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Supporting mathematics and science teachers in addressing diversity and promoting fundamental values

Are mathematics and science really neutral?

Are they culturally independent? No, they are not! If we want to decide on whether measles vaccination should be obligatory or not, this decision is not only influenced by facts from natural sciences but also by ethical and moral values and by parents’ autonomy on deciding for their child. Different cultures use science differently and advance  science and mathematics through the cultural lense of their researchers and experts.

However, science and mathematics teachers are neither prepared to include citizenship education nor taking into account different cultural backgrounds in their education.

The EU funded project MaSDiV aims to supports maths and science teachers

  • to deliver inclusive education for all students
  • to build active citizenship
  • to foster intercultural learning

To this end, ministry-university tandems from six European countries work closely together to develope and implement a professional development course which innovatively connects mathematics and science education with intercultural learning and the promotion of fundamental values.

What is MaSDiV?

Supporting mathematics and science teachers in addressing diversity and promoting fundamental values (MaSDiV) was a EU funded project that aimed to support maths and science teachers in accommodating cultural, socioeconomic and performance related diversity in their classrooms. Central to this project was the inclusion of the social and intercultural dimensions in maths and science classes. Teachers were equipped to foster students’ understanding of fundamental values of our society through maths and science lessons.

The MaSDiV Professional Development course, which was developed during the project, includes innovative teaching approaches and links inquiry-based learning with the influence of culture and fundamental values. They create inclusive class environments and help to enhance the achievement levels of all students. By applying these approaches, teachers can actively support their students in the process of becoming well-informed and critically-reflected citizens.

Project Poster

 

Why is the project essential?

Science and mathematics are vital prerequisites for active participation in society and belong to the eight key competences (EU framework for key competences, EC 2007). However, across the EU, 17% of 15-year-olds underachieve in science. In mathematics, that figure rises to 22% – and even to 36.6 % among students with low socioeconomic status (ET 2020). 13.7 million young people – those with migration backgrounds are particularly concerned here – are not in employment, education or training (Youth Report 2015). These young people are less involved in social and political life, and at risk of exclusion and marginalisation (ibid.), which in turn is a risk to our societies. Increased migration enhances the need for inclusive education that promotes learning in groups with different competence levels and cultural backgrounds and ‘disadvantaged’ students (see also Eurydice 2016).

Science also has social, cultural and ethical dimensions (e.g. the decision for or against genetic engineering in agriculture in developing countries). Therefore, science learning should be used to promote cultural awareness, critical thinking, decision making and consequently, social and civic competences (EC 2007). However, conventionally, science education has focused on the ‘learning of science’ (Hazelkorn et al. 2015). This means pure science detached from societal implications, as opposed to learning ‘of and about science’. The latter fosters young peoples’ understanding of the nature, applications and implications of science and thus, they learn principles and competences vital in democratic, pluralistic and increasingly multi-cultural European societies. In this sense, science education is also citizenship education as envisaged by the Paris declaration 2015 and in the European Education and Training 2020 program.

Delivering inclusive mathematics and science education linked to citizenship education and intercultural learning is, however, not a trivial task. Consequently teachers need support (EU-WG MST 2013, EU-WG PD 2013, Arjomand et al. 2013). Here, we find shortcomings in Europe. Experts have marked out a need to substantially improve the quality of STEM PD offers (Hazelkorn et al. 2015) and mismatches exist between teachers’ expressed need for training in suitable approaches and the course offerings available (Eurydice 2015).

A lack of adequate PD offers and an increased need for inclusive STEM education approaches (due to increased diversity in classrooms) concerns all European countries. In many European nations, policy has recently recognised the need to better support science teachers in dealing with the above named challenges in science education. MaSDiV’s measure provides an approach suitable to jointly address these challenges.

 

What are the activities of the project?

The concrete measures of MaSDiV were the development, the evaluation and the dissemination of an innovative professional development course for teachers, who are teaching at secondary schools. The project included three phases:

 

Phase 1 (March 2017 – February 2018): Development phase

Development of the professional development (PD) course, related PD materials and evaluation instruments, setting up European and national dissemination plans based on stakeholder analysis, monitoring grid, starting dissemination according to the European and national dissemination plans.

 

Phase 2 (March 2018 – February 2019): Phase of field trials

Implementation of PD course and data collection in all six partner countries, execution of dissemination plans, monitoring project activities

 

Phase 3 (March 2019 – February 2020): Phase of evaluation and optimisation

Carying out data evaluation leading to the final report, optimisation PD course based on evaluation results, monitoring project activities, carrying out dissemination activities with focus on upscaling and sustainability

 

Key data

Program: Erasmus+ Key Action 3, Initiatives for policy innovation – European policy experimentations in the fields of Education, Training and Youth led by high-level public authorities (Call: EACEA/34/2015), Priority ‘Promoting fundamental values through Education and Training addressing diversity in the learning environment’

Duration: 36 months (February 2017 – February 2020)

Grant awarded: EUR 2.5 Mio

Grant agreement number: 2016 – 2927 / 003 – 001

Project number: 582943-EPP-1-2016-2-DE-EPPKA3-PI-POLICY

 

How were the professional development courses evaluated?

A multi-method evaluation design reverting to both quantitative and qualitative data accompanied the policy measure and allowed for reliable and valid conclusions on the effects of our measure and routes to upscaling. In line with the aims of our policy measure, we measured effects on the development of teachers’ beliefs, their self-efficacy and knowledge of IBL as an approach to deliver inclusive education, promote citizenship education and intercultural learning. Furthermore, we evaluated how teachers actually use this approach in their lessons.

To evaluate how teachers actually implement our teaching approach and what challenges they encounter, we applied a case study approach giving in-depth insight into selected teachers’ science teaching and their related considerations (N= 3 per country). In order to allow for comparability, we used the same methods in each country for data collection (collecting lesson plan, lesson observation followed by a semi-structured interview about the lesson and its objectives, students’ questionnaire to evaluate their acceptance). While the evaluation experts carried out analysis centrally, case studies were drafted in English at the local level to avoid problems due to language and then be analysed across cases centrally.

Overall, the evaluation results provided evidence that the MaSDiV professional development program had a positive impact on teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs, learning-related beliefs and their practices. Read more on the evaluation in the final report which can be found in the resources section. The evaluation instruments are published as a resource as well.

Who is involved in the project?

The project consortium consists of 13 institutions. It is comprised of university-ministry tandems in six countries that will jointly develop and test the measure in 2017/2018. An evaluation institution is in charge of a thorough evaluation of the measure.

  • University of Education Freiburg, Germany (Project Coordinator)
  • Ministry for Education, Youth and Sports Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany
  • University of Nicosia, Cyprus
  • Ministry of Education and Culture, Cyprus
  • University of Jaen, Spain
  • Ministry of Education and Vocational Training, Spain
  • University of Malta, Malta
  • Ministry of Education and Employment, Malta
  • Utrecht University, Netherlands
  • Ministry of Education, Culture and Science, Netherlands
  • Hacettepe University, Turkey
  • Turkish Ministry of National Education, Turkey
  • IPN – Leibniz Institute for Science and Mathematics Education at Kiel University, Germany (evaluation institution)

Project coordinator: Prof. Katja Maaß (International Centre for STEM Education- ICSE)

Project manager: Sabine Mickler (ICSE)

 

© ICSE

Via the European Impact Board further 5 University-Ministry tandems and experts/networks from European STEM education are linked to the project. They will support the dissemination, scaling-up and broad use of the measure across Europe after its positive evaluation.

  • Vilnius University, Lithuania
  • Education Development Centre (UPC) established by and acting under the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Lithuania
  • Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway
  • Ministry of Education and Research, Norway
  • University of Innsbruck, Austria
  • Federal Ministry of Education, Austria
  • University of Hradec Králové, Czech Republic
  • Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, Czech Republic
  • National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece
  • Agueda Gras-Velazquez, European School Net, Belgium
  • Dr. Manuela Welzel-Breuer, University of Education Heidelberg, Germany
  • Ruta Mazgelyte, Education Development Centre, Lithuania
  • Dr. Michele Artigue, Université Paris Diderot, France

 

National project websites

SpainMaltaCyprusTurkeyNetherlands

The MaSDiV teachers‘ professional development course provides an evidence-based approach to tackle current challenges in STEM education: the underachievement of particular student populations; linking science competences with social and civic competences and effectively supporting teachers as they face increasing social, cultural and competence-related diversity in their classrooms. It thus aims to support the teaching of science and mathematics in diverse and multicultural contexts for the benefit of all students, regardless of their cultural or socioeconomic background. We call this teaching approach inclusive science education.

The fundament of this approach is inquiry-based learning (IBL). IBL can be used for addressing different achievement levels, because all students get the opportunity to participate at their own level to prevent labelling and creating fixed mindsets towards science or mathematics.

The professional development course covers three interconnected modules. Each of the modules offers a set of activities and present inquiry-based learning (IBL) with a different emphasis:

  • Modul 1 (achievement) introduces IBL as a means for addressing achievement-related diversity
  • Modul 2 (contexts) expands IBL to realistic, relevant contexts
  • Modul 3 (intercultural learning) embeds IBL in multicultural settings

You can find more information about the structure of the module as well as the modules themselves below.

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The creation of these resources has been funded with the support of the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union under grant no. 2016 – 2927 / 003 – 001. The European Union/European Commission is neither responsible for the content nor liable for any losses or damage resulting of the use of these resources.

CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license is granted for all our materials. Please feel free to use and adapt them for non-commercial purposes. Make sure to give attribution to the original materials as well as for the adapted ones. Find explicit terms of use for CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/deed.en

Hands-On Materials: Teaching Professionals Watch out!

We offer a rich set of exemplary classroom materials for immediate use for students, teachers and teacher trainers. Description of each task includes information about the content and gives suggestions for implementation.

Feel free to draw examples from our classroom materials repository and use them in your own classroom or your teacher training course.

Classroom Materials
MaSDiV_Booklet_Cover

In order to provide you with useful, practical information, new classroom ideas and innovative teaching approaches, we published a MaSDiV booklet. It is designed to support you and other teachers in including the promotion of fundamental values and intercultural learning into your teaching. It shows interesting examples of classroom materials which engage students in dealing with controversial real-life situations and in decision-making as well as in the multicultural character of mathematics and science.

You can download the booklet here:

MaSDiV Booklet

If you have remarks and observations, please contact us (buttons below) to share your thoughts and expertise.

The creation of these resources has been funded with the support of the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union under grant no. 2016 – 2927 / 003 – 001. The European Union/European Commission is neither responsible for the content nor liable for any losses or damage resulting of the use of these resources.

CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license is granted for all our materials. Please feel free to use and adapt them for non-commercial purposes. Make sure to give attribution to the original materials as well as for the adapted ones. Find explicit terms of use for CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/deed.en

Outputs of the MaSDiV project may be for interest for different stakeholders. Please feel free to use our resources for your work. If you have any comments, additions or feedback, please let us know.

Resources for Teachers and Teacher Educators: The MaSDiV PD Toolkit

The MaSDiV professional development course innovatively connects mathematics and science education with intercultural learning and the promotion of fundamental values.

PD course concept

This document outlines the aims and intentions of the PD course, the guiding pedagogical principles of the course as well as modules’ structure and content.

   WP2 Policy measure D2.1 PD concept | 464 KB | Download

 

Module 1

This module introduces inquiry-based learning (IBL) as a means for addressing achievement-related diversity.

  Outline Module 1 | 1.16 MB | Download

 

  Handout Module 1 | 243.74 KB | Download

 

  PPP Module 1 | 867.58 KB | Download

 

Module 2

This module expands IBL to realistic, relevant contexts.

  Outline Module 2 | 559.84 KB | Download

 

  PPP Module 2 | 608.40 KB | Download

 

Module 3

This module embeds IBL in multicultural settings.

  Outline Module 3 | 1.44 MB | Download

 

  PPP Module 3 | 582.20 KB | Download

 

Teaching Materials

For hands-on classroom materials (which can be used in class as well as in the PD course) please visit the online repository:

Advertising text

This document is a standardised announcement of the course which can be used for advertisement:

   WP4 Field trials D4.1 Standardised announcement of course | 290 KB | Download

 

Resources for Policy Makers, Researchers and Project Managers

Reports on the results of the policy experimentation, dissemination and project monitoring.

Evaluation instruments

A rigorous pre-post-test evaluation design and an additional qualitative case studies approach were employed to ensure that the MaSDiV professional development program indeed has positive effects on participating teachers.

   WP3 Experimentation protocol D3.1 Pre-post Questionnaire | 3 MB | Download

 

   WP3 Experimentation protocol D3.2 Data collection instruments for case study | 3 MB | Download

 

Evaluation Results

Overall, the evaluation results provide evidence that the MaSDiV professional development program had a positive impact on teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs, learning-related beliefs and their practices. Read more on the evaluation in the final report:

  Final Evaluation Report D5.1 Results of Policy Experimentation | 1 MB | Download

 

 

Project Monitoring

The collection of instruments developed as a monitoring grid offers a collection of interesting tools for a participatory and continuous evaluation of the project and provides a basis for the improvement and optimisation of the activities and products, when necessary.

  WP7 Quality control D7.1 Monitoring grid | 1 MB | Download

 

  WP7 Quality control D7.1 Monitoring grid Appendix 2 | 1 MB | Download

 

  WP7 Quality control D7.1 Monitoring grid Appendix 3 | 1 MB | Download

 

 

Guide for Dissemination, Communication and Exploitation

The purpose of this guide is to summarize, at the end of the MaSDiV project, what has been achieved in relation to dissemination, communication and exploitation in the past three years and thereby lay the foundation for the dissemination and exploitation to come, in particular in terms of sustainability.

  D6_1 MaSDiV Final Report_Diss_Comm_Exp | 1 MB | Download

 

Publications

Publications related to the project’s ideas can be found here:

Publications

The creation of these resources has been funded with the support of the Erasmus+ programme of the European Union under grant no. 2016 – 2927 / 003 – 001. The European Union/European Commission is neither responsible for the content nor liable for any losses or damage resulting of the use of these resources.

CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license is granted for all our materials. Please feel free to use and adapt them for non-commercial purposes. Make sure to give attribution to the original materials as well as for the adapted ones. Find explicit terms of use for CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/deed.en

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