Examining The Beliefs Of Prospective Elementary And Science Teachers Regarding Reformed Science Teaching And Learning

Year 2013, Volume: 4 Issue: 3, 1 - 9, 01.09.2013

ayhan Karaman Pınar Karaman

Abstract

Turkey following the footsteps of western education system is nowadays struggling to implement constructivist paradigm in its schools. The success of the integration of constructivist elements into the schools is heavily contingent upon the support of teachers. This necessitates that the ideas advocated in constructivist reform movements should be promoted adequately in the preparation of teacher candidates. Therefore, investigating the beliefs of prospective teachers regarding reformed science teaching and learning becomes crucially important for an accurate portrayal of the current structure of the teacher profiles. This study focuses on the beliefs of prospective elementary and science teachers regarding reformed science teaching and learning. An adapted version of the BARSTL (Beliefs about Reformed Science Teaching and Learning) questionnaire developed originally by Sampson, Grooms and Enderle (2013) was delivered to a total of 393 first-year elementary and science teachers. The reformed science teaching and learning beliefs of prospective teachers with respect to their majors, genders and type of high school from which they graduated was investigated using independent samples t-test statistics and one-way ANOVA statistics. The results of the study indicate that many prospective teachers regardless of their majors adopt traditional perspectives in science teaching and learning. Particularly, prospective elementary and science teachers scored lower on “how people learn about science” and “the nature of the science curriculum” sub-dimensions of the BARSTL questionnaire, which implies that traditional beliefs are more dominant in these two specific sub-dimensions. The mean scores of elementary and science prospective teachers differ statistically significantly in two sub-dimensions of the BARSTL questionnaire (“characteristics of teachers and the learning environment” and “the nature of the science curriculum”). With respect to gender, the mean scores of male teacher candidates are significantly higher than their female peers in two sub-dimensions of the questionnaire (“how people learn about science” and “lesson design and implementation”). No statistically significant difference is present between the mean scores of prospective teachers graduated from different types of high schools. The results obtained from the study indicate the limited acceptance of constructivist reform ideas by pre-service elementary and science teachers. Constructivist Reform The history of Western thought might be divided in three consecutive time periods: pre-modern, modern and post-modern (Doll, 1993). Pre-modern worldview that reached its highest level with the exceptional works of influential ancient Greek philosophers like Plato, Socrates and Aristotle was replaced by modernity in sixteenth century with the major contributions of prominent natural philosophers; Copernicus, Galileo, Descartes and Newton just to name a few. The modernity’s success, which was crowned with the emergence of industrial revolution, permeated to every aspect of life until its death announcement was made by Jürgen Habermas in late twentieth century. The postmodern era in which we currently live makes itself feel in different fields in different ways. Needless to say, the education field is no exception. Although it is quite difficult to give a precise account of the emerging new paradigm accompanying postmodernism, its effects are being felt in education domain with the emergence of contemporary education reform movements (Doll, 1993). Transitioning from an industrial society to a knowledge driven economy necessitated the renewal of science education standards in 1980s. Fast development of science and technology led to changing relationship between the workforce and production. Preparing the qualified workforce in harmony with the knowledge driven economy triggered a change in the education of students in science. In parallel to the emerging needs of the knowledge driven economy, the influence of the postmodernism manifested itself on science education with constructivism (Schulz, 2007; Sherman, 2000). In other words, the new science education standards in the US rise on the philosophical foundations of constructivism (National Research Council, 1996). Likewise, Turkey following the footsteps of Western education system prepared recently new standards for science education in all levels of schooling, namely elementary, middle and high school (Eğitimi Araştırma ve Geliştirme Dairesi Başkanlığı, 2007; Talim ve Terbiye Kurulu Başkanlığı, 2006). Constructivism as an epistemology considers knowledge as a constructed entity by individuals rather than an external agent free from its knower. As such, learning takes place by constructing the meaning from experiences as opposed to acquiring the knowledge directly from the teacher. Without any doubt, constructivist reform in the education system is fruitful yet a difficult task. That is mainly because the underlying principles advocated in contemporary science education reform efforts are at odds with the traditional foundations of the current education system built on the modernistic worldview. In a most general sense, traditional science education considers students as passive acquirers of information transmitted by their teachers. Traditional education system promotes “the learning of answers more than the exploration of questions, memory at the expense of critical thought, bits and pieces of information instead of understandings in context, recitation over argument, reading in lieu of doing” (American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1990). Therefore, in most science classrooms, students are filled with the preexisting information written on the textbooks at the expense of internalizing knowledge constructed from classroom experiences. The success of any reform effort is contingent upon the support of the teachers (Levitt, 2001). If the proposed reform movement comes especially from top to down, the support of the teachers becomes more crucial for the future success of the reform efforts. That is mainly because the innovative ideas adopted at the macro level of education are carried out by teachers at the micro level of classroom. Obtaining wider support from practicing teachers depends partly on providing better education, which is consistent with the central tenets of contemporary science education standards, to them in their university education. Teacher candidates come to the teacher education programs with their preexisting beliefs regarding science teaching and learning. After many years being spent as a student at the K-12 level, prospective teachers develop certain set of beliefs not necessarily aligned with the science education reform ideas. Examining these beliefs is extremely important because they play an important role in teacher candidates’ further improvement in teacher education programs. Since beliefs are considered to be the driving force behind the actions, preparing teachers with beliefs inclined more to reform ideas will help actualize the ideas advocated in reform efforts. In this research study, the reformed science teaching and learning beliefs of prospective teachers were examined with respect to their majors, genders and type of high schools from which they graduated. The following research questions guided this study: 1. Is there a statistically significant difference between the reformed science teaching and learning beliefs mean scores of prospective teachers with respect to their majors? 2. Is there a statistically significant difference between the reformed science teaching and learning beliefs mean scores of prospective teachers with respect to their genders? 3. Is there a statistically significant difference between the reformed science teaching and learning beliefs mean scores of prospective teachers with respect to the type of high school from which they graduated? Research Design This research study was conducted at a Turkish university located on the north-west shores of the Aegean Sea. A total of 393 teacher candidates, 204 of whom were preservice elementary teachers and 189 of whom were preservice science teachers, participated in the study. First-year student teachers attending the College of Education were asked to complete a questionnaire entitled “Beliefs about Reformed Science Teaching and Learning (BARSTL)”. The questionnaire instrument originally developed by Sampson, Grooms and Enderle (2013) was translated to Turkish language by one of the authors. After the translation was completed, the other author of the paper performed a thorough review of the translation and made some revisions on it. Other than the authors of the paper, the translation process continued through checking the accuracy and appropriateness of the translation by two bilingual (Turkish and English) scholars. The feedback provided by these scholars competent both in English and Turkish languages determined the final shape of the Turkish version of the instrument to be used in this study. BARSTL was designed for assessing the beliefs of prospective elementary teachers about science teaching and learning. The original instrument included 32 items distributed into the following four subdimensions: how people learn about science, lesson design and implementation, characteristics of teachers and the learning environment, and the nature of the science curriculum. Each sub-dimension included eight questions, four of which represented the traditional perspective and four of which represented the reformed perspective. Table-1 below summarizes the traditional and reformed perspectives embedded in each subdimensions of the instrument. In the study, prospective elementary and science teachers completed the Turkish version of the questionnaire comprised of a total of 32 items. The data were collected from an online version of the questionnaire prepared specifically for teacher candidates. Table-1Contrasting Perspectives Represented in the Sub-dimensions of the BARSTL Instrument BARSTL Sub-dimensions Traditional Perspective Reformed Perspective Factor-1: How people learn about science Compared with blank slates What students learn is influenced by their existing ideas. Learning is accumulation of information. Learning is the modification of existing ideas. Factor-2: Lesson design and implementation Teacher-prescribed activities Student-directed learning. Frontal teaching-telling and showing students Relies heavily on student-developed investigations, manipulative

Keywords

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References

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