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Research Interests and Projects

filaments

Science and technology education research interests

The Science and Technology Research Group is interested in topics and questions around broad areas such as:

  • Thinking and learning in science and technology
  • Pedagogy and curriculum development in science and technology
  • Science and technology teacher preparation and development
  • Teaching and learning about the nature of science and technology

Please note that particular projects may relate to science and technology education, or to teaching and learning about particular disciplines (e.g. biology education, chemistry education, physics education, etc.) 

Currently active themes include:

• Conceptual learning in science (e.g., Cogbooks: Adaptive learning in science education; Children's Chemistry Reasoning; LASAR: Learning about science & religion; ECLIPSE: Exploring Conceptual Learning, Integration and Progression in Science Education)

• Science capital (e.g., COSMOS: Evaluation of a Cambridge Science Centre Programme; Tinkering 2: Building Science Capital for all; STEM teens)

• Informal science learning & Science enrichment (e.g., COSMOS: Evaluation of a Cambridge Science Centre Programme; Tinkering EU: Contemporary Education for Innovators of Tomorrow; The Pathway to Inquiry Based Science Teaching; STEM teens

• Inquiry based learning & Making and tinkering (e.g., Tinkering EU: Contemporary Education for Innovators of Tomorrow; Tinkering 2: Building Science Capital for all; The Pathway to Inquiry Based Science Teaching

• Teacher education and professional development in science and technology education (e.g., Tinkering EU: Contemporary Education for Innovators of Tomorrow; Tinkering 2: Building Science Capital for all;  

• Digital technology in science and technology education & adaptive learning (e.g., Cogbooks: Adaptive learning in science education; 

• Science & technology curriculum (e.g., Reviewing the agriculture curriculum of Uganda and Ghana) 

  

Indicative project topics

Below is a list of research interests and projects within the science & technology education group. (An overview of ongoing research at the Faculty can be found on the research projects page.) A list of some of our current students, and their project themes, can be found on the Research Students page.

The following list is indicative, based on current research interests, ongoing, and completed projects involving members of staff working in and with the group, and their graduate research students.

  • Developing early science skills through playful learning
  • Early chemistry understanding
  • Anthropomorphic explanations and chemistry understanding
  • Science learning with digital technology
  • Investigating the development of conceptual understanding in secondary science students engaged in project-based learning
  • Using science centres/museums to raise science capital
  • Applying scaffolding principles in science learning
  • Developing metrics for measuring the impact of STEM (especially science, technology, engineering, computer science) enrichment activities
  • Maker pedagogy
  • Inquiry-based science education
  • Back-channeling in the science classroom
  • Pedagogy design to visualise reasoning along the hierarchical organisation in biology with the fusion of chemistry triplet
  • Development of a web-based multiple choice diagnostic instrument on ionisation energy
  • Chemical Formulae and Equations as a social semiotic resource
  • The development of reflectivity of science teachers-in-preparation
  • Developing professionalism of physics teachers)
  • The professional education of engineers in Canada
  • Towards an educational model of scientific explanation as a means to improve teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge
  • Teacher interpretation of nature of science elements of the English national curriculum
  • Science reasoning
  • Investigating undergraduate engineering and art & design students and lecturers’ beliefs about creativity, and teaching and learning
  • Secondary school students’ ideas in astronomy
  • Exploring concept learning, integration & progression in science education
  • Inquiry learning
  • Creative problem solving in design & technology at secondary level
  • Evaluation of the Technology Enhancement Programme
  • Using new technologies in science teaching
  • Molecular biology education
  • Tinkering
  • Adaptive learning in science education
  • Effecting principled improvement in STEM Education
  • Science education for the gifted
  • Students’ perceptions of the relationship between science and religion

If you are unsure whether your project might fit in the group, please feel free to make an informal email enquiry to kst24@cam.ac.uk