First of all, I can hardly believe a whole semester has already rushed by! It feels like just a few weeks ago, I started at Purdue. In that time, I've had some truly enlightening and engaging academic experiences. While my classes have played a significant role, it has been the workshops, seminars, and conferences that have felt truly transformative.
Seeing the contemporary world of research in education, especially science education, has helped me understand the current trends and deepen my global understanding of the issues. I still believe that the Indian context is unique and quite different from the Western context. The pace of development and globalization in India puts it on a trajectory where it will encounter many of the same challenges as the West.
When I began this semester, my research interests were mostly focused on developing critical thinking through science education, supporting the process of modeling in sciences, especially chemistry, and enhancing student motivation in science education. One semester in, I haven't drastically changed my research goals, but they have been refined further. My primary research interest has always been the development of critical thinking skills through science education. My experiences and learnings over the semester, such as the AI in P-12 Education Conference and numerous seminars organized by the College of Education, have led to a narrowing down of my focus to the science teacher experience and teacher development. Reflecting on my experience at Mallya Aditi International School, I was always aware I had a privileged experience where I was given considerable freedom to interpret the curriculum in ways that supported much larger student learning outcomes than the common denominator of examination success across the country. Of course, the context in which I taught is significant since the students come from very socioeconomically privileged families. However, all teachers, to varying extents, are interpreters of the curriculum. They are the ones that animate curriculum, shaping it to their context and experiences. As a result, I believe that teacher development and training are crucial to achieve real change on the ground. This has also been highlighted by research coming from India such as by Sharma (2017), Mashood and Singh (2019), Giri and Paily (2020), and by Sellars et al. (2018). All these researchers (and groups) have been unanimous in advocating for teacher training to improve the development of critical thinking skills in students.
For any interventions to be meaningful and equitable, they must first capture the reality of the teacher experience in science classrooms. My initial foray into reading literature on Indian science education show a paucity of description of the existing landscape. Without understanding and describing the current system and factors, meaningful interventions cannot be made.
I believe I would like to engage in understanding the experiences, motivations, and identities of my fellow Indian science teachers. However, teacher training and reform is, I presently believe, my destination.
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