GRK 1561:  Teaching and Learning Processes

• Subject Area: Educational Research
• Term: from 2009 to 2018
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 87672343

The Research Training Group aims at the advancement of talented young scientists within interdisciplinary research projects. These projects focus on both process-directed and outcome-directed research on teaching and learning and combining the perspectives of psychology, empirical educational science, and language or science education. To enhance mutual connections between theory and practice, a specific recruitment model for doctoral candidates is applied, which enables the cooperation between experienced school teachers with a scientific interest and university graduates of psychology and empirical educational science. The unique combination of the teachers’ expertise in subject matter and teaching, on the one hand, and the expertise of psychologists and empirical educational scientists regarding research methodology, on the other hand, is expected to result in synergy effects and in a bridging of the gap between theory and practice in teaching and learning. 15 scientists as well as 14 doctoral students and 16 associated doctoral students are involved in the Research Training Group.
The Research Training Group aims at investigating domain-general cross-disciplinary as well as domain-specific aspects of teaching and learning. The domain-general aspects include teacher personality, individual student characteristics and heterogeneous contextual and cultural conditions. The domain-specific aspects comprise/encompass learning culture and learning tasks, content-specific forms of information presentation, as well as the usage of such (re)presentations as cognitive tools.
The innovative potential of the Research Training Group consists of the following: (1) the linking of outcome-directed and process-directed empirical research on teaching and learning, (2) interdisciplinary cooperation of language and science education, empirical educational science and psychology within joint research projects, which allows for multiple perspectives on teaching and learning, (3) recruitment of doctoral candidates from experienced school teachers and university graduates of psychology and empirical educational science in order to enhance mutual connections between theory and practice within the behaviour and social science, and (4) the strengthening of internationality, especially within language and science education, through the encouragement of research stays abroad and the support of the doctoral candidates’ participation in international scientific conferences.

• DFG Programme: Research Training Groups
• Applicant Institution: Universität Koblenz
• Participating Researchers: Professor Dr. Ingmar Hosenfeld; Professorin Dr. Constanze Juchem-Grundmann; Professorin Dr. Gisela Kammermeyer; Professor Dr. Alexander Kauertz; Professor Dr. Peter H. Ludwig; Dr. Johanna Pretsch; Professorin Dr. Renate Rasch; Professor Dr. Jürgen Roth; Dr. Jochen Scheid; Professor Dr. Christoph Schneider; Professor Dr. Wolfgang Schnotz; Professor Dr. Wilfried Smidt
• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Manfred Schmitt