Teachers’ concerns in implementing engineering into elementary classrooms and the impact of teacher professional development

Jeongmin Lee, Johannes Strobel

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

In order to increase and strengthen engineering programs in P-12 schools, professional development for in-service teachers in engineering is required, since teachers play a key role in implementing changes in their classrooms. However, despite teachers’ knowledge about engineering and their capability to implement changes accordingly, many barriers stand in their way to integrating engineering into the curriculum. Teachers are not likely to adopt innovation or change their teaching practice unless they are confident enough about implementing it. Therefore, strengthening the confidence of teachers in engineering curriculum is needed. This research project used the theoretical framework of a concern-based adoption model to capture concerns and the level of teachers’ use of engineering on a new class of innovation. The results indicate that while stages of concerns dealing with the new innovation are addressed and significantly lowered after the teacher professional development, other more complex concerns are significantly raised. It is recognized that the success of innovation is increasingly dependent on the identification and adequate addressing of concerns by policymakers and the teacher professional development providers. In addition, teacher professional development on engineering education should track teachers’ concerns and must be designed to take into account the teachers’ concerns.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationEngineering in Pre-College Settings
Subtitle of host publicationSynthesizing Research, Policy, and Practices
PublisherPurdue University Press
Pages163-182
Number of pages20
ISBN (Electronic)9781612493572
ISBN (Print)9781557536914
StatePublished - 1 Jan 2014

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2014 by Purdue University. All rights reserved.

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