Research

My research has dealt with policy issues and initiating and sustaining reform in science education.

In 1981-83 I directed a project funded by the National Science Foundation in which we reviewed more than 3,000 research reports (including 1,000 dissertations on microfilm) in science education and did a meta-analysis of 769 studies that addressed six central questions concerning (1) the effects of different curricular programs in science, (2) the effects of different instructional systems, (3) the effects of different teaching techniques, (4) the effects of different teacher education programs and techniques, (5) the relationships between science teacher characteristics and teacher behaviors or student outcomes, and (6) the relationships between student characteristics and student outcomes in science. Reports of the results of this project constitute the entire May 1983 issue of the Journal of Research in Science Teaching.

In a subsequent project (reported in Journal of Research in Science Teaching, Vol. 27, No. 6, pp. 553-574. September 1990) I conducted a cost-effectiveness analysis of 69 interventions proposed by educational reformers for improving science and mathematics education. Recommendations for practice were formulated based on the costs of putting these interventions into practice and their probable effectiveness based on the extant research literature.

From 1991-1995 I directed a U.S. Department of Education funded project to research the improvement of education in science, mathematics, and higher order thinking across the disciplines. A central part of this project was conducting case studies of nine schools from across the U.S. that had been identified as engaged in significant and successful educational reforms. Results of the project are reported in Study of Curriculum Reform published by the U.S. Government Printing Office (1996) and in Phi Delta Kappan, Vol. 77, No. 1, pp. 33-36, September 1995.

I directed the U.S. component of a comparative study of activity-based elementary school science conducted in four countries (Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, and the U.S.) The results were published in 1995 by SUNY Press as a jointly authored book titled Portraits of Productive Schools.

While not a report of research, a book written for practitioners reflects the results of a wide sweep of educational research. This book (authored jointly with H. Pratt) is intended for local school leaders and was published by the National Science Supervisors Association/Kendall-Hunt under the title Local Leadership for Science Education Reform. (1995).

My current work on educational change has extended into the area of religion.  A grant from the John Templeton Foundation supported work that resulted in the publication by Peter Lang Publishing of Religion and Spirituality in the Public School Curriculum (2004).  A book based on case studies is under contract and in preparation with an expected title of Religion and Teaching.