Analysis of the K‐12 component of the Central Arizona–Phoenix Long‐Term Ecological Research (CAP LTER) project 1998 to 2002

Abstract

The Central Arizona–Phoenix Long‐Term Ecological Research (CAP LTER) project includes training elementary and secondary teachers. This training component, Ecology Explorers (EE), prepares teachers in grades 4 through 12 to teach about ecological principles and processes. The EE pedagogy employs scientific inquiry and data collection protocols. This study attempted to capture the impact of the EE training on how teachers were integrating their training knowledge and what support systems influenced the pedagogy. The research‐evaluation design used cohort panels to address questions regarding immediate and long‐term impacts. Inquiry methods were based on survey questionnaires with ordinal and reflective questions. Some of the key findings were: (1) it takes less than a year to integrate the use of scientific protocols into teaching practices, (2) current scientific methodologies appear to support student use of the Internet for research purposes, and (3) both internal and external school support are necessary to ensure protocol integration and Internet use.

Acknowledgements

We thank all the dedicated teachers who have participated in our program and brought urban ecology to their classrooms. The Ecology Explorers program and this study were funded by NSF grant DEB 91–4833 (CAP LTER).