ABSTRACT
“Taking developmental science to school” is an ambiguous term. Most readers will probably think it refers to the contributions of developmental science and scientists to practice—the need for educators to embrace the contributions of developmental science. We would argue, on the other hand, that the contributions of developmental science to the improvement of educational practice have, despite the best of intentions, been modest. Thus, we interpret the phrase “taking developmental science to school” as indicating the need for developmental science and scientists to go to school, in order to learn more about children, the crucial tasks they face, the contexts of their lives, and the challenges their teachers experience. In other words, we echo here the principles that underlie the Strategic Education Research Partnership (SERP), an effort to forge dynamic and reciprocal relations between educational practitioners and researchers in the service of better teaching and learning. We use work done in the context of the SERP field site, first established in the Boston Public Schools in 2005, to demonstrate the working of some of those principles, and their relevance to one major educational challenge—preparing students to use academic language.
