Throughout the course teachers will experience inquiry-based and creative approaches in 3 different modes: a) as learners participating in science and mathematics inquiry-based activities fostering creativity; b) as teachers implementing inquiry-based and creative approaches in their science and mathematics classes; and c) as researchers collecting, examining and interpreting data about their practice and their students’ learning. The course will leverage an inquiry-based creative approach through hands-on and reflection sessions to experience the principles of inquiry-based and creative science learning, while introducing the basics of curriculum design research and exploring teacher education curriculum design principles. The latter cover: learning activities, role of teacher educator, materials and resources, grouping, location, time; and assessment.

Reflective and collaborative practices will be promoted and during the hands-on sessions attention will be paid to formative assessment and feedback.

Finally, course participants will be introduced to learning repositories for sharing learning resources and will explore best practices of using digital technologies and resources to promote creative science learning. They will be given the opportunity and tools to design their own teaching materials using digital content resources from digital repositories and collections of science museums and centres.

The training course overall comprises 10 hours of guided explorations, and 15 hours of hands-on workshops. All participants will have direct access to PCs (although participants are encouraged to bring their own laptops) as needed to enhance the hands-on activities. Visits to non-formal learning settings (such as the Skinakas Observatory, and/or the Natural History Museum of Crete, and/or the Cretaquarium) will introduce participants to ways of using such settings with their students for creative science learning.