The Norwegian Centre for Science Education

Aims

The Norwegian Centre for Science Education shall contribute to improvements in the quality of science education.

Target groups

The Centre’s primary target groups are teachers, educational personnel in kindergartens, teacher educators, school directors, and kindergarten and school owners.

Activities

The Centre develops resources for teachers (naturfag.no) and students (viten.no) in school and for kindergartens (forskerfrø.no) that focus on children and youth’s deeper learning, motivation and interest in science.

The Centre also provide various types of research-based in-service teacher training in science education that integrate resources from the Centre’s webpages. One example is online in-service resources in science education at realfagsløyper.no, which are tailored for professional development in learning communities.

The research at the Norwegian Centre for Science Education is closely tied to the Centre’s resources and in-service professional development activities. Through initiatives for local competence development in partnership with kindergarten and school owners, the Centre aims to explore good practice in schools and kindergartens.

The Norwegian Centre for Science Education cooperate with other Departments and Centers at the University of Oslo to support other institutions, especially teacher education institutions in their work with professional development in schools and kindergartens. The Centre also serve as an advisor for national education authorities regarding science education.

On commission from the Norwegian Directorate for Education and Training, the Centre is running the following national projects:

• Realfagsløyper
• The Sustainable Backpack
• Lektor2-ordningen

Funding

The Centre receives an annual basic subsidy from the Ministry of Education and Research. The Centre may be allocated special tasks that are financed either by the basic subsidy framework or through supplementary subsidies.