The University of Western Australia

W/Prof Grady Venville

Winthrop Professor
Graduate School of Education

Contact details

Address

Graduate School of Education
The University of Western Australia (M428)
35 Stirling Highway
CRAWLEY WA 6009
Australia

Phone

6488 3811

Email

grady.venville@uwa.edu.au

Qualifications

BSc DipEd W.Aust. GradScEd PhD Curtin

Biography

Grady Venville was appointed as the inaugural Professor of Science Education at the University of Western Australia in January, 2007. She is known internationally for her research in science education, particularly in the fields of curriculum integration and students’ cognitive understanding of complex scientific ideas such as genetics. She has published more than 40 papers in scholarly journals and is the co-author of the highly regarded “Let’s Think!” a cognitive acceleration program for Year 1 students in the United Kingdom. She also is the co-editor of the widely used textbooks “The Art of Teaching Science” “The Art of Teaching Primary Science”. Grady is passionate about the teaching and learning of science and believes that inspiring and motivating students in their science learning is as equally important as helping them to develop appropriate cognitive understandings.

Publications

Books
Rennie, L., Venville, G. Wallace, (Eds). (in press). Case studies in integrated curriculum: Issues, reflections and ways forward. A contract signed with Taylor and Francis February 2011.
Rennie, L., Venville, G. & Wallace, J. (2011). Knowledge that counts in a global community: Exploring the contribution of integrated curriculum. Routledge.
Dawson, V. & Venville, G. (Eds.). (2007). The art of teaching primary science. Sydney, Australia: Allen and Unwin.
Venville, G., & Dawson, V. (Eds.). (2004). The art of teaching science. Sydney, Australia: Allen and Unwin.
Adey, P., Robertson, A., & Venville, G. (2001). Let’s think! A cognitive acceleration programme for 5 and 6 year old children. Windsor, UK: NFER-Nelson.
Refereed journal articles
Donovan, J., & Venville, G. (in press). Exploring the influence of the mass media on primary students’ conceptual understanding of genetics. Education 3 to 13 (accepted April 2011).
Tao, Y., Oliver, M. & Venville, G. (in press). Chinese and Australian year 3 children’s conceptual understanding of science. International Journal of Science Education. Accepted April 2nd 2011.
Salter, Z., Venville, G., & Longnecker, N. (in press). Ten Steps to Green Behaviour: A Case Study of a Primary School in Perth, Western Australia. Australian Journal of Environmental Education. Accepted May 2011.
Venville, G., Wilhelm, J., & Louisell, R. (in press). A complex dynamic systems view of young children’s knowledge about the Moon. Research in Science Education, Accepted March 6th 2011.
Coward, D. M., Venville, G., Todd, M., Laas-Bourez, M., Zadnik, M., Heary, A., Klotz, A., Boer, M., Longnecker, N., (in press). The Zadko Telescope: A resource for cross-cultural science education enrichment. Advances in Space Research. Accepted 5th January 2011.
Oliver, M., & Venville., G. (in press). An exploratory case study of Olympiad students’ attitudes towards and passion for science. International Journal of Science Education. Accepted 22nd December 2010.
Dawson, V., Carson, K., & Venville, G. (2010). Genetics education in the 21st century. Teaching Science, 56(4), 38-42.
Venville, G., Oliver, M., Longnecker, N., & Rennie, L. (2010). Selecting science subjects: Why students do, why they can’t! Teaching Science, 56(3), 19-26.
Rennie, L., Venville, G., & Wallace, J. (2011). Learning science in an integrated classroom: Finding balance through theoretical triangulation. Journal of Curriculum Studies. 43(2), 139-162.
Venville, G. & Dawson, V. (2010). The impact of an argumentation intervention on Grade 10 students’ conceptual understanding of genetics. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 47(8), 952-977.
Dawson, V., & Venville, G. (2010). Teaching strategies for developing students’ argumentation skills about socioscientific issues in high school genetics. Research in Science Education,40 (2), 133-148. http://www.springerlink.com/openurl.asp?genre=article&id=doi:10.1007/s11165-008-9104-y

Funding received

2010 – 2012: G. Venville & P. Adey. “Thinking Australia: A Cognitive Acceleration Program to Raise High School Students’ Achievement in Science.” A nationally competitive Discovery research grant awarded by the Australian Research Council. Project ID – DP1093877 (Total $334,000)

2010 – 2012: D. Blair, G. Venville, N. Longnecker, M. Zadnik & D. Coward. “Measuring the Effectiveness of Specialist Science Enrichment Programs.” A nationally competitive Linkage research grant awarded by the Australian Research Council and co-funded by Graham (Polly) Farmer Foundation and the Gravity Discovery Centre Foundation. Project ID – LP100100640 (Total $740,000)

2009 - 2011: G. Venville, N. Longnecker & L. Rennie. “Beyond the Beaker: Maximising the Impact of a Science Careers Program on High School Students’ Attitudes towards Science”. A nationally competitive Linkage research grant awarded by the Australian Research Council and co-funded by Scitech and Chevron. Project ID – LP0989409 (Total $260,000)

Previous positions

2007 – current: Professor of Science Education, Graduate School of Education, Faculty of Life and Physical Science, University of Western Australia, Australia

June 2004 - December 2006: Associate Professor of Science and Technology Education, Edith Cowan University , School of Education, Perth, Australia.

January 2002 – June 2004: Lecturer in Science Education, Masters Course Coordinator, Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Australia

January 2001 – December 2001: Lecturer in Science Education, Edith Cowan University, School of Education, Perth, Australia

September 2000 – December 2000: Science Teacher, Presbyterian Ladies College, Perth, Australia

January 1999 – July 2000: Research Associate, King’s College, University of London, School of Education, London, United Kingdom

1985 - 1998: Various teaching and research positions in Australia and Japan

Teaching

I teach pre-service secondary science education students about science curriculum in the post-graduate diploma of education as well as a Masters level unit on contemporary issues in science education.

Research profile

Research profile and publications