Date of this Version Paper presented at the annual meeting of
the American Educational Research Association: San Diego, CA,
2009 This study focuses on elementary teachers' conceptions of
flooding before and after inquiry-based Earth science content-
based professional development. Several misconceptions emerged
from the science content two tier pre-post test, some of which
persisted throughout the institute while others led to evidence
of teachers' conceptual change. On the post-test some teachers'
ideas emerged as hybrid conceptions as they applied newly
acquired academic language to prior conceptions. There was a
significant increase (n = 17, mean gain = 4.3 (SD = 3.27, t (17)
= 5.69, p < .000) from the pre- to post-test. The concepts most
resistant to change from pre- to post-test were analyzing an
overall topographic region, reading a map image, and hydrograph
interpretation. The highest frequency of hybrid conceptions
occurred as teachers attempted to add new academic language,
such as storm surge and dis