them to co-design a club that would facilitate 1) students’ understanding of environmental health, 2) use of electronic resources, and 3) argumentation skills. The process included researcher-led sessions emphasizing the importance of argumentation to science and teacher-led curriculum design sessions. The analysis of the meetings and teacher interview transcripts suggests that while teachers viewed argumentation as important, its practice was relegated to the background by the focus on student engagement and perceived logistic and systemic constraints. We discuss the implications for researcher-teacher co-design efforts.

Authors

• Savreen Hundal, Center for Public Service Communications

• Daniel M. Levin, University of Maryland - College Park

• Alla Keselman, National Library of Medicine