Primary teachers conducting inquiry projects: effects on attitudes towards teaching science and conducting inquiry

ABSTRACT

This study used an experimental, pretest-posttest control group design to investigate whether participation in a large-scale inquiry project would improve primary teachers’ attitudes towards teaching science and towards conducting inquiry. The inquiry project positively affected several elements of teachers’ attitudes. Teachers felt less anxious about teaching science and felt less dependent on contextual factors compared to the control group. With regard to attitude towards conducting inquiry, teachers felt less anxious and more able to conduct an inquiry project. There were no effects on other attitude components, such as self-efficacy beliefs or relevance beliefs, or on self-reported science teaching behaviour. These results indicate that practitioner research may have a partially positive effect on teachers’ attitudes, but that it may not be sufficient to fully change primary teachers’ attitudes and their actual science teaching behaviour. In comparison, a previous study showed that attitude-focused professional development in science education has a more profound impact on primary teachers’ attitudes and science teaching behaviour. In our view, future interventions aiming to stimulate science teaching should combine both approaches, an explicit focus on attitude change together with familiarisation with inquiry, in order to improve primary teachers’ attitudes and classroom practices.     

Science and computer-based technologies: attitudes of secondary science teachers

As is the case with most developed countries, pressures from various sectors of society have seen computers make a big presence in Australian education systems in the last decade. In the state of Victoria, integrating learning technology (LT) into all key learning areas of every school's curriculum has been a priority policy of governments. Over the last 8–10 years, large amounts of money have been provided to set schools up with computers and associated technologies. In the area of science, a range of LT resources is available for use in the teaching and learning processes in the classroom. However, there has been limited evaluation into teachers' attitudes towards, and types of, methodology and effectiveness of usage of computer-based technologies in knowledge construction. Using both quantitative and qualitative methods, a study aimed at identifying science teachers' opinions and practices with the use of computer-based technologies in their teaching has been carried out in Victorian government schools. The focus of this paper is on the attitudes of these science teachers towards the use of computer-based technologies in their teaching. The study showed that most teachers have embraced the introduction of these technologies into the school structure well and are generally positive about their potential in the classroom. However, their use in the classrooms is infrequent and often on an ad hoc basis. A range of obstacles preventing the use of these technologies are identified and discussed in this paper.     

Research interests of secondary science teachers

In the past few years, science educators and the nation at large have become increasingly concerned about the “Crisis in Science Education.” An underlying cause of this crisis is the nonuniform quality of instruction delivered by secondary science teachers. One way to improve the quality of teaching in the schools is the application of science education research findings to teaching. Most teachers are unaware of the research findings and/or do not apply them in their classrooms. This study helps determine the areas of research which are of greatest interest to secondary science teachers. Results will be used by NSTA to determine the contents of future volumes of the monograph What Research Says to the Science Teacher. A random sample of 600 secondary science teachers was obtained from the National Registry of NSTA. Teachers were sent a 23 item questionnaire that asked them to rate their interest in each research topic on a five point scale. The questionnaire contained the 12 items prepared by a NARST-NSTA committee in 1979 and an additional 11 items using the same format. Demographic data collected from the survey included sex, teaching assignment, role in school, type of school, type of community, years of teaching experience, and familiarity with What Research Says. … Data were analyzed using this demographic data as well as according to whether teachers returned the original or a follow-up questionnaire. Teachers who returned the first questionnaire had basically the same preferences as those who returned the follow-up questionnaire. Sixty percent of the teachers completed the questionnaire in usable form. Overall results of the study based on both frequency of response and on mean rating indicate that the following five topics are of greatest interest to secondary science teachers: laboratory experiences, motivational techniques, effect on college courses, problem solving, and meaningful learning. Analysis of data according to the subject taught indicated that chemistry and physics teachers are more interested in problem solving than biology teachers, and that chemistry, physics, and earth science teachers are also interested in the sequence of the content. Males and females had the same top five interests but in a different order. The same is true for teachers of grades 7–9 versus grades 10–12. Rural teachers preferences varied substantially from those in other settings and differences were also found for teachers familiar with What Research Says … compared to the rest of the sample. For every classification of teacher, the area of least interest was sex difference research.     

Challenging gender-blindness in preservice secondary science teachers

This material is based upon work supported in part by a grant from the National Science Foundation (Grant No. HRD 945-0022). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.     

Embracing the essence of inquiry: New roles for science teachers

“This is the thing I really get excited about. There are some great ideas here, some really neat projects. Wanda and Joan are working on amphibian decline. Ann is interested in territorial behavior or some sort of feeding behavior in crawdads. That is a good one to study because crawdads are an important decomposer in the stream. We're looking at what kinds of criteria in a stream make it habitable for different kinds of organisms. And when you see those different combinations of organisms, what do they mean? How do you interpret them? I mean we're really getting into higher levels of thinking, because we're looking at different kinds of organisms and interpreting them in terms of stream health.” Jake, biology teacher, Northwestern High School. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 37: 916–937, 2000     

Characteristics of elementary teachers related to attitudes toward science

The purpose of this study is to ascertain what personal and professional characteristics are related to elementary attitudes toward science and the scientific institution. The Schwirian Science Support Scale (TRI-S) was administered to 191 elementary teachers and analysis of variance was used to analyze the data. The personal characteristics examined are: (1) age; and (2) religious preference. The six professional characteristics explored are: (1) highest academic degree held; (2) semester hours of college science; (3) type of undergraduate institution attended; (4) years teaching experience; (5) grade level taught; and (6) the nature oj the teaching experience, i.e., continuous or interrupted. Of these eight independent variables, age is associated with the greatest attitudinal differences, the younger teachers expressing the more positive attitudes toward science. Teachers who graduated from state schools had more positive attitudes than those who came from private, liberal arts institutions. There was also a positive association found between number of hours in science and positive science attitudes.     

Preservice secondary science teachers making sense of constructivism

This paper describes a naturalistic study of secondary pre-service science teachers and explores the process of implementing a constructivist approach to science teaching. Specializations: Gender and science, preservice education.     

The (non)making/becoming of inquiry practicing science teachers

Teacher education programs have adopted preparing science teachers that teach science through inquiry as an important pedagogic agenda. However, their efforts have not met with much success. While traditional explanations for this failure focus largely on preservice science teachers’ knowledge, beliefs and conceptions regarding science and science teaching, this conceptual paper seeks to direct attention toward discursive practices surrounding inquiry science teaching in teacher education programs for understanding why most science teachers do not teach science through inquiry. The paper offers a theoretical framework centered on critical notions of subjection and performativity as a much needed perspective on making/becoming of science teachers through participation in discursive practices of science teacher education programs. It argues that research based on such perspectives have much potential to offer a deeper understanding of the difficult challenges teacher education programs face in preparing inquiry practicing science teachers.     

An inquiry into the development of critical reflection in secondary student teachers

The extent, nature, and development of critical reflection was examined in three secondary social studies preservice teachers over the course of one semester of student teaching. Using an action research case study methodology, the researcher looked for evidence of the study participants’ deliberation about the ethical and moral basis of their work as teachers, and reflection on the broader social conditions of schooling. The study revealed limited, but significant, evidence of critical reflection and critically reflective teaching. Factors of influence are also discussed. The results lend support to the view that critical reflection can be a practical aim of preservice teacher education.     

Personal metaphors of prospective secondary economics and science teachers

Using the responses to open questions, this qualitative study examines the personal metaphors expressed by prospective secondary education teachers, 46 science graduates and 41 economics graduates. The metaphors are classified into the four categories of Leavy, McSorley, and Boté: the behaviourist/transmissive, the cognitivist/constructivist, the situative, and the self-referential. The results showed most metaphors to fall into the behaviourist/transmissive category, followed by the cognitivist/constructivist, self-referential, and situative categories, although some teachers expressed metaphors framed in more than one category. Of the 129 metaphors detected in the study, only one, of a chemistry graduate concerning the equilibrium between reactants, was associated with the prospective teachers' specific undergraduate education. The rest were expressions of their overall vision of teaching and learning, regardless of the speciality.     

Changing inquiry practices and beliefs: The impact of an inquiry-based professional development programme on beginning and experienced secondary science teachers

This study explores how an inquiry-based demonstration classroom in-service programme impacted the beliefs and practices of 14 secondary science teachers. Both structured and semistructured interviews captured in-service programme participants' beliefs, while in-class observations of participants documented their instructional practices. An analysis of the data revealed that the in-service programme had an impact on the participants, but the impact varied among the six induction and eight experienced teachers: the induction teachers changed their beliefs more than their practices, whereas the experienced teachers demonstrated more change in their practices than their beliefs. Ultimately, the changing belief systems of beginning teachers may have resulted in the limited use of student-centred practices, whereas the established belief systems of experienced participants may have been conducive to studentcentred practices. On the basis of the findings of this study, implications for professional development programmes are discussed.     

Measuring language learning environments in secondary science classrooms

The purpose of this study was to explore a new learning environment instrument which could be used by teaching practitioners and other educators to measure the language learning environment in the secondary science classroom. The science teacher is central in creating science classrooms conductive to the language needs of students and should be promoting the learning of language in the science curriculum and in the teaching strategies with English as second language learners. The data in this study were collected using a structured self-administered survey with a sample of 240 secondary school students from eight science classrooms. Factor analysis identified five dimensions, namely, Teacher Support, Vocabulary Development, Assessment, Motivation and Language for Learning Science. These five dimensions explained 56.9% of the variance in the language learning environment instrument. The internal reliability of the dimensions using Cronbach’s α ranged from 0.603 to 0.830. The study revealed significant differences in the dimensions of the language learning environment between what the students perceived to actually be occurring to what they would prefer. Implications from this preliminary research include the ability for measuring the language learning environment in the secondary science class and the potential for practitioners to use the information to develop teaching strategies conducive to learning for all students.