Teachers’ Experiences of Co-designing and Implementing Rich Tasks in Physics at Primary and Second Level

Physics education in primary and secondary schools needs to respond to the global challenges faced by 21st century society. This response demands a shift in physics education to focus on the development of students’ competences across the domains of knowledge, skills, and attitudes and values. The use of rich tasks to develop students’ competences has been strongly promoted in mathematics for the past twenty years. A professional learning model to support teachers to co-design and implement rich tasks in physics with students aged 10–16 years, was adopted in this study. Four in-service Irish teachers (one primary and three secondary) participated in a professional learning community, facilitated by the authors, to design a rich task based on a real-world context and implement this rich task with their own students. The teachers identified a positive influence on their students’ understanding of the relevant concepts, as well as an increase in student’s awareness of real-world contexts in physics/STEM education. The teachers reported a positive influence on their own professional learning of designing and using rich tasks in their own classroom practices. The findings promote the wider use of rich tasks to support teacher professional learning and enhance student learning in physics at primary and second level.