"Time to Reskill": questions about science-related professional development

The webinar “Time to Reskill: A Practitioner Engagement Event”, was broadcast on March 13, 2014.  (For those who were unable to participate, the webinar will be archived and available later.)  The focus of the webinar was to discuss the results of the Program for International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) and the issues facing adult education in the United States.  One key issue is teacher preparation and training in the teaching of science in adult education programs.  To continue the conversation, please respond to any of these questions that apply to you:

  • How are programs providing professional development for teachers without science backgrounds? 
  • For instructors who have participated in science professional development opportunities, what professional learning experiences have had the greatest impact on your practice?
  • If you have not yet participated in science-related professional development, what do you need?

Comments

Hello!  There have been 2624 views of this posting about PIAAC, science skills, and science-related professional development.  Does any one of you viewers wish to comment on the questions?

Thanks!

Susan

Susan,

I am also interested in hearing responses to the questions you have posed.  And would like to add a couple more.

1) What does science education look like in a typical adult education classroom?

2) How have the new high school equivalency tests impacted the science being taught in your programs?

Aaron

Aaron,

I am not a science teacher but have taught in an adult classroom situation for a number of years now.  On the 2002 GED test, students basically just needed good reading comprehension skills in order to pass the science section.  So for the most part I taught from textbooks.  Most of the students I worked with wanted to complete the exam and be done very quickly.  They were ready to move on with their lives.  

With the new 2014 GED test the students do need to know more science content to pass the science section.  I can only speak to my own personal approach, but since I became involved in the OER STEM Science Users Group, and that corresponded time-wise to the new test, I am now using videos, lesson plans, and on-line interactive activities to teach science content.  The GED Testing Service published an Assessment Guide for Educators, and in Chapter Two they stated that 40% of the test would be over life science, 40% would focus on physical science and 20% on Earth and space science.  They listed the topics and subtopics that would be covered in each of these areas.  I gave my students a copy of what they would need to know and I researched OER's that covered all of the topics and subtopics.  We do some group lessons in class, mostly watching videos and then have a discussion.  I am using climate change as the main topic and relating many of the test topics back to this.  We are doing cross curriculum lessons with the climate change topic.  I have students making mind-maps as they search different topics.

We also have the Common Core Achieve texts and students work with this and other new texts geared toward the 2014 test.  Students who are on more of the fast track mode can work individually and opt out of some of the group work if they so desire. 

Deb