The Informal Learning Environment Group Projects

Title	Description
Science Learning in Informal Environments	This research examines everyday engagement with science in the family setting, identity development in families and during museum visits, and discourse resources and embodied interactions involved in such processes.
Teacher Professional Learning (PD)	This research explores discourse and collaborative learning processes among teachers in in-school team meetings and regional PD workshops. We collaborate with Adam Lefstein and the Laboratory for the Study of Pedagogy, and with teachers from a wide range of disciplinary areas (science, math, language arts and more), school principals, coaches, and administrators from two large MoE districts, as part of the national HASHKAFA endeavor to improve the culture of PD. This research focuses on the social and emotional aspects of learning, such as motivation, identity, agency, uncertainty, and face management.
Motivation for Science Learning in School and out of School	This research examines elementary and middle-school students' motivation to learn science in school and to engage with science out of school. It explores the factors affecting student motivation (in particular the age-related decline in their motivation): school culture (democratic vs. traditional schools), teaching approach, and parents' and friends' perceptions.
Teacher pedagogical emotions as resources for collaborative professional learning	This research examines the way the display of pedagogical emotions (i.e., emotions related to teacher work), in various teacher preparation and professional development settings, can afford or constrain professional learning, and how such displays may serve as a resource for collaborative inquiry. This research further examines the PD discourse emotional rules and the way they are shaped by different discourse participants, aiming to develop facilitation moves and tools that support a productive professional emotional discourse.
Developing a model for the implementation of inquiry into practice in student teachers’ clinical courses	This research examines the professional development of teacher preparation staff, in a program aiming to implement inquiry into practice in student-teachers' clinical courses. It is conducted in collaboration with Rotem Trachtenberg Maslaton and Hagit Kuperstein.
Forest Schools: Beliefs, Practices, and Impact on Student Motivation for Learning, Social Skills, and Connectedness to Nature.	This research examines a relatively new educational movement in Israel: Forest Education, aiming to describe the range of epistemological beliefs and pedagogical practices that characterize it as well as its impact on students. It is conducted in collaboration with Gidi Dishon.
Teacher Learning about Teacher-Parent Interaction: Developing Social Perspective Taking and Emotional Discourse in Bedouin and Jewish schools.	This intervention study develops and examines a model for teacher professional development regarding the management of teacher-parent conflicts. Working with our educational simulation center, the PD model is based on the development of social perspective-taking and emotional discourse and is culturally tailored for schools in Jewish and Bedouin communities. This project is conducted in collaboration with Haled Al Said, Gidi Dishon, and Idit Fast.