Jenna Gist

Dr. Jenna Gist is a postdoctoral scholar in science education. She is currently working under Dr. Rebekah Hammack on an NSF-funded project entitled, "Investigating how combining intensive professional development and modest support affects rural, elementary teachers' science and engineering practice" (STEM Strong). Dr. Gist is also serving as the Assistant to the Executive Director for the Association for Science Teacher Education (ASTE) and working as an adjunct professor at American University in Washington D.C.

+ Education

+ Career Experience

+ Awards & Honors

+ Professional Affiliations/Memberships

My research centers on the learning and development of preservice and inservice elementary teachers, with a focus on supporting high-quality science and engineering instruction. One strand of my research investigates how elementary preservice teachers develop science teacher identities in response to contemporary reform efforts such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). I am particularly interested in how elementary preservice teachers make sense of and navigate the multiple, intersecting identities they hold as they learn to teach science and engineering. I also have a strong interest in examining the challenges preservice teachers face when learning about and implementing various reform-based teaching approaches in science education (e.g., engineering design; phenomenon-driven instruction; three-dimensional learning), and how their science teaching self-efficacy informs their identity development. A second strand of my research focuses on inservice elementary teachers. I am particularly interested in investigating how sustained professional learning experiences impact inservice teachers' disciplinary and pedagogical knowledge related to reform-based science teaching approaches and their abilities to mentor preservice teachers in utilizing these approaches to teach science and engineering.

+ Selected Publications

Purdue University

• BIOL 69500, Teaching Assistant Professional Development
• EDCI 36500, Teaching Science in the Elementary School
• BIOL 20500 and 20600, Biology for Elementary School Teachers
• BIOL 20400, Human Anatomy and Physiology

American University

• EDU 456, Teaching Science in the Elementary School
• EDU 604, Teaching Science in the Elementary School