Participatory Action Research as Pedagogy in Elementary Science Methods

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Askew, R. (2021). Participatory Action Research as Pedagogy in Elementary Science Methods. Innovations in Science Teacher Education, 6(3). Retrieved from https://innovations.theaste.org/participatory-action-research-as-pedagogy-in-elementary-science-methods/
by Rachel Askew, Vanderbilt University

Abstract

Participatory action research (PAR) is a methodology where the traditional lines dividing researchers and participants are blurred. In this article, a description of how PAR was used to cocreate a science methods course is explored with specific focus on the challenges and benefits it can bring to teacher education. Using PAR as pedagogy provided a way of teaching that centered students’ questions, experiences, ideas, and perceived needs as future science teachers. This way of teaching impacted our class community and opened space for students to create their own meanings of science and views of themselves as science teachers.

Innovations Journal articles, beyond each issue's featured article, are included with ASTE membership. If your membership is current please login at the upper right.

Become a member or renew your membership

References

Adriansen, H. K. (2012). Timeline interviews: A tool for conducting life history research. Qualitative Studies, 3(1), 40–55. https://doi.org/10.7146/qs.v3i1.6272

Avraamidou, L. (2014). Tracing a beginning elementary teacher’s development of identity for science teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 65(3), 223–240. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487113519476

Avraamidou, L. (2016). Telling stories: Intersections of life histories and science teaching identities. In L. Avraamidou (Ed.), Studying science teacher identity: Theoretical, methodological and empirical explorations (pp. 153–176). Sense Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6300-528-9_8

Barton, A. C., Johnson, V., & The students in Ms. Johnson’s Grade 8 science classes. (2002). Truncating agency: Peer review and participatory research. Research in Science Education, 32(2), 191–214. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1016078128502

Baum, F., MacDougall, C., & Smith, D. (2006). Glossary: Participatory action research. Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, 60(10), 854–857. https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.2004.028662

Birmingham, D., & Calabrese Barton, A. (2014). Putting on a green carnival: Youth taking educated action on socioscientific issues. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 51(3), 286–314. https://doi.org/10.1002/tea.21127

Birmingham, D., Calabrese Barton, A., McDaniel, A., Jones, J., Turner, C., & Rogers, A. (2017). “But the science we do here matters”: Youth‐authored cases of consequential learning. Science Education, 101(5), 818–844. https://doi.org/10.1002/sce.21293

Brydon‐Miller, M., & Maguire, P. (2009). Participatory action research: Contributions to the development of practitioner inquiry in education. Educational Action Research, 17(1), 79–93. https://doi.org/10.1080/09650790802667469

Castillo-Burguete, M. T., García-Gómez, C., Castro-Borges, P., & Dickinson, F. (2015). ‘I’m not afraid of him; that dog barks but he don’t bite.’ PAR processes, gender equity and emancipation with women in Yucatán, Mexico. In H. Bradbury (Ed.), The SAGE handbook of action research (3rd ed., pp. 291–300). SAGE. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781473921290.n29

Emdin, C. (2016). For white folks who teach in the hood . . . and the rest of y’all too: Reality pedagogy and urban education. Beacon Press.

Fornet-Betancourt, R., Becker, H., & Gomez-Müller, A. (Gauthier, J. D., Trans.). (1987). The ethic of care for the self as a practice of freedom: An interview with Michel Foucault on January 20, 1984. Philosophy & Social Criticism, 12(2–3), 112–131. https://doi.org/10.1177/019145378701200202

Gee, J. P. (2000). Identity as an analytic lens for research in education. Review of Research in Education, 25(1), 99–125. https://doi.org/10.3102/0091732X025001099

hooks, b. (2014). Teaching to transgress. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203700280

Kohn, A. (1993). Choices for children: Why and how to let students decide. Phi Delta Kappan, 75(1), 8–16, 18–20.

Lemke, J. L. (1990). Talking science: Language, learning, and values. Ablex Publishing.

Lewis, M. E. (2004). A teacher’s schoolyard tale: Illuminating the vagaries of practicing participatory action research (PAR) pedagogy. Environmental Education Research, 10(1), 89–114. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350462032000173724

Luehmann, A. (2016). Practice-linked identity development in science teacher education: GET REAL! Science as a figured world. In L. Avraamidou (Ed.), Studying science teacher identity: Theoretical, methodological and empirical explorations (pp. 15–47). Sense Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6300-528-9_2

Martin, L. H., Gutman, H., & Hutton, P. H. (Eds.). (1988). Technologies of the self: A seminar with Michel Foucault. University of Massachusetts Press.

Mensah, F. M. (2016). Positional identity as a framework to studying science teacher identity: Looking at the experiences of teachers of color. In L. Avraamidou (Ed.), Studying science teacher identity: Theoretical, methodological and empirical explorations (pp. 49–69). Sense Publishers. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-6300-528-9_3

Roth, W.-M., & Tobin, K. (2004). Co-generative dialoguing and metaloguing: Reflexivity of processes and genres. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung, 5(3), Article 7. https://doi.org/10.17169/fqs-5.3.560

Sharma, A., & Muzaffar, I. (2012). The (non)making/becoming of inquiry practicing science teachers. Cultural Studies of Science Education, 7(1), 175–191. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11422-011-9372-0

Siry, C., & Martin, S. N. (with Baker, S., Lowell, N., Marvin, J., & Wilson, Y.). (2010). Coteaching in science education courses: Transforming teacher preparation through shared responsibility. In C. Murphy & K. Scantlebury (Eds.), Coteaching in international contexts: Research and practice (pp. 57–78). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-3707-7_4

Tobin, K. (2006). Learning to teach through coteaching and cogenerative dialogue. Teaching Education, 17(2), 133–142. https://doi.org/10.1080/10476210600680358

Udas, K. (1998). Participatory action research as critical pedagogy. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 11(6), 599–628. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022184120067

Windschitl, M., Thompson, J., & Braaten, M. (2018). Ambitious science teaching. Harvard Education Press.