Scientists' views of science,models of writing,and science writing practices

Written and oral communications and the processes of writing and reading are highly valued within the scientific community; scientists who communicate well are successful in gaining recognition and support from members of their own communities, the research funding agencies, and the wider society. Yet how do scientists achieve this proficiency? Are expert scientists equally expert writers in and of science? Do scientists' perceptions of the nature of science influence their writing strategies and processes, and their beliefs about the role of writing in knowledge construction? This study used a questionnaire and semistructured interviews to document these perceptions, strategies, processes, and beliefs in a nonrandom sample of Canadian university scientists and engineers. The results indicate that the scientists subscribed to a contemporary evaluativist view of science, used common writing strategies, held similar beliefs about scientific writing and nonscientific writing, and agreed that writing generates insights and clarifies ambiguity in science. The engineers held a different view of technology than the common views of science or technology as simply applied science. These findings were slightly different than those found for American scientists from a large land‐grant university. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 41: 338–369, 2004     

Letter from the Editors

Journal of Science Teacher Education -     

Using Lesson Study in teacher professional development for domain-based moral education

This study examined the application of Lesson Study for professional development (PD) for a domain approach to moral education. A comparison was drawn between the effects of Lesson Study with 17 teachers and 144 students representing middle schools in the same district as a prior study employing intensive traditional PD. In Lesson Study, groups of same grade teachers construct lessons taught by one group member and observed by the others. Teachers meet following the lesson to critique and improve the lesson using criteria established by teachers and informed by outside ‘experts.’ Findings from analysis of teacher discourse over nine months and end of year surveys revealed improvements in teacher pedagogy, knowledge of moral development, greater sense of professionalism, and efficacy for engagement in moral education in comparison with controls. Fewer lessons were produced, resulting in fewer gains in student moral and conventional reasoning than observed with intensive individualized PD.     

Recommendations for Practice: Justifying Claims of Generalizability

Recommendations for practice are routinely included in articles that report educational research. Robinson et al. suggest that reports of primary research should not routinely do so. They argue that single primary research studies seldom have sufficient external validity to support claims about practice policy. In this article, I draw on recent statistical research that has formalized subjective notions about generalizability from experiments. I show that even rather large experiments often do not support generalizations to policy-relevant inference populations. This suggests that single primary studies are unlikely to be sufficiently generalizable to support recommendations for practice.     

Conservation Writing: An Emerging Field in Technical Communication

This article discusses the rise of conservation writing as a new field of technical communication, and it offers pedagogical strategies for teaching conservation writing and building curricula. Conservation writing is an umbrella term for a range of writing about ecology, biology, the outdoors, and environmental policies and ethics. It places the natural world at the center of readers' attention, often viewing sustainability as a core value. A course or curriculum in this kind of writing would likely need to help students master a variety of genres, while providing a working knowledge in environmental law, ethics, and politics.     

Multiple methods: research methods in education projects at NSF1

Projects on science and mathematics education research supported by the National Science Foundation (US government) rarely employ a single method of study. Studies of educational practices that use experimental design are very rare. The most common research method is the case study method and the second most common is some form of experimental design. However, most studies use a combination of methods to study educational practices such as case study and survey. The types of methods found in this group of education researchers represent the best quality available to the education community. The proposals were selected from those carefully reviewed by a panel of senior researchers.     

Creating optimal work environments: exploring teacher flow experiences

The purpose of this article is to provide a new perspective on the intricacies of the work life in schools that motivate and satisfy teachers. The authors review the literature related to the improvement of school environments and the concept of ‘flow’ as defined by Mihalyi Csikszentmihalyi (1990 Csikszentmihalyi M 1990 Flow: the psychology of optimal experience (New York, Harper and Row)  [Google Scholar]). He describes flow as a ‘state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at a great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it’ (p. 4). These experiences when applied to classrooms have the potential of enhancing teachers' work environments and increasing their effectiveness, thereby increasing student achievement. A review of research over several years indicates that the frequency of principals' classroom visits predicts teacher flow experiences in the following areas: (a) teacher self‐efficacy, (b) teacher‐perceived school efficacy, (c) teacher‐perceived efficacy of other teachers, (d) teacher‐perceived organizational effectiveness, and (e) teacher‐perceived efficacy of evaluations and professional development programs. Each of these those variables is discussed and suggestions incorporated so administrators can build work environments where teachers have greater opportunities to experience flow.