Demonstration Sites  PRISMS Project University of Northern Iowa Cedar Falls, IA 50614-0150

Demonstration sites are located throughout the U.S. as a result of physicsteachers attending a PRISMS National Leadership Development Workshopfunded by NSF. These teachers participated in a three-week workshop duringthe summer, taught PRISMS in their classes during the followingacademic year and participated in follow-up activities such as telephoneconference calls, submitting video tapes of their PRISMS teachingexperiences, preparing teaching plans to integrate PRISMS into theirphysics curricula and participating in the student evaluation program.They also returned to the University of Northern Iowa campus the followingsummer for preparation to conduct awareness sessions and teacher trainingworkshops. To show the quality of these trainers and/or the effect thatPRISMS had on their teaching, seven of our trainers have been honoredas recipients of the Presidential Award in Science Teaching. There is onescience teacher selected annually from each state to receive this award.We are obviously very proud of our trainers.

At the completion of a training workshop participants are asked to completea workshop evaluation survey. Workshops conducted by 20PRISMS trainerswere randomly selected and the average response to each question recorded.The questions that reflect on the quality of the workshops are listed below.The overall rating of the workshops was near the "superior, one of thebest I have attended" category.
 

1. I feel that my experiences in the PRISMS workshop will have a positiveeffect on my physics teaching techniques.

1. strongly agree


2. agree
3. disagree
4. strongly disagree

(Average 1.05)
2. The degree to which the strategy of the learning cycle was modeled was

1. an overkill


2. done in greater detail and/or emphasis than necessary
3. just right for me
4. barely enough for me to get the hang of things
5. who's cycle?

(Average 3.0)
3. In terms of my interest in utilizing the learning cycle in my classroomI

1. think it has great merit and will use it substantially


2. am anxious to give it a try
3. will plan to mix it in here and there
4. will test it with my students before I can tell
5. can see little use in my situation

(Average 1.7)
4. I see benefit in activating prior knowledge through exploratory activities.

1. Strongly agree


2. Agree
3. Disagree
4. Strongly disagree

(Average 1.0)
5. My overall rating of this workshop is

1. Superior; one of the best I have attended.


2. Excellent; better than most I have attended.
3. Average; I've had better and I've had worse.
4. Fair; If I hadn't got paid, it would not have been worth it.
5. Poor; I wish I would have gone fishing.

(Average 1.35)

Workshops schedule for 2001 year