Innovations for the chemistry portion of the Master of Arts in Teaching Science (MATS) degree.

摘要

The MATS (Master of Arts in Teaching Science) Program started at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) in fall 2003 and initially consisted of a cohort of 21 high school and middle school teachers taking a concentration of courses in chemistry and physics. The MATS Program would not have come into existence at UTEP without the substantial financial help from the Math Science Partnership (MSP) grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to the El Paso Collaborative.; The MATS Program is evidence of the commitment of the College of Science to the Goals and Objectives of the El Paso MSP grant.; This thesis begins with an introduction of the program; how it was created, who participated in the early stages of the program, how it was decided that the program emphasize chemistry and physics content knowledge. Because I was only involved with the chemistry courses, this thesis I will primarily deal with these courses; the syllabi, the course content, the hands-on activities, the assessments and several surveys conducted to evaluate effectiveness of the courses, the program and the experimental laboratories. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)