American Educational Research Association (AERA) Annual Meeting- San Diego

Dr. Petrosino will have two papers presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association this week in San Diego. The conference meets from Monday, April 13 - Friday, April 17, 2009 and is the largest gathering and association of researchers in the social sciences in the world. Dr. Petrosino has had his research presented at the annual conference every year since 1991. The following is a summary of this year's presentations. Presentation of these research papers and expenses related come at no cost to the Hoboken School District.

Petrosino, A. J. (2009) Teachers as Designers: Examining LEGACY Cycle Authoring as a Professional Development Activity. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (San Diego).

Schedule Information:
Scheduled Time: Fri, Apr 17 - 12:25pm - 1:55pm Building/Room: San Diego Marriott Hotel & Marina / Marriott Hall Salon 3
In Session: Examining the Impact of Technology in Teacher Practice, Teacher Learning, and Teacher Professional Development

Abstract:
Our position is that the way to meet the needs of K-12 educators to improve science, mathematics, engineering and technology based teaching and learning is best achieved by reworking the challenge based instructional environments into project-based K-12 science curricula. To do this, we employ collaborative design teams that include both teaching and learning and subject-matter expertise in STEM related areas. This means that K-12 teachers, education researchers, undergraduate and graduate students in STEM disciplines all work together to design project-based K-12 instructional materials. Over the course of the past 2 years, a total of 26 teachers from across the United States have worked on the development and implementation of LEGACY cycles. The Legacy Cycle is based on these general principles of instruction: 1) Contextualize the knowledge – Challenges provide a goal statement for the students to see how knowledge is applied., 2) Generate and demonstrate what you know – The cycle provides for multiple opportunities for student expression and activities, and 3) Illustrate knowledge in multiple contexts –exploring several challenges aids in understanding the general conditions under which the knowledge can be used. Utilizing mixed methodologies, this study examines how teacher created, challenge based learning materials impact student learning, teachers’ knowledge and technological literacy


Svilha, V., Petrosino, A. J., Martin, T., Diller, K. (2009) Learning to Design: Interactions and Distributed Cognition
Examining the Impact of Technology in Teacher Practice, Teacher Learning, and Teacher Professional Development. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association (San Diego).

Schedule Information:
Scheduled Time: Tue, Apr 14 - 12:25pm - 1:55pm Building/Room: Omni San Diego / Balboa 3
In Session: Design Applications for Classrooms and Action Research

Abstract:
Designers rely on each other as they design, yet most studies of design occur in isolation, such that a sequestered view of design expertise has emerged. Design commonly occurs in a distributed system, with members transferring in with different knowledge and interests. This study takes as its unit of study in-situ student teams learning to design in a capstone bioengineering course. Because students are nested within teams, we analyze data using Hierarchical Linear Modeling, and find that students give significantly higher scores to the design class in terms of Critical Voice (t = 3.288, p < t =" 3.441," t ="">

Petrosino's Research Summary

Before coming to Hoboken, Dr. Petrosino was the Elizabeth G. Gibb Endowed Fellow at The University of Texas at Austin where he is also an Associate Professor of the Learning Sciences. He holds a Masters from Teachers College, Columbia University; a PhD from Vanderbilt University and did a post doc at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He has published dozens of peer reviewed articles in the area of Science, Mathematics, Engineering and Technology Education, as well as over 45 papers presented at research conferences both nationally and internationally. He was a founding member of the nationally recognized UTeach program. He has also been award over $8,000,000 in funding from the National Science Foundation as well as grant awards form the Department of Education and the McDonnell Foundation. He has supervised 6 doctoral dissertations and has served on the committee of 20 more.