Abstract

The findings from the Improving Practical Work in Science (IPWiS) evaluation suggest that the project can, and did, bring about noticeable improvements in the effectiveness of practical work in school science. However, the extent of these improvements varied widely and appeared to be dependent on the departmental seniority of the person undertaking the training, their commitment to the project and the extent of support from the school’s senior management team. It was also found that the IPWiS project had a much less noticeable effect on the way primary teachers taught science, as much of what IPWiS set out to achieve was already taking place in primary science lessons