This book discusses a number of ways in which out-of-school science education can uniquely engage learners with ‘wicked’ global problems such as biodiversity loss and climate change. The idea for the volume originated in discussions among members of the ESERA special interest group on "Science Education in Out-of-School contexts". It emerged from these discussions that out-of-school institutions and experiences offer opportunities for critical engagement in wicked problems that go far beyond what is possible solely in the science classroom. The book opens with a principled discussion of the nature of wicked problems and what addressing them involves. This introduction clarifies key terms and ideas to create a coherent backdrop for the rest of the book. Subsequent chapters discuss the challenges of designing educational experiences to address wicked problems, as well as the teaching and learning that takes place. The authors offer perspectives across a range of out-of-school environments such as science centres, natural history museums, botanical gardens, geological sites, and local communities. The book concludes with a chapter that synthesises the findings from the various contributions and points to the messages for educators. Finally, the editors outline an exciting research agenda to build knowledge of education addressing wicked problems. The intended audience of the book includes teachers, educators/facilitators, teacher educators, curriculum developers, and early career researchers as well as established researchers.

A "wicked problem" isn't one with an evil nature, but a problem that is impossible or difficult to solve because of incomplete, contradictory, and changing requirements that are often hard to recognize. Classic examples of wicked problems include economic, environmental, and political issues. We now live in a world full of wicked problems, most of them urgent challenges calling out for creative, democratic, and effective solutions. Ed Weber, Denise Lach, and Brent Steel, of the Oregon State University School of Public Policy, solicited papers from a wide variety of accomplished scholars in the fields of science, politics, and policy to address this challenge. The resultant collection focuses on major contemporary environmental and natural resource policy issues, and proposes an assortment of alternative problem-solving methodologies to tackle such problems. New Strategies for Wicked Problems will appeal to scholars, students, and decision-makers wrestling with wicked problems and "post-normal" science settings beyond simply environmental and natural resource-based issues, while providing much needed guidance to policymakers, citizens, public managers, and other stakeholders.

This engaging and practical book offers science teacher educators and K-12 science teachers alike the tools to engage in a dialogic mode of collaborative action research (D-CAR), a collaborative mode of action research focused on teachers’ experiences with students, reflection upon these experiences, and peer learning. Renowned science educator Allan Feldman and co-authors from across numerous settings in K-12 science education present the theory, methodology, case studies, and practical advice to support the use of D-CAR as a means to enhance teachers’ normal practice and address the problems, dilemmas, and dissonances that science teachers must negotiate as they work to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse student population and engage with complex science teaching challenges that disproportionately affect marginalized students. The book will be of use to science teacher educators, pre-service and in-service science teachers, professional development specialists, or any science educator invested in developing creative, reflective, and thoughtful teachers.

It feels like our world is spinning out of control. We see poverty, disease, and destruction all around us, and as we search for ways to make sense of the chaos, we're turning to new disciplines for answers and solutions. New, creative innovations are needed, and these new approaches demand different methods and different theories. This book is presented as a handbook for teaching and learning how to design for impact. In it, you'll learn how to apply the process of design to large, wicked problems, and how to gain control over complexity by acting as a social entrepreneur. You'll learn an argument for why design is a powerful agent of change, and you'll read practical methods for engaging with large-scale social problems. You can read this entire book online for free at http://www.wickedproblems.com/

Transdisciplinary Research (TR) is an emerging field in the knowledge society for relating science and policy in addressing issues such as new technologies, migration, and public health. This handbook provides a structured overview of the manifold experiences gained in these fields. In the first part, 21 projects from all over the world present their research approaches. In the second part, cross-cutting challenges of TR are discussed in reference to the same projects.

The recognition and reconciliation of ‘opposites’ lies at the heart of our most personal and global problems and is arguably one of the most neglected developmental tasks of Western education. Such problems are ‘wicked’ in the sense that they involve real-life decisions that have to be made in rapidly changing contexts involving irreducible tensions and paradoxes. By exploring our human tendency to bifurcate the universe, Education for Wicked Problems & the Reconciliation of Opposites proposes a way to recognise and (re)solve some of our most wicked problems. Applying an original theory of bi-relational development to wicked problems, Adam proposes that our everyday ways of knowing and being can be powerfully located and understood in terms of the creation, emergence, opposition, convergence, collapse and trans-position of dyadic constituents such as nature/culture, conservative/liberal and spirit/matter. He uses this approach to frame key debates in and across domains of knowledge and to offer new perspectives on three of the most profound and related problems of the twenty-first century: globalisation, sustainability and secularisation. This book is a comprehensive study of dyads and dyadic relationships and provides a multidisciplinary and original approach to human development in the face of wicked problems. It will be of great interest to students and academics in education and psychosocial development as well as professionals across a range of fields looking for new ways to recognise and (re)solve the wicked problems that characterise their professions.

This collection explores the broad landscape of current and future out-of-school science learning environments. Written by leading experts and innovators in informal science learning, these thoughtful and critical essays examine the changing nature of informal institutions such as science museums, zoos, nature centers, planetariums, aquaria, and botanical gardens and their impact on science education. The book examines the learning opportunities and challenges created by community-based experiences including citizen science, makerspaces, science media, escape rooms, hobby groups, and gaming. Based on current practices, case studies, and research, the book focuses on four cross-cutting themes – inclusivity, digital engagement, community partnerships, and bridging formal and informal learning – to examine how people learn science informally. The book will be of interest to STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) educators – both in and out of school – designers of science and experiential education programs, and those interested in building STEM learning ecosystems in their communities.