Focus

We will spend our time networking and learning together to raise our ceiling of support for in-service and pre-service teachers.

1. Share our best approaches for supporting implementation of KAS-Science in response to compelling challenges identified in higher education.
2. Continue to deepen our own understanding of how and why K-12 science instruction has shifted and how we can best support K-12 teachers – both pre-service and in-service.
3. Explore organizational opportunities to create a state-wide approach for leveraging our collective expertise for continuing this work.

Many different people share responsibility for preparing and supporting our state’s K-12 science teachers, including science educators, professional scientists, informal science professionals, and tertiary science instructors. As K-12 science teachers and their students align instruction and learning with the Kentucky Academic Standards for Science (KAS), the challenging task of thinking about and teaching science in more cognitively complex and rich ways requires us to continue to learn and inform our capacity to provide teacher support structures. There is a strong tendency for teachers to teach science in a manner like how they were taught. It is critical for higher education science instruction to evolve along with K-12 science instruction as we learn more about the most effective ways to teach – and learn – science. We should embody and enact approaches consistent with KAS-Science tenants as we work with classroom science teachers.