Journals for publishing science education and outreach work
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Please try to go beyond lists of journals and indicate how they specialize or why you think it’s a good resource for LTER educators.
If you have an article with national relevance that would be of interest to teachers, any one of the NSTA journals would be a good target. You just have to adjust the science standards to NGSS.
- Science & Children (elementary)
- Science Scope (middle school)
- The Science Teacher (high school)
- Journal of College Science Teaching (mainly undergrad focus)
- Connected Science Learning (out-of-school science teaching & learning: such as school enrichment programs)
The Journal of Environmental Education is an option for more theoretical work.
Interdisciplinary Journal of Environmental and Science Education is an international journal for serious research.
The Bulletin of the ESA publishes articles on ecological education and best practices.
Current: The Journal of Marine Education might be a good fit for coastal sites. This is the journal of NMEA, National Marine Educators Association.
Journal of Science Teacher Education (JSTE) or Innovations in Science Teacher Education would be good for RET-related work
It’s often possible to Include education research articles as part of special issues for an LTER site:
Examples from Luquillo (Steven McGee): [Also mentioned by Steph B]
- Ecosphere (Canopy Trimming Experiment special issue): https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.4624
- Forests (wind disturbance special issue): Forests | Free Full-Text | Engaging Middle School Students in Authentic Scientific Practices Can Enhance Their Understanding of Ecosystem Response to Hurricane Disturbance
Also see the Shared LTER Education library of citations on Zotero. Request to join in order to add citations.
The Journal for Research and Practice in College Teaching
For university-level education materials (I know a number of early career faculty who have published here)
Regional options to reach local educators:
VIRGINIA
- VAST has a journal: Virginia Association of Science Teachers - Journal
- If you want to reach local education leaders (dept chairs, science supervisors, superintendents, education professors, etc) & your paper will have more rigor (more data, evaluation evidence, background research), the VA Association of Supervision & Curriculum Development (VASCD), is a good journal target. VASCD
MICHIGAN
- MSTA, Michigan Science Teachers Association, which has a journal (and quarterly newsletters)
- MAEOE, Michigan Alliance for Environmental and Outdoor Education, I need to check on journal/newsletter options
- Place-based education conference, held every 2-3 years, presentations not publications
General input about science education literature and publishing
A helpful thing to know about publishing work on science education and programming…
- Need IRB for most publication as primary literature
- Few sites are doing this - most don’t have the capacity, expertise, etc
Questions we have about publishing education work
- (Steph, JRN) How do you track use of lessons put online? Is there a way to go beyond just tracking number of downloads? Do you follow up with educators who’ve used your material?
- Where to publish work other than our sites. How do we get it to broader teacher groups?
- Presenter at conferences (share link even to our own website)