Fieldwork is an important part of biology as well as science and biology education. However, teachers perceive several reasons for the limited use of fieldwork in schools. Further, outdoor education is often organised as a single fieldtrip guided by outdoor educators, and little research has been done on fieldwork as a regular part of formal biology education. This case study explores three secondary-school biology teachers who untypically use outdoor education as a major part of their ecology courses for 8^th grade students (median age 14). Berger and Luckmann’s theory of the process of institutionalization as a theoretical background is used to interpret the pedagogical and organizational choices of the case study teachers. Analysis of the interviews of the selected three teachers revealed pedagogical and organizational means through which outdoor teaching is institutionalized into a regular activity in biology lessons. The teachers considered regularity, assessment practices and the school curriculum as major tools to legitimate outdoor learning as a formal schoolwork and foster successful learning. However, they also emphasised students’ freedom during outdoor activities. The findings are discussed in terms of how the teachers succeeded in combining the institutional order of formal schooling with students’ freedom in nature.

Science education can be alienating for students, as it is apart from the mundane world with which they are familiar. Science education research has approached the gap between everyday understandings and science learning largely as a challenge arising while learning about science concepts and the kinds of instructional approaches that may support this. However, the forms of everyday ways of relating to the world fundamentally expand beyond conceptual understandings. In this study, we use data from an outdoor science learning setting to examine a range of non-conceptual but culturally possible and intelligible ways in which students actually connect science learning processes to their everyday world and its characteristic commonsense understandings. Our study shows how students’ (a) spontaneous embodied explorations, (b) humor in all of its bodily and grotesque forms, and (c) narrative representation and interpretation of the world are used to contextualize science learning, namely its environment and content, within their familiar world. We show how students draw on these fundamental cultural forms of understanding the world even without particular instructional support while, at the same time, completing their science tasks according to the goals set by their teachers. Our findings suggest that the ways in which students connect their everyday world with science learning do not have to be explicitly related to the particular conceptual learning goals but can parallel conceptual learning while contextualizing it in affectively meaningful ways.

Uncertainty is endemic to scientific research practices; therefore, it is also an important element in learning about science. Studies have shown that experiences and management of uncertainty regarding the epistemic practices of science can support learning. Whereas the common strategies of supporting students in handling uncertainty rely on the teacher knowing the preferred outcomes and answers, few studies have explored settings in which no one can give the right answers to students. In this study, we explore how Finnish, suburban secondary school students (aged 13–14 years) respond to epistemic uncertainty during an ecological citizen science inquiry, in which the aim is to produce novel scientific knowledge. Drawing from qualitative interaction analysis of video and interview data, we articulate three responses to uncertainty that arise when students try to make optimal choices during the inquiry: they (a) envision alternative narrative scenarios and hypothesis; (b) accept and maintain it as part of their argumentation practices, and (c) flexibly reframe their research activities and goals. The findings indicate that the citizen science setting can allow students to reframe epistemic uncertainty in ways that are typical of scientific practices even without deliberate scaffolding by the teacher. We suggest that incorporating experiences of uncertainty that are shared by students and teachers in pedagogical design can support doing and learning science in different settings.

The article discusses the development of an educational model intended to support teachers’ professional development in science education. In this research and development project, LumaLähetit, pre-service teachers, in-service teachers, and teacher educators formed teams to collaboratively plan teaching and produce material for inquiry-based and integrative science instruction in primary schools. The results are based on three design cycles of the model. Thus far, ten schools, 24 in-service teachers, 30 pre-service teachers, and 560 pupils have participated. The results, which are based on the qualitative content analysis of participants’ open answers to a questionnaire, indicate that the developed collaborative model for science education supported preservice teachers and in-service teachers’ professional development in many ways. Several processes mediating the embodiment of the designed model were identified, especially during the second or third design cycles. Participants reflected on theory and practice. They experienced increased knowledge about inquiry and integrative approaches, collaborated in teams to some extent, and found this to be supportive during the project. Also, pre-service teachers appreciated the opportunity to teach in the schools. In general, careful goal setting, collaboration between the participants, and guidance by teacher educators during the initiation of the project were found to be crucial to the further success of the project. The results highlight a need for further research in order to better meet to the challenges of team teaching, inquiry-based instruction, and integrative teaching. The designed model was developed between the cycles and must be further developed in the future, especially in terms of supporting collaboration and clarifying theoretical concepts during the project.