Tom van Eijck

I am born and raised in Amsterdam, Netherlands. After graduation with a neurobiology master at the University of Amsterdam (UvA), I worked several years in nature conservation in Central America, before qualifying as a first grade biology teacher (UvA). After seven years in secondary education, I have been teaching STEM Education within the Faculty of Education of the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences (AUAS). In recent years I have been involved in various research projects in the AUAS Centre for Applied Research on Education and I am an active member of various STEM Education and Research networks.

My PhD project focuses on the question of how interactive diagrams and matching experiments can support scientific reasoning in primary education. The growing attention for natural sciences in primary education in the Netherlands is typically aimed at the development of practical experimental skills. Scientific reasoning, in which thinking back and forth between phenomena and explanations forms the connecting factor, remains underexposed. As a result, the increased attention has not led to an increase in scientific literacy. It is intended that my research leads to an innovative teaching method that better meets the cognitive needs in upper primary education.