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Initial Certification Programmatic Information

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  Initial Certification Programmatic Information for
Earth and Space Science
or
Environmental Science
Program Overview
 

The Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences has approval from the State of Illinois to offer initial teacher certification in Earth & Space Science and in Environmental Science leading to the Standard Secondary Certificate (grades 6-12).

The State of Illinois has adopted a standards-based, as apposed to course-based, approach to teacher preparation. This does not mean that students do not take courses. It means that the teacher candidates are required to demonstrate that they have met all relevant standards, rather than simply showing they have certain courses on their transcripts. Therefore, here at NIU, each teacher candidate must demonstrate competence in all applicable standards via an electronic portfolio compiled by each candidate. 

Portfolio "artifacts" demonstrating competence are most often created through content courses, clinicals, methods courses and student teaching. Theses varied opportunities and activities permit candidates to amass sufficient documentation to demonstrate compliance with the standards appropriate to the individual certificates.

The State of Illinois requires that all teacher candidates (1) meet the general education requirements at an accredited institution of higher education (i.e. a B.A. or B.S), (2) have a minimum of 32 semester hours in the appropriate content area, (3) pass three Illinois State certification exams (Basic Skills, Content and Assessment of Professional Teaching, APT), (4) undergo a criminal background check and (5) pass a yearly Tuberculosis skin test.

The specifics of all the Illinois State requirements and NIU's procedures to meet them appear on the General Information page, the Prospective Certification Candidate page and the Current Certification Candidate page as appropriate.

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Program Philosophy and Goals

This program has been designed to provide numerous opportunities for the teacher candidates to meet the National (INTASC, NSTA), State of Illinois (ISBE) and NIU (Conceptual framework) standards. This is accomplished through a developmental (constructivist) approach designed to provide the teacher candidates with varied experiences through which they can demonstrate professional growth and fulfillment of the standards.

Goals for the certification programs are drawn from, and are therefore congruent with, the NIU Conceptual Framework and the content goals promulgated by The National Center for Earth Science Education of the American Geological Institute in Earth Science Education for the 21st Century: A Planning Guide (1991).

The NIU Conceptual Framework, A Community of Learners, embodies a core set of tenets broadly defined as Knowledge (both content and pedagogical), Practice, and Reflection, which are exemplified by twelve "competencies." The content goals have been subsumed within the more general tenet of Knowledge as an elaboration of the content expectations.

Knowledge1 :

1. The teacher understands the central concepts, methods of inquiry, and structures of the discipline(s) and creates learning experiences that make the content meaningful to all students.

1a. Stewardship means having sufficient knowledge and appreciation of the Earth to make informed decisions concerning the use of Earth's resources and the maintenance of a high-quality environment.

1b. Appreciation of the history, beauty and complexity of the Earth is a prerequisite to good stewardship. Actions of individual citizens and of governments have significant future impact on the Earth and its environment.

1c. To comprehend and evaluate information from Earth scientists, students should have an understanding of the nature of Scientific Thought. Specifically, that the search for knowledge is based on observation, logic, ethics, theory, imagination, technological innovations and is often imbued with the social, political, and economic contexts of a particular time period.

1d. Earth Science Content encompasses the key concepts that Earth scientists consider to be of profound and historical importance in understanding the Earth's past, present and probable future. Ultimately, students should be able to provide reasoned, scientific explanations of those objects and events, make justified predictions of future events, make informed decisions about both personal and group actions and develop a positive attitude about science and the natural world.

2. The teacher understands how individuals grow, develop, and learn and provides learning opportunities that support the intellectual, social, and personal development of all students.

3. The teacher understands instructional planning and designs instruction based upon knowledge of the discipline, students, community and curriculum goals.

4. The teacher understands various formal and informal assessment strategies and uses them to support the continuous development of all students.

Practice:

5. The teacher understands how students differ in their approaches to learning and creates instructional opportunities that are adapted to diverse learners.

6. The teacher uses an understanding of individual and group motivation and behavior to create a learning environment that encourages positive social interaction, active engagement in learning, and self-motivation.

7. The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies to encourage students' development of critical thinking, problem solving and performance skills.

8. The teacher uses knowledge of effective written, verbal, nonverbal, and visual communication techniques to foster active inquiry, collaboration, and supportive interaction in the classroom.

9. The teacher understands the role of the community in education and develops and maintains collaborative relationships with colleagues, parents/guardians, and the community to support student learning and well being.


Reflection:

10. The teacher is a reflective practitioner who continually evaluates how choices and actions affect students, parents, and other professionals in the learning community and actively seeks opportunities to grow professionally.

11. The teacher understands education as a profession, maintains standards of professional conduct, and provides leadership to improve student learning and well being.

12. The teacher is a life-long learner of both content and pedagogy.

1Content Goals1A-1D are adapted from NCESE'S Earth Science Education for the 21st Century: A Planning Guide (1991), in which the four interrelated goals of Stewardship, Appreciation, Scientific Thought, and Content, are defined to address "what students need to know to prepare them for becoming responsible participants in the social and political dynamics of the world."
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Portfolio Alignment with the NIU Conceptual Framework
Structurally, the alignment between the Conceptual Framework and the portfolio is not evident because the portfolio does not include a separate section dedicated to the Conceptual Framework as is does to the ISBE core etc. (See example here.) This is because the Conceptual Framework aligns with INTASC, NSTA and the State of Illinois Core (ISBE). Having a separate section dedicated to the Conceptual Framework would be redundant. The following chart indicates how the various standards align with each other. The standards are highly correlated and are identical in many cases. Thus, if a performance satisfies INTASC standard 3, NSTA standard 5 and ISBE Core standard 3, it would also satisfy the NIU Conceptual Framework standard 5.


ISBE Core
 INTASC
 NSTA
 NIU Conceptual Framework

1

 1
 1
 1

2

 2
2

3

 3
 5
 5

4

 7
 5, 6
 7

5

 5
 6, 9
 6

6

 4
 5
 3, 7

7

 6
 5
 8

8

 8
 8
 4

9

 10
 7, 10
 9

10

 9
 10
 10, 11, 12

11

 9, 10
 10
 10, 11, 12

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Assessment Plan for Initial Certification Programs

The Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences certification programs endorse the National Science Teachers Association Position Statement on Science Teacher Preparation Programs. In accordance with good practice and university policy, the department continually monitors and reviews the certification programs to assure that they provide a high quality experience that effectively meets the needs of the prospective teachers, the public schools, society, and ultimately the students in the public schools. The department views the development and revision of these programs as a dynamic process based on the results of this ongoing assessment.

As shown in the Program Assessment Decision Tree below, ongoing analysis of the electronic portfolios by internal and external reviewers, candidate performance evaluations by cooperating teachers and university supervisors, regular interviews with the candidates, periodic program reviews by external agencies, and feedback from course instructors provide the data by which the secondary science program coordinators, along with relevant faculty, evaluate the effectiveness of all components of the programs. This review is the basis for recommending appropriate changes either in the program structure or in course content.

Program Assessment Decision Tree


In detail, the data sources for programmatic level changes are divided into three main sections:  Professional Organizations, Best Practices and Candidate Feedback. Specifically, data from professional sources derive from ISBE reviews and modifications of the Illinois State standards and previous NCATE and NSTA (SPA) reviews. The "Best Practices" heading is comprised of course instructor, cooperating teacher and university supervisor feedback and reviews; action research by faculty and best practices as found in the literature. The final heading is "Candidate Feedback" and is without doubt the most important source of information. It includes quantitative data from the Illinois Standardized Tests and NIU exit surveys. Additionally, the Department of Geology and Environmental Geosciences conducts their own more in-depth exit interviews in GEOL 482, which is a capstone course taken during the final student teaching semester. However, the most significant measure of a program's effectiveness is the competency of the candidates completing the program.

The paradigm shift from course-based to standards-based programs is both a major challenge and a major opportunity. The certification programs are no longer evaluated on whether or not they require candidates to complete specific courses but rather on each candidate documenting that he/she meets every applicable standard, each of which includes multiple knowledge and performance indicators.  Electronic portfolios have been implemented to manage the mass of data that this requires. The analysis of both the candidates' in-progress and final portfolios for quality of evidence and number and quality of opportunities to generate that evidence is therefore the primary indicator of the certification programs' strengths and weaknesses.

Note that the assessment plan for the teacher candidates themselves appears on the Current Candidate page here.

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Alignment Between Standards and Courses in which Candidates Demonstrate Competencies


As described above, the State of Illinois has adopted a standards-based approach to teacher preparation. This does not mean that students do not take courses. It means that the teacher candidates are required to demonstrate that they have met all relevant standards. Therefore, the courses, and the opportunities they provide, must themselves be aligned to the standards the teacher candidates are striving to meet. Additionally, all the science certification coordinators and their respective departments have taken the view that in order to ensure that candidates truly embrace and master standards, a developmental constructivist methodology should be actively modeled by the program itself. This methodology can be expressed by the term OPUS. 

O: 
Experiences in which candidates learn about and/or OBSERVE the standards
P: 
Experiences in which candidates PRACTICE meeting the standards
U: 
Experiences in which candidates are required to USE their skills to meet standards
S: 
Candidates SHARE their experiences and SHOW they have met standards


Courses in which candidates have the opportunity to experience each of these developmental steps are indicated by the appropriate letter in the grid. Courses that address standards, but whose exact content or assignments can not be guaranteed by the program, are indicated by an X. The geology certification courses are listed from top to bottom by the order in which the candidates take them with the exception of the first two clinical courses ILAS 201 and ILAS 301, which are linked and taken concurrently with, GEOL 201 and GEOL 301 respectively. By infusing the development of standards throughout the candidates' training, initial data have shown that higher quality teachers are produced as determined by retention in the field at three years and interviews with the school districts where they are employed.

The following tables also serve a secondary function to that of modeling. They also serve as an extremely valuable program assessment tool. The final electronic portfolios are evaluated at the end of every spring and are compared to the idealized program represented by these tables. Do the portfolios actually reflect what is in the tables or are the artifacts produced by the teacher candidates of lesser quality or number? Is there evidence in the portfolios that the candidates are struggling to meet specific standards because the program or specific courses have not been optimized? As a case in point, the GEOL 475 course The Nature of Science Across Time and Culture was designed specifically to address a perceived lack of opportunities for the teacher candidates to demonstrate their competencies relating to diversity, the nature of science and the relationship between science, technology and modern society.
 

Standards Applicable to All Teachers

 
  Course  
GEOL 201
GEOL 301
GEOL 401 
GEOL 475
GEOL 429
GEOL 483
GEOL 484X
GEOL 495X
GEOL 487
GEOL 482
EPS 406
TLSE 457
ILAS 201
ILAS 301
Content Crs.
ISBE (Illinois Professional Teaching) Core
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11
      O    O O O O    O
 O

O O O O O O O O O O

O O O O O O O O O O
O
O
 O
 O
 O

O
 O
P

P
 O
 OP
 P
P

P     P  P P P P P P P P 
             O  O  O    O
      
P     P  P P P P P P P P  
U U U U U U U U U U U
S S S S S S S S S S S
   X X X X  X X    X X    

X X X X X X X X X X
    X       X  X X    X X
 X
   X X  X   X  X  X     X  X X
X                                
INTASC
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10
       O O O
 O
O
 O O

O O O O O
 O O O
 O

O O O O O O O O O
O
O
 O
 O
O
O
 O
P
       OP  O P   P        P
P
P P P P P P P P
         O  O O
          O
P
P P P P P P P P
U U U U U U U U U U
S S S S S S S S S S
   X
 X
 X  X X X
    X
 X
    X  X
 X
  X X
 X
 X
 X
 X
   X    X
  X X
       X X
   X X X
  X X X      X X
X                            

 
  Course  
GEOL 201
GEOL 301
GEOL 401 
GEOL 475
GEOL 429
GEOL 483
GEOL 484X
GEOL 495X
GEOL 487
GEOL 482
EPS 406
TLSE 457
ILAS 201
ILAS 301
Content Crs.
ISBE L.A.
#1 #2 #3
O O O
O O O
P
 P
 P
    P O

P
 P
P
 P P
      P
P P P
U U U
S S S
        
 X X X
   X   
   X X
   X
   
ISBE Technology
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9
P
 P
 P
 O P
 O O    O
P
 P
 P
 O P
 O P
 O O
P
 P
 P
 O P
 O P
 O O
P
 P
 P
 O
 P
 P
 P
 O
 P
P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P

P
 P
 P
 P
 P
       
P P P P P P P P P
P
 P
 P
 P
 P
   P
  
U
 U
 U
 U
 U
 U
 U
 U
 U
S
  S   S  S
  S   S  S
 S
 S
X
    X
                 
X
 X
 X    X
   
X
  
X X X
 X
 X
 X
    X
 X
X
 X X
 X
 X
 X
    X
 X
X
X
    X
    X
     
 

Standards Specific to Science Teachers

 
  Course  
GEOL 201
GEOL 301
GEOL 401
GEOL 475
GEOL 429
GEOL 483
GEOL 484X
GEOL 495X
GEOL 487
GEOL 482
EPS 406
TLSE 457
ILAS 201
ILAS 301
Content Crs.
ISBE Science Teacher Core
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12 #13 #14 #15 #16 #17 #18 #19
O
                               O
 O
 O
 O
       O   
O
                               O O O O O O O O
P
                               P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
P
 O





OP
 OP
 O
 O
 O
    O
 O
 P
 P
   
P






P
P
P
P

P
 P
P
                               P P P P P P P P
   P
                      P
       P
    P
       P
   
P
                               P P P P P P P P
U U U U U U U U U U U U U U U U U U U
S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S S
                                                        
                                                        
                                                        
                                                        
X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
 X
       X
               


 
  Course  
GEOL 201
GEOL 301
GEOL 401 
GEOL 475
GEOL 429
GEOL 483
GEOL 484X
GEOL 495X
GEOL 487
GEOL 482
EPS 406
TLSE 457
ILAS 201
ILAS 301
Content Crs.
NSTA
#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10
     
   O O       O O



   P
 O O O O O
      P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
 P
  O
O OP U
 OP O
 OP
 OP       P
P
 P
 U
P
 P



P P P P P P P P P P
                             
P P P P P P P P P P
U U U U U U U U U U
S S S S S S S S S S
                             
                             
            X
               
            X
               
X  X
    X           X       
ISBE Earth Science Core
#1 #2 #3 #4
           
           
           
          P 
P

P
P
 P
 P
 P
           
P
 P  P
 P
U U U U
S S S S
           
           
           
           
X
 X
 X
 X
ISBE Environ. Science Core
#1 #2 #3
        
        
        
      P
P
 P
 P
P
 P
 P
        
P
 P
 P
U U U
S S S
        
        
        
        
X
 X
 X

Note:  Course descriptions may be obtained here and on the General Information page. The standards key may be obtained here.
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