Center for the Scholarship of Teaching < Events < 2007 < How Lenses for Examining Science Education: How Students Learn and Teachers Teach

Center Events: Speaker Series

Kathy Roth
Two Lenses for Examining Science Education:
How Students Learn and Teachers Teach
18 October 2007

Kathy Roth will first share key results from two strands of her research: her teacher/researcher studies of students’ science learning and her work on the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) video study. From these studies, two lenses for analyzing and improving science teaching emerged. Using examples from her current work on two projects (Science Teachers Learning from Lesson Analysis and Videocases for Preservice Science Teacher Analysis), Kathy will illustrate how these two lenses inform her work with inservice and preservice teachers. In both projects, teachers analyze videocases using the two conceptual lenses, and data is being collected to assess teacher learning. Preliminary research results about teacher and student learning will be reported.

Kathleen Roth is Senior Research Scientist at LessonLab Research Institute in Santa Monica, California, where she directed the TIMSS Science Video Study and is currently the principal investigator for two NSF-funded projects: Science Teachers Learning from Lesson Analysis (STeLLA) and Videocases for Science Teaching Analysis (ViSTA). In these projects, Dr. Roth uses videocases of K-8 science teaching to help inservice and preservice teachers deepen their understandings of science content, students’ thinking and learning in science, and effective science teaching practices.

Dr. Roth received her PhD in Science Education from Michigan State University, a master’s degree in science teaching from Johns Hopkins University, and an undergraduate degree in Biology from Duke University. Her career in education includes seven years as a middle and high school science teacher followed by fifteen years as a teacher educator and researcher at Michigan State University. She has been at LessonLab Research Institute since 1999.

Kathy’s research program has focused on studies of upper elementary and middle school science teaching and learning, preservice teacher learning, and inservice teacher learning. Much of her research on young students’ learning occurred in her role as a teacher-researcher, where she taught elementary school science and studied her own practice and her students’ learning. In her most recent research, Kathy draws from the findings from the TIMSS Science Video Study to develop and study innovative, videocase-based teacher learning programs for preservice and inservice science teachers. Three themes permeate all of Kathy’s work. First, there is the theme of teaching as listening -- listening to students (whether they be K-12 students or teachers) and their ideas and ways of making sense of new ideas. A second theme throughout her career has been bridging the gap between research and practice. Finally, as evidenced in more recent work, is a theme that focuses on the use of videos in supporting teacher learning.