Increased synergy between content and pedagogy. Most of the
articles in our study provided little description of student learning
as a result of the lab. Most articles in ABT are written to introduce
new activities and seem to focus more exclusively on lab procedure.
A consistent challenge in teaching science is the synergy between
content and pedagogy (Abell, 2008). Indeed, National Science
Foundation data on teacher priorities in professional development
show that only 24% of teachers rate content as the main priority for
professional development: the other 76% prioritize pedagogical and
school-climate issues (National Science Foundation, 2012). Teachers
should receive more integrated training on how labs are enacted
in classrooms to support student-directed inquiry (Key & Owens,
2013)