While the OpenSciEd units are designed to provide teachers who are new to three-dimensional learning with enough support to implement the units successfully, this OpenSciEd Teacher Handbook provides overviews of features of the OpenSciEd units and open educational resources on the website that are likely to be new to many teachers. Each chapter focuses on a different feature.
The Handbook is not designed to be read from front to back. We envision that teachers will read some chapters as an introduction to the OpenSciEd approach as they begin to plan for instruction, and will choose to read others on an as-needed basis as they go through the planning process. Most important, the Handbook is designed to be a resource that teachers can refer back to at any time.Â
The Handbook is neither a comprehensive reference on the OpenSciEd program nor a tutorial on how to implement the teaching practices of the program. The OpenSciEd developers believe that such resources have limited utility. Ultimately, we believe that teachers learn new practices by doing—through the acts of planning, implementing, reflecting, and replanning. We envision this Handbook as one support for that learning-by-doing process, ideally in combination with other informational resources, peers, experts, and open educational resources websites.