ENHANCING TEACHERS' KNOWLEDGE OF GEOSCIENCE CONCEPTS

The Teaching Key Earth Science Topics summer workshop at The University of Akron enriched the content knowledge and pedagogical skills of 30 middle school teacher attendees. The workshop focused on the major concepts of plate tectonics, volcanoes, and earthquakes, key benchmarks of the Ohio Science Standards. Using an integrated, interconnected, dynamic Earth system perspective, the geoscience instructor employed active learning techniques, with teachers engaged in activities such as making models, completing Venn diagrams, writing minute papers, and working collaboratively on problem solving tasks. Formative and summative assessment took place by the use of conceptest questions and the Geoscience Concept Inventory (GCI), respectively. Using personal response system technology on the first day of the workshop, participants completed GCI questions relevant to workshop topics. Responses to the same questions on the last day indicated an impressive gain in participants' content knowledge over these topics. In addition, with the assistance of a university science educator, participants translated their workshop experiences into lessons they could teach to their students. Workshop evaluations showed gains in teachers' confidence in and their ability to transfer this knowledge to their classrooms.