Teacher Learning and Informal Science Education

This book is situated in a study of learning to teach science, informal science education and identity. The study initially aimed to learn how teachers’ identities were influenced by teacher learning experiences in informal science institutions and sites. What emerged was how teachers transformed meanings, pedagogies and applications of informal science in ways that both resonated with their identities as teachers and social agents as well as the identities and needs of their students. This book emphasizes the teaching and learning of racialized students as well as highlight the experiences of similarly racialized teachers. However, what emerges are lessons for educators who are committed to authentically enacting equity in learning spaces; that is learning that is attentive to and affirming of students’ and teachers’ identities and desirings to utilize education as a tool to create imaginations of alternative futures. This is critical if we are to move towards planetary well-being. This book will highlight salient aspects of the research and offer examples of teacher enactments and frameworks for designing professional development and learning experiences that afford critical awareness, creativity and culturally affirming science education both in formal and informal contexts.