Development of a Formative Assessment Initiative in Support of District Implementation of Model-Based Science Instruction

• In Event: 32.029 - Supporting Science as a Modeling Practice in the Classroom Through the Lens of Next Generation Science Standards

Abstract

Objectives. In this design-based implementation research project (Penuel et al., 2011), researchers, district staff, and all middle school teachers from an urban school district collaborated to adapt instructional materials to support model-based instruction in science. We sought to understand how an initiative focused on co-design of integrated formative assessments supported and constrained model-based instruction.
Theoretical Framework. Research has shown that teachers who experienced explicit PD in adapting curriculum produce higher quality curriculum compared to teachers who create their own or adopt designed curriculum (Penuel & Gallagher, 2009). Further, teachers assimilated new curricular strategies into their existing context based on students’ needs, their own pedagogical values, and local constraints (Squire,et al., 2003). Research-practice partnerships can leverage distributed expertise to design and implement systems-level initiatives to support such work. We approach the implementation of district initiatives as knotworking—“rapidly pulsating, distributed, and partially improvised orchestration of collaborative performance between otherwise loosely connected actors and activity systems” (Engeström et al., 1999, p. 346). We theorize the unfolding activities as involving multiple, intersecting sociomaterial practices—in ways that are aligned or in tension (Authors, 2012).
Methods and Data. The research team engaged in the co-design of PD experiences with the larger project team and classroom instruction. Data sources include field notes, audio/video, and artifacts from across multiple levels of the work—management meetings, PD design meetings, PD events with teachers, and classroom instruction. We crafted an ethnographic case study to account for the implementation dynamics of the formative assessment strategy (Erickson, 1986).
Results. First, fieldwork and artifact analysis showed that the formative assessment initiative can support teacher professional learning of important dimensions of model-based instruction—eliciting students’ models, orienting to diverse knowledge of students, supporting students’ model refinement. Second, shifts in leadership can jeopardize the endeavor. Informal interactions and trusting relationships at the leadership level are key to working on emergent design tensions in collaborative ways. Third, political risk management is a significant influence on co-design pace and focus. School systems typically have relatively limited capacity to engage educators in professional learning. These initiatives can be compromised if the implemented designs are perceived to be unsuccessful. Implemented co-designs need to be responsive to political context. This can lead to accelerated program design to match emergent needs. Finally, infrastructuring focuses on “building a foundation for change, attending to who and what is already there, while seeking to build networks that can take on the difficult work of making significant and broad changes to educational practice” (Penuel, 2015, p. 5). In order to be responsive, it is often necessary to ‘resource in’ expertise from the broader social networks of team members to support unfolding endeavors within initiatives.
Scholarly significance. Our field has not adequately theorized and studied how research-practice partnerships influence educational improvement through systems-level initiatives. Design-focused research-practice partnerships represent a promising approach for building equity-centered human capacity and developing theory about professional learning as large-scale implementation unfolds within complex educational systems. This study highlights qualities and dynamics of such endeavors.

Authors

• Philip L. Bell, University of Washington

• Shelley Stromholt, University of Washington

• Deb Morrison, University of Washington - Seattle