Use this activity to explore your neighborhood. Take a walk and make observations. Who and what do you share your neighborhood with? For example, what plants, animals, other people, and elements like water do you notice?
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This project aims to re-envision the places of science learning by engaging in a place-based participatory design research (PDR) project with teachers, families, administrators, garden coordinators, and researchers. This project emphasizes processes of partnership (co-designing) and role re-mediations in the design and implementation of learning.
Who participates in design, how design processes occur, and what relational dynamics are prioritized shape the opportunities for learning that are enacted.
PDR aims to expand predictable patterns of roles, relations, and powered decision-making towards critical role re-mediations that empower non-dominant families & communities.
Family and community engagement and leadership is necessary to creating and sustaining culturally-relevant and academically stimulating places for learning.1-3 As such, many learning environments such as schools are required to incorporate family and community engagement in their programs, yet rely on outdated and inequitable forms of partnering that can actually disengage many families and communities. In particular, nondominant individuals, families, and communities – or those marginalized and excluded due to race, language, socioeconomic status, gender identity, sex, and sexual orientation, etc. – are often most impacted by educational decisions, yet least likely to participate in the decision-making process. For example, funding decisions; curricular adoption, design, and implementation; and educator hiring and training are just a few examples that matter in the educational lives of students and their families and communities.This brief synthesizes promising research that leverages family and community knowledge and expertise and provides some key practices to supporting engagement and leadership. In particular, this brief focuses on collaborating with families and communities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) curricular design and implementation.
Ahora que ha reflexionado sobre su significado a partir de su modelo, sus datos (de las investigaciones y los miembros de la comunidad) y su investigación sobre lo que la gente ya sabe sobre su pregunta de “Deberíamos”, estar listos para hacer su decisión de la pregunta de “Deberíamos” y compartirlo con los demás. Esta actividad lo guiará algunos pasos a considerar al decidir lo que debe hacer.
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Socio-ecological decisions are those made by individuals, communities, organizations, and institutions that are informed by and impact the natural world. These decisions are affected by relationships between humans and the natural world, what is called “nature-culture relations”.
Nature-culture relations often vary by culture, context, and society, and affect which socio-ecological decisions are made and enacted. Understanding the connections between humans and the natural world is imperative for creating and sustaining socially and environmentally just decisions.
Megan Bang is a Professor of the Learning Sciences and Psychology at Northwestern University and is currently serving as the Senior Vice President at the Spencer Foundation. Dr. Bang’s research focuses on understanding culture, learning, and development broadly with a specific focus on the complexities of navigating multiple meaning systems in creating and implementing more effective learning environments in science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics education. Megan approaches her work through rigorous mixed methods – utilizing experimental design in her foundational cognition and development studies, to community based participatory design work in which she co-designs learning and teaching with communities, families, and youth as well as engages in the collaborative study of such environments. She conducts research in both schools and informal settings. She has taught in and conducted research in teacher education as well as leadership preparation programs. Dr. Bang has won several awards including the AERA early career award in Indigenous Education as well as the Division K early career award in Teaching and Teacher Education. She has published in leading outlets such as Cognition & Instruction, Science Education, and Educational Psychologist. She is currently serving on the Board of Science Education at the National Academy of Sciences and the editorial boards of several top journals.
Dr. Carrie Tzou is an associate professor in science education in the School of Educational Studies and a PI in the Goodlad Institute. She holds a PhD in Learning Sciences from Northwestern University and an M.S. in Teaching and Learning with a concentration in science education from Vanderbilt University.
Her research has three major components, all connected with an interest in addressing issues of culture, identity, and equity in science and environmental science learning:
1) ethnographic work to understand how youth and their communities are positioned and position themselves through place-based education,
2) design-based research to design curricula to bring youths’ out of school science and cultural practices into science and environmental science teaching and learning, and
3) research and design of elementary and secondary preservice teacher education that explores how to orient preservice teachers to the sophisticated learning and identities that their students construct both in and out of school in order to make science more accessible to all of their students.
Phenology is the study of seasonal impacts on plant and animal life cycles – including humans.
Learning more about phenology can help us think about complex social – ecological systems and human relations with the natural world and the decisions we make daily and over time. Through our Field Based Seasonal Storyline, we learn more about how seasons shape and reflect our relationship to the natural world.
How are we Studying Phenology in Learning in Places?
For K-3 students, the study of phenology serves as a lens through which family and cultural experiences, and Next Generation Science Standards (Science and Engineering Practices, Disciplinary Core Ideas, and Crosscutting Concepts) can all be investigated. Students can practice everything from observing phenomena to asking questions to analyzing data to communicating information. Phenology touches the physical, life, earth and space science, as well as engineering, technology, and applications of science. Furthermore, patterns, cause and effect, etc. can all be seen in phenology. Studying seasonal changes based on students’ wonderings provides a path toward “engaging all students in both meaningful learning and socio-ecological decision making.”
For families, seasonal changes provide touch points for all cultures and communities. Every family has stories that map onto the change of seasons, and many people’s understandings of nature come through these stories. When these unique perceptions of nature show up in the classroom, students can engage in more culturally relevant science learning. As research has shown, family and community engagement and leadership is necessary to creating and sustaining culturally-relevant and academically stimulating places for learning. Learning in Places engages families’ knowledges and practices throughout the storyline by embedding learning opportunities that connect investigation to families’ home lives and communities.
Using the Field Based Science Seasonal Storyline framework, teachers can co-design yearlong investigations with students and families. By eliciting stories and curiosities from students, classes can go outside on wondering walks that provide phenomena for further study. These can be developed into questions and models that provide predictions that can further refine models. After going on wondering walks with families, this process will generate new questions that will prepare students for data collection. This data will be analyzed and models then revised once again. Rinse and repeat as necessary. Eventually, students can use their data and models to construct explanations about the seasonal phenomena that they have investigated, and share these insights as experts. To summarize, we will start with what students and families wonder about, continue with what they want to learn about, and build an investigation around the questions that will help them learn about their wonderings.
All files are in PDF format.
Learning in Places Collaborative (2018). Learning Brief: Issue x: Title. Bothell, Seattle, WA & Evanston, Il: Learning in Places.
Example: Learning in Places Collaborative (2018). Learning Brief: Issue 3: Seeing and Reasoning about Complex Socio-Ecological Systems in the Early Grades. Bothell, Seattle, WA & Evanston, Il: Learning in Places.
Veronica Cassone McGowan is a research scientist and instructor at the University of Washington Bothell. Veronica comes to the Goodlad Institute with a broad background in social, ecological and technical sciences. She received her doctorate in Learning Sciences and Human Development from the University of Washington Seattle where she worked as a graduate researcher for the Institute for Math and Science Education and the LIFE Center. Her research focuses on broadening participation in STEM fields, particularly K-12 engineering and computational modeling, with a focus on connecting learning across settings in ways that incorporate learners’ everyday interests, identities and community knowledges as foundations for sociotechnical learning. Prior to her doctoral work, Veronica received her Master’s in Biological Sciences and was a field ecologist as well as a middle school science teacher.
Jordan is a postdoctoral scholar on the Learning in Places project who holds a PhD in Education from the University of Washington. Coming to the work with a background in psychology, philosophy, and early childhood education, his research draws upon participatory design based methods to better understand how dynamics of culture, development, and identity mediate learning in early place-based education. Specifically, he studies the role of ethical speculation in supporting sophisticated socioecological inquiry, alongside pedagogical approaches that cultivate educators’ attunement to diverse forms of sensemaking to develop their capacities for ethical pedagogical mediation. Prior to his doctoral training Jordan received his Master’s in Education while working both as a curriculum specialist at the Childcare Quality and Early Learning Center and also founding Co-Director of a mixed-age family childcare center where he served for over a decade.
Ahora que han tomado una decisión sobre su pregunta “Deberíamos” su decisión se vuelve mucho más poderosa cuando la comparte con otros! En esta actividad, usted decidirá algunas formas de compartir su decisión, porque cree que la decisión es importante y que espera lograr.
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Elizabeth Starks (Shiwi/Diné) is an artist, developer, and education researcher with a background in Software-driven Systems Design, Museum Studies, and Studio Art. She is a Research Scientist at OpenSTEM research group at University of Washington Bothell. While living in Los Angeles as an artist, she imagined showing her contemporary work in museums only to see herself represented behind glass on display next to dinosaurs. This led her to pursue equity and innovation through museums, technology, and education. Her current work involves collaboratively designing informal STEAM education and technological innovation for the thrivance of Native people.
Shirin Vossoughi is an associate professor of Learning Sciences at Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy, where she draws on ethnographic and interactional methods to study the cultural, socio-political, and ethical dimensions of education and the relationships between human learning and social change. Dr. Vossoughi’s research centers on hybrid learning environments that blend formal and informal elements and support young people to develop, question and expand transdisciplinary and artistic knowledge in ways that nourish educational self-determination. She is particularly concerned with understanding the forms of pedagogical mediation, ethical relations, and developmental trajectories that take shape within these settings. Her current work looks closely at teaching and learning in making/STEAM environments, literacy learning in the context of political education, and the design of justice-oriented educator learning. She takes a collaborative approach to research, partnering with teachers, families, and students to co-design and study the conditions that foster educational dignity and possibility.
Christa Haverly began her career as an elementary school teacher in Maryland and Illinois, and she has also worked for a nonprofit environmental education organization in the D.C. metro area. Currently, her research focuses on teacher responsiveness to students’ equitable sensemaking in elementary science classrooms as well as systemic and organizational supports that work to sustain improvements in elementary science instruction in classrooms. She is also interested in the intersections of environmental education and science education in elementary classrooms. She received a B.A. from Boston College in Elementary Education, an M.S. from Nova Southeastern University in Environmental Education, and a Ph.D. from Michigan State University in Science Education.
Alejandra Frausto Aceves is a science teacher and educational leader currently working on a PhD at Northwestern University in the Learning Sciences. Her research interests include transformative collective [science] learning, intergenerational & international co-constructions, imaginations, and praxis, as well as learning and pedagogies towards thriving and sustainable present-futures.
Miguel Angel Ovies-Bocanegra is currently pursuing a doctorate in Learning Science at Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy. His research interest investigates the development and maturation of culture, cognition, ethics and political sense-making that emerge in moment-to-moment interactions. Specifically, he aims to design, sustain and promote epistemological alterity using a sociohistorical approach that advances and strengthens learning partnerships in and out of school settings. Miguel holds an M.Ed in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota and MPA from Southern Utah University.
Anna Lees (Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, descendant) began her career as an early childhood classroom teacher in rural northern Michigan. Now, an Associate Professor of Early Childhood Education at Western Washington University, she partners with schools and communities for early childhood teacher education. Anna is committed to developing and sustaining reciprocal relationships with Indigenous communities to engage community leaders as co-teacher educators, opening spaces for Indigenous values and ways of knowing and being in early childhood settings and higher education. She is currently engaged in research around a land education professional development model led by tribal nations and a relationship-based site embedded professional development model with tribal early learning programs. Her scholarship has been recognized by the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education’s Journal of Teacher Education, Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education, and the Spencer Foundation; she currently serves as editor of the Tribal College and University Research Journal.
Nikki McDaid-Morgan (Shoshone-Bannock) is a doctoral student in Learning Sciences at Northwestern University. She is interested in designing land-based learning environments in formal and informal contexts for Indigenous youth. She also is exploring the relationship between how youth conceptualize agency of more-than-humans and youth beliefs and decisions regarding the natural world. Nikki earned her M.A. in Teaching from Pacific University and her B.S. in Sociology from Northeastern University prior to attending Northwestern. She also has experience as a middle school and high school classroom teacher and has two young children of her own.
Michelle Salgado is a doctoral student in Curriculum and Instruction. Her research interests focus on children in primary grades engaged in authentic and collaborative inquiry practices within interdisciplinary science learning opportunities. She focuses on co-designing equitable learning environments with teachers and which include family engagement with science concepts to support and elevate a diversity of student participation. She is a National Board Certified Teacher and has taught elementary school for close to a decade. She has also worked as science curriculum developer, professional development provider, and instructional coach.
Ananda Marin is an Assistant Professor of Social Research Methodology in UCLA’s Department of Education and faculty in American Indian Studies. As a learning scientist, she uses video-ethnographic methods and participatory design research to explore questions about the cultural nature of teaching, learning, and development. A primary goal of her work is to desettle and broaden conceptualizations of cognition and learning in ways that are consequential to the communities she partners with and the field of education. To do this, she draws upon Indigenous ways of knowing and sociocultural theories to: (1) develop research on learning across a variety of activities including the everyday (i.e., forest walks) and the professional (e.g., teaching, ensemble performances) and (2) co-design learning contexts with communities that are in right relations with Indigenous lands/waters. Within both of these strands of research she examines the multiple ways that multigenerational groups of people coordinate attention and observation in order to participate in joint activity, collaborate, and improvise. She also engages in micro-ethnographic analyses of the moment-to-moment unfolding of interaction, accounting for the role of relationality, embodied movement, and place in science-related education and teaching/learning more generally. She has widespread experience designing and learning with Indigenous communities and organizations to cultivate educational contexts that center Indigenous futures. She also applies her expertise to participatory and collaborative evaluation projects.
Leah Bricker is a Research Associate Professor at Northwestern University and the Spencer Foundation. She is a science educator and a learning scientist who studies children and youths’ science-related learning trajectories in schools and in other learning environments, such as museums, gardens, and zoos. She is really interested in connections between language (verbal and nonverbal communication) and science learning. Leah also uses design-based research to design science curricula in partnership with youths, families, and teachers, and then studies the curricula in action. Leah’s undergraduate and Master’s degrees are in the biological sciences (from the University of Arizona and Purdue University, respectively), and her PhD is in the learning sciences from the University of Washington. She was a middle school science teacher in Indianapolis, IN before working on issues related to science education policy at the Indiana Department of Education and at the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Project 2061. Bricker has also helped preservice science teachers learn to teach science, and has designed and facilitated professional development experiences with and for practicing science teachers.
Sharon Siehl joined Seattle Tilth (now Tilth Alliance) in July 2013, after completing her Master’s in Public Policy and Administration from Northwestern University. She is a Program Director working with Youth Education, and has held several leadership roles around Garden and Adult Education. She co-facilitates the School Learning Garden Network with Seattle Public Schools and is co-leader in the Washington Farm to School Network. Sharon is an informal outdoor educator working with children, students, teachers, parents and community members in school gardens and outdoor spaces in Columbus, OH, Houston, TX and Seattle for 14 years. She is passionate about creating a just food system through food policy and community work, and is a co-founder of the Houston Food Policy Workgroup. She, her husband, and two sons enjoy planting, eating, traveling, reading and local adventures.
Nat completed a Master’s in Education Policy at the UW College of Education in 2016, one year after receiving a Bachelors of Arts in Comparative History of Ideas, also at UW. He is also currently the Outreach Coordinator for the Comparative History of Ideas Department at UW and the Board President of The Common Acre, a 501(c)(3) organization that creates space for science and stories across cultures. Nat comes to Learning in Places after coordinating children’s gardens for Tilth Alliance, and his research interests include facilitation design, posthuman learning, and plant consciousness.
Priya Pugh is a postdoctoral research scientist at the University of Washington Bothell and postdoctoral fellow at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. She comes to this project as both an environmental educator and a researcher. Priya received a certificate in Education for Environment and Community from IslandWood in 2011, and has directed, designed, and been a field instructor for environmental education and STEAM-focused learning programs here in Seattle. Priya’s research focuses on how people learn about science when they are outside. More specifically, she studies how youth, adults, and families understand and actively make sense of complex ecological phenomena, and the social and cultural influences on this sense making.
Rebecca Holbert holds a M.A. of Education specializing in science education from the University of Washington, and a certificate in Education for Environment and Community from IslandWood. She loves working alongside children as they bring out her own inner child and curiosity. Rebecca has been teaching in classrooms and outdoor settings for over 10 years and has found that learning happens best when it’s fun! To stay connected to her own sense of fun- Rebecca enjoys spending time outside, reading, writing, and cuddling with her dog. Currently, Rebecca works in education leadership as a supervisor and mentor at SEED Early Childhood School- collaborating with children, teachers, and families to create sustainable learning communities for life-affirming education.
Mary Margaret Welch serves as the K-12 Science Program Manager for Seattle Public Schools. Formerly, she served as secondary instructional science specialist for the Seattle School District supporting teachers to improve their pedagogy, assessment and curriculum. Ms. Welch is a celebrated science educator who has served as a classroom teacher, a curriculum leader, dean of academics, student advisor, professional development coach and school administrator. In her tenure she has taught children from kindergarten through college. MaryMargaret was named the National Outstanding Science Education Leader for 2019. Ms. Welch has been recognized for her excellence in teaching with several awards including Puget Sound ESD Teacher of the Year, Washington State Outstanding Biology Teacher, Amgen Award for Science Teaching Excellence, Pacific Science Center’s Excellence in Education. Welch has earned both a BS and MS in biology, a MEd in Educational Administration and completed the Non- profit Management Certification Program at the University of Washington.
MaryMargaret’s mission and passion is to act as a catalyst to
empower all youth with knowledge and skills, through equitable inspirational
educational opportunities, to ensure all children can realize their full
potential and serve as a contributing member of our multicultural global
community.
Christine’s teaching experience includes 8 years as the E-STEM Program Manager at Hazel Wolf K-8 School. She earned her Master’s of Science Education from the University of Houston and holds Bilingual (Spanish) and ELL teaching endorsements. Christine believes science learning encompasses the full breath of learning opportunities for all students. Science taps into all students’ curiosity and their need to make sense of their surroundings and this creates meaningful opportunities for collaboration, reading, and communicating. Science is a social endeavor for no scientist works alone. Christine is excited about supporting teachers in their shift in practice to create more equitable opportunities for students to engage in relevant science learning through the outdoors.