Earthworks: Earth System Science for Secondary Teachers

"Earthworks" is a one-week summer workshop, developed and offered by CIRES (Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences). Designed primarily for pre-service and new teachers, it also involves a large group of research scientists as guides and co-learners with the teacher participants.

The workshop design is based on the principles of "place-based" environmental education and "distributed expertise." Results of the program evaluation suggest that intensive and carefully guided practice with these strategies, even for the brief period of the workshop, can significantly affect teachers' classroom practices and can encourage them to use the environment around their school as a natural laboratory. In addition, this experience can enhance their skill and confidence in teaching Earth system science and meeting science content standards, particularly in interdisciplinary science areas and others that rely on the concept of interacting systems.

Elements of program design that support optimal teacher learning in this environment will be discussed, as well as the conditions under which teachers are most likely to benefit from this type of professional development. The implications for designing other professional development programs for pre-service teachers will also be discussed.