Albert Einstein Distinguished Educator Fellow 24-25; Award-winning author; PAEMST state finalist 2024 (OH). Opinions are my own and do not represent AEF, LOC, or the US government.
Science education connections: I’m putting together a document on the status of elementary science and am looking for some specific information, including NGSS adoption vs standards influenced by NGSS vs standards not influenced by NGSS, time devoted to science, popular pedagogical approaches and materials used, etc. My initial searching has led to wildly differing information, stats without citations, etc. Who are the experts in this area? Where fluid I go to find the most current information?
DaNel Hogan
3mo
I am not sure you will find these all together in one place or up-to-date. You might have more luck asking your network to share their state's info. I can tell you Arizona adopted NGSS influenced science standards in 2018 despite the fact that we were a lead writing state on the NGSS. These standards were protected by a large amount of work done by the Arizona Science Teachers Association under the leadership of Sara Torres to remain accurate and complete in terms of evolution, climate change, and big bang in particular. There are recommendations within our standards for time devoted to science and, as expected, this varies greatly in practice from district to district and school to school. I am including the table of suggest time below. Very few elementary schools are anywhere close to these suggested times and many elementary students are still getting little to no science because of the hyper focus on math and English language arts. Link to our science standards page with standards document and other resources: https://www.azed.gov/standards-practices/k-12standards/standards-science
Rebecca Garelli
3mo
I think Kimberley Astle and the CSSS Elementary folks may have gathered info on this in the past....maybe? They asked for state data on instructional time I believe from folks working in state-level dept of ed positions.
Another fellow and I,Kama Almasi, PhD , wrote ba policy piece on this. I’ll send it to you. But the short answer is it’s really difficult to find that information. When I started my doctoral program, I wanted to do a statistical analysis of implementation versus adoption versus enaction in California and found that the data didn’t even exist at the district or site level. Even finding an updated US map of states that have adopted or are adopting is really difficult to find. I was interested in how adoption influenced earth science courses and enrollment numbers. NASEMS Call to Action is a great source of info and I have some other articles I used and researching our paper that I can send you as well.
DaNel Hogan
3mo
Let me know if you want me to nudge other folks in my network to share their state's status.
Spencer Martin
3mo
I have actually just completed a full evaluation of this for a contracting project that I am working on. It took me several weeks to complete so I don’t suggest doing it from scratch and I am hoping to get permission to share it with the field freely in the new year from the organization that I am contracting with. I should know if I have the ok around the first few weeks of January. I can share some broad strokes at the beginning of the year after I am back in town from the holidays if that might help. For clarity, my project is only on state standards and their proximity to the NGSS and level of influence from the framework. I looked at the science standards for each state and evaluated whether they adopted the NGSS or how closely their Standards were influenced by the NGSS and / framework. As of now, Florida is the only state that does not have standards influenced by the framework at all but your mileage Varies after that.
Megan Jacobs
3mo
This is a really interesting question! I’d love to stay posted about the results as well. I know a little about Massachusetts & Connecticut, and I’d be happy to work with you on this question.
Kathy Hughes
3mo
Hi, Jessica Fries-Gaither I'm curious about your research. I'm in Texas and can give some insight.
Amber Woods
3mo
I’ve done a bit of this research informally on my own. Mostly to find out about state standards by getting info directly from state sites. I can’t speak to direct influence from NGSS but from what I’ve seen the majority of states 98% are aligned to the Framework or fully adopted NGSS
Katrina Ford
3mo
Following this post, because I am curious about the answers you receive.
Coach, Colleague, Consultant | Professional Elementary Certification
3moI am not sure who has the database these days. I think NSTA ( Ted Willard) might have had it in the past. I can tell you Vermont adopted NGSS in 2014 . I know that because I was K-5 state science supervisor at the time