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Project

Pilot project to strengthen teacher training courses

In this pilot project, a partnership is formed between (1) students and teachers of the courses 'Pedagogies and Internship of interdisciplinary STEM education' in the Master of Teaching Programme at KU Leuven, (2) the expertise center 'iSTEM inkleuren', (3) the pedagogical support services of the Flemish Provincial Education (POV) and those of the Public Education of the Flemish Community (GO!), and (4) teacher teams of four Flemish pilot schools offering secondary education. The partnership aims to empower the teacher education by strengthening the bond between the teacher education and the workfield in terms of pedagogy of integrated STEM (iSTEM) in grades 9 to 12 of secondary education. The introduction of the new national curriculum standards in STEM, among which also interdisciplinary standards, poses new challenges. In-service STEM teachers have a large practical discipline-specific pedagogical expertise, but are not trained to teach STEM in an integrated way. Pre-service STEM teachers at KU Leuven, who are also schooled in a discipline-specific way, are currently being trained in interdisciplinary pedagogies, but they lack practical classroom experience. Moreover, the research literature indicates that pre- and in-service teachers need more support in making cross-disciplinary links and that both groups can benefit from each other's knowledge of classroom dynamics resp. of (discipline-specific) pedagogical developments. To address these needs, this pilot project will pair pre-service teachers of KU Leuven's Master of Teaching programme and in-service teachers of the four pilot schools in multidisciplinary teams. In these mixed teams, both groups will experience the pedagogical principles behind high-quality iSTEM education first-handedly, supported by teacher educators and professional development experts. The learning process of the pre- and in-service teachers in the mixed teams is guided by the cooperative design of iSTEM learning units for secondary school students, including a well-designed combination of face-to-face and virtual learning activities aimed at achieving the new curriculum standards. Afterwards and as part of their cooperative learning process, the pre- and in-service teachers will implement these units via co-teaching in the classrooms of the pilot schools. Via practice-based research, we will study the conditions required to successfully support this learning process and the ways in which pre- and in-service teachers learn from one another across roles and STEM disciplines in terms of discipline-specific knowledge and pedagogy, and in terms of iSTEM pedagogical principles. By continuing the lessons learned from this pilot project and dissiminating its results and positive impact across Flanders, this project's partnership will lay the basis of a sustainable collaboration between the teacher education and the workfield with the common goal of realizing high-quality integrated STEM education.

Date:1 Sep 2021 →  31 Aug 2023
Keywords:teacher education, professional development of teachers, Science and Technology, pedagogies of interdisciplinary STEM education
Disciplines:Teacher education and professional development of educators, Science, technology and engineering curriculum and pedagogics