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KNOWLEDGE, BELIEFS, & PERFORMANCE OF NEW HIGH SCHOOL
CHEMISTRY TEACHERS: A STUDY OF TEACHERS
CHARACTERISTICS & TEACHER PREPARATION
PROGRAM INFLUENCES
By

Qasim Mohammad Alshannag

A DISSERTATION
Submitted to
Michigan Sate University
In partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Department of Teacher Education

1998

ABSTRACT
KNOWLEDGE, BELIEFS, & PERFORMANCE OF NEW HIGH SCHOOL
CHEMISTRY TEACHERS: A STUDY OF TEACHERS'
CHARACTERISTICS & TEACHER PREPARATION
PROGRAM INFLUENCES
By

Qasim Mohammad Alshannag

This study investigated the influence of teachers' characteristics and secondary
science teacher preparation programs on new high school chemistry teachers' knowledge,
beliefs, and performance. “New high school chemistry teacher” refers to any teacher who
during their first three years of teaching, has a major/minor in chemistry and/or any
teacher who teaches chemistry for high school students. This research focused on four
new high school chemistry teachers in their second year of teaching who were part of the
Salish I Research Project. These four teachers graduated from two different teacher
preparation programs, at major research universities.

The focus of this study was on teachers who demonstrated one or more of the
following teaching styles: teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-centered. A cross
case analysis was done among these four teachers to explore the linkages among teachers’
characteristics, secondary science teacher preparation program features, and new high
school chemistry teachers' knowledge, beliefs, and performance. Data included interviews

with university faculty in education and in science, analysis of course syllabi and program

descriptions, interviews with the new teachers, analysis video portfolios of the classroom
teaching, and other data collected as part of the Salish I Project.

The key findings of the in-depth study included: 1) The course objectives in the
teacher education courses at both institutions were more diverse and more comprehensive
than science disciplinary course objectives. 2) All four of the new teachers and most of
the faculty interviewed confirmed that the connections between prospective science
teachers’ learning and real world applications were not clearly addressed as a major goal in
science courses at either institution. 3) Prospective science teachers did not experience
cooperative learning in their science courses, but did so in education courses. 4) All new
secondary science teachers reported that they experienced a much wider variety of
assessment methods in their science education courses than in their science courses.

5) All four of the new teachers identified that learning from on-the-job experience or field
experience in their teacher preparation programs was crucial in developing their teaching
approaches. 6) While all four of the secondary science teachers hold student-centered
beliefs about teaching, only one consistently demonstrated student-centered teaching. 7)
Evidence from video portfolios showed that the new secondary science teachers did not
reflect a deep conceptual understanding of the scientific concepts that they taught, even
though the content of the lessons was from their minor scientific field.

More empirical research is needed to explore the influences of teacher preparation
program features on prospective science teachers’ performance in more than one year of

teaching, and when they are teaching in their major field of study.

Copyright by
Qasim Mohammad Alshannag
1998

DEDICATION
“In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful”

First of all I would like to thank and pray to my almighty
Allah (God) who has supported me with faith, patience, and
energy to achieve one of the most important goals I have ever
achieved. This dissertation is a reward to the important people in
my life whose spiritual, love, and continuous support have made
this dream become a reality: to a very special women in my life,
my wife Manal for her unlimited support and diligence during this
journey; to my lovely children Adalia and Ghayth for giving me the
hope to work very hard to be a good father; to my brother Adnan
who has dedicated his life to his family; to my parents who made a
lot of sacrifices to provide their children with every opportunity to
be prosperous; to my parents-in-law for their being patient with
not seeing their daughter for five years and more; and finally, to my
brothers, sisters-in-law, and brothers-in-law for being proud of
Qasim’s success and providing me with motivation.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

“In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful”
“Praise be to Allah The Cherisher and Sustainer of the Worlds”

I would like to extend my appreciation and gratitude to my academic advisor and
dissertation director, Dr. James Gallagher. His support, encouragement, and guidance
through my Ph.D. program at Michigan State University were helpful for me to achieve
one of the most important goals in my life.

In addition to Jim, I am also deeply indebted to Dr. Deborah Smith, Dr. Edward
Smith, Dr. Joyce Parker, and Dr. Paul Hunter for their consistent support and
encouragement through my stay at Michigan State University, and their written feedback
and conversations about my work.

I am very thankful for my best friend Don Duggan-Haas. Don played a significant
role in helping me achieve my goal. He sacrificed his personal time to edit, read, and
discuss issues with me in order to finalize my dissertation. We have worked closely
together over three and a half years on the Salish Project. We analyzed videotapes and
interviews together, participated in intense meetings and conference calls with Salish
researchers from around the United States and around the world, and presented papers
together at various professional meetings. I also wish to express my thanks for Katy
Duggan-Haas for her support of both Don and me as we worked through the Salish

Project.

vi

Finally, very special thanks to the four teachers who agreed to allow me to use

their data and write case studies for the purpose of this dissertation.

vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES ..................................................................................... xi

LIST OF FIGURES ................................................................................... xiii

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................... 1
The Problem .................................................................................... 1
The Research Questions ....................................................................... 6
A Review of Literature ......................................................................... 7
The Significance of This Study ............................................................. 19
An Overview of The Dissertation .......................................................... 20

CHAPTER 2

METHODOLOG ...................................................................................... 22
Salish I Project ................................................................................. 22
Dissertation Framework ..................................................................... 23
Sample Selection .............................................................................. 31
North Global University ..................................................................... 32
South Global University ..................................................................... 34
Data Sources ................................................................................... 35
Data Analysis ................................................................................. 36

CHAPTER 3

TEACHER PREPERATION PROGRAMS AT NORTH GLOBAL UNIVERSITY
AND THE CASES OF TERRY & STEVE WHO GRADUATED FROM THIS
PROGRAM ............................................................................................ 39

SECTION ONE: NORTH GLOBAL UNIVERSITY TEACHER PREPARATION

PROGRAMS .......................................................................................... 39
Part a: Science Content Program at North global University ........................... 40
Part b: Teacher Education Program at North global University ........................ 49
SECTION TWO: TERRY’S CASE STUDY ...................................................... 66
Terry’s Knowledge and Beliefs ............................................................. 68
Terry’s Teaching Performance .............................................................. 79
Summary of Terry’s Case .................................................................... 84

viii

SECTION THREE: STEVE’S CASE STUDY .................................................... 86

Steve’s Knowledge and Beliefs ............................................................. 88

Steve’s Teaching Performance .............................................................. 101

Summary of Steve’s Case ................................................................... 111
CHAPTER 4

TEACHER PREPERATION PROGRAMS AT SOUTH GLOBAL UNIVERSITY
AND THE CASES OF DON & KATHY WHO GRADUATED FROM THIS

PROGRAM .......................................................................................... 112
SECTION ONE: SOUTH GLOBAL UNIVERSITY TEACHER PREPARATION
PROGRAMS ......................................................................................... 112
Part a: Science Content Program at South global University .......................... 113
Part b: Teacher Education Program at South global University ....................... 123
SECTION TWO: DON’S CASE STUDY ........................................................ 138
Don’s Knowledge and Beliefs ............................................................. 141
Don and His Students’ Beliefs about the Learning Environment inside the
Classroom .................................................................................... 149
Don’s Teaching Performance .............................................................. 151
Summary of Don’s Case .................................................................... 156
SECTION THREE: KATHY’S CASE STUDY ................................................ 157
Kathy’s Knowledge and Beliefs ........................................................... 160
Kathy and Her Students’ Beliefs about the Learning Environment inside the
Classroom .................................................................................... 168
Kathy’s Teaching Performance ............................................................ 170
Summary of Kathy’s Case ................................................................. 176
CHAPTER 5

THE LINKAGES AMONG TEACHERS’ PERFORMANCE, KNOWLEDGE,
BELIEFS, TEACHER PREPARATION PROGRAM FEATURES, AND

TEACHERS’ CHARACTERISTICS ............................................................ 179
SUMMARY OF MAJOR FINDINGS ........................................................... 180

LINKAGES AMONG TEACHERS’ PERFORMANCE, KNOWLEDGE, AND

BELIEFS .............................................................................................. 184
Teachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs about Science Content ............ 186
Teachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs about Teacher’s Actions ......... 190
Teachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs about Students’ Actions ......... 196

THE LINKAGES AMONG FINDINGS FROM QUESTION ONE, TEACHER
PREPARATION PROGRAM FEATURES, AND TEACHERS’

CHARACTERISTICS .............................................................................. 199
The Linkages among Findings from Question One, Science Content Course
Features, and Teachers’ Characteristics ................................................. 204
The Linkages among Findings from Question One, Teacher Education Course
Features, and Teachers’ Characteristics ................................................. 210
LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY THAT INFLUENCED FINDINGS .................... 219
CHAPTER 6
RVIEW OF THE STUDY, DISCUSSION OF THE RESEARCH QUESTIONS,
IMPLICATIONS OF THE FINDINGS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS ................. 223
Review of The Study ...................................................................... 223
Discussion of The Research Questions .................................................. 226
Implications of The Findings ............................................................. 236
Recommendations for Further Research ................................................ 239
APPENDIX A: PERSONAL BACKGROUND ................................................ 241
BIBLIOGRAPHY ................................................................................... 244

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: List of All New High School Chemistry Teachers in the
National Sample .......................................................................... 24

Table 2: New High School Chemistry Teachers Who Had Two Years of Experience
Across the National Sample and their Teaching Style .............................. 32

Table 3: Science Content Program Features Matrix for North Global University ......... 41

Table 4: Teacher Education Program Features Matrix for North Global University ...... 50

Table 5: Analysis of Terry ‘3 Knowledge and Beliefs .......................................... 69
Table 6: Video Portfolio Analysis of Teaching Performance for Terry ..................... 80
Table 7: Summary of Analysis Results for Terry’s Knowledge, Beliefs, and

Performance .............................................................................. 85
Table 8: Analysis of Steve’s Knowledge and Beliefs .......................................... 90
Table 9: Video Portfolio Analysis of Teaching Performance for Steve ..................... 104

Table 10: Summary of Analysis Results for Steve’s Knowledge, Beliefs, and
Performance ........................................................................... 110

Table 11: Science Content Program Features Matrix for South Global University ...... 114

Table 12: Teacher Education Program Features Matrix for South Global University ...124

Table 13: Analysis of Don’s Knowledge and Beliefs ........................................ 142
Table 14: Don’s and His students’ Scores on the Constructivist Learning

Environment Survey (CLES) ..................................................................... 150
Table 15: Video Portfolio Analysis of Teaching Performance for Don .................... 152
Table 16: Grading Rubric Table Constructed by Don & His Students ..................... 154

Table 17: Summary of Analysis Results for Don’s Knowledge, Beliefs, and
Performance ........................................................................... 156

Table 18: Analysis of Kathy’s Knowledge and Belief ........................................ 161

Table 19: Kathy’s and Her students’ Scores on the Constructivist Learning
Environment Survey (CLES) ........................................................ 169

Table 20: Video Portfolio Analysis of Teaching Performance for Kathy .................. 173

Table 21: Summary of Analysis Results for Kathy’s Knowledge, Beliefs, and
Performance ........................................................................... 177

Table 22: The Linkages among New Secondary Science Teachers’ Performance,
Knowledge, and Beliefs in the Science Content Domain ........................ 187

Table 23: The Linkages among New Secondary Science Teachers’ Performance,
Knowledge, and Beliefs in the Teacher’s Actions Domain ..................... 191

Table 24: Assessment Methods Listed by Prospective Secondary Science Teachers
in Their SIDESTEP Questionnaires ................................................ 195

Table 25: The Linkages among New Secondary Science Teachers’ Performance,
Knowledge, and Beliefs in the Students’ Actions Domain ...................... 197

Table 26: The Program Features in Science Content courses & Teacher
Education Courses .................................................................... 200

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: The Linkages among Teachers’ Knowledge and Beliefs expressed, or
Performance displayed .................................................................. 185

Figure 2: Factors Identified by Terry that Contribute to Her Teaching Package (N GU)...202
Figure 3: Factors Identified by Steve that Contribute to His Teaching Package (N GU). . .202
Figure 4: Factors Identified by Don that Contribute to His Teaching Package (SGU). .....203

Figure 5: Factors Identified by Kathy that Contribute to Her Teaching Package (SGU)...203

CHAPTER 1

INTROD TI N

This chapter provides a discussion of the nature of the problem followed by the
research questions, a review of the relevant literature, and description of the purpose of

the study. The chapter ends with an overview of the dissertation itself.

The Problem

A woman is observed standing in front of a group of teenagers1 with a variety of
body types and facial features, in a modern looking building in a small American city. She
is talking to the teenagers and writing a series of numbers and letters on a green board.
Occasionally, we hear the woman ask questions to a few of the teenagers. Some of them
must have given appropriate answers because we hear the woman giving them
affirmations. If we take a look around the room we observe some teenagers with their
eyes closed and mouths open, some are reading books inside books, we see some
frantically paging through their books as if looking for something important, and some are
just listlessly sitting looking at the woman with numbed stares. Not knowing what was
going on in the room, you stop someone walking by and ask them what is going on in the

room. The person responds by telling you that the woman is a teacher and that she is

 

' This imaginary story was part of a paper presented by Alshannag, Bailey, Cheng,
Dodge, & Malakolunthu in TE921 class “Learning to teach” at Michigan State University
as one of the course requirements.

teaching the teenagers about chemistry and that the teenagers are students who are
learning fiom the teacher.

In this hypothetical situation the assumptions of the passerby are very broad and
revealing about what takes place in today's classrooms (or what is assumed to take place
in today’s classrooms). The passerby assumed that the woman standing in front of the
class was helping the students learn chemistry. She appeared to know the language and
symbols used in the discipline of chemistry and was telling the students about the
knowledge she had. The students were assumed to be taking in all of this information and
finding the information valuable. We may laugh at these assumptions about what was
taking place in the classroom, but these ideas are not so uncommon. They mirror what
many people believe is occurring in classrooms all over the world.

This hypothetical case could raise many questions concerning teachers’
preparation and their teaching. Someone could ask, why is she considered to be a teacher?
Is it because she knows more about chemistry than her students? Is it because she knows
how to present knowledge to teenagers? Is it because she knows what ideas in chemistry
are difficult for her students to understand and knows how to address these issues so that
the students understand them? Is it because she knows her students’ backgrounds? A lot
of questions can come up that highlight issues related with teacher’s knowledge, beliefs,
and practice.

Generally speaking, the learning of chemistry, as well as science more generally, is
seen by most students as irrelevant to their lives and to the world around them (Caj as,

1998; Linn, et. al, 1997). Furthermore, Gallagher (1991) indicated that, “the academic

community has virtually no vehicle for helping secondary science teachers learn about the
applications of scientific knowledge in the daily lives of their students” (P.128). Yet,
making connections among chemical concepts, natural phenomena, and the real world is
essential for any learner to understand these concepts (Tobias, 1992).

The macro level of connections was also mentioned by Gréiber (1996). He argued
that the importance of chemistry for the environment, for everyday life and for
sociopolitical relevant problems must be emphasized in classroom instruction.

In common practice, Tobias (1992) found that teaching chemistry is highly
focused on content. Chemistry is generally taught as clusters of isolated concepts,
formulas, chemical and mathematical equations, and theories (American Chemical Society,
1990; Kirk & Layman, 1996). This is true in the teaching of chemistry at different levels:
middle school, high school, and college. Prospective high school chemistry teachers as
well as other science disciplines teachers almost always enroll in their introductory
science courses through Colleges of Art and Science with students who are traditional
non-teaching science majors (Salish, 1997).

The prospective secondary science teachers will learn more about scientific
knowledge and less about the process of science because of the nature of these courses
(Gallagher, 1991). This way of teaching science at the undergraduate level likely
influences these teachers’ knowledge, beliefs, and practices as they move into their own
classrooms.

Furthermore, these prospective teachers, when they complete their science

courses, would not understand fundamental concepts in a way that would allow them to

teach these concepts effectively. For example, Lee & Magnusson (1997) studied the
college students' molecular-level representations of common chemical phenomena,
including solution chemistry. They found that college students had gaps in their
knowledge and a lack of development in their conceptions of solutions, even after several
years of formal study in high school and college.

This lack of students’ understanding at the college level will not be solved by
taking more academic courses. Sanford (1988) confirmed that prospective science
teachers do not acquire the content knowledge of any science discipline, and understand it
for the purpose of teaching, by enrolling in these academic disciplinary courses. She says:

“...there is a growing awareness that university study of an academic

discipline may not provide the kind of knowledge and understanding that

teachers need to effectively transform their academic knowledge into

instructional activities in the classroom.”

Sanford’s argument was supported by Ruthann (Schulke, et. al, 1991), a
new chemistry teacher who thought that if she took more undergraduate chemistry
courses, it would properly prepare her for teaching, but she found that that was
not the solution. She feels,

“...[I] was required to take enough undergraduate chemistry courses to

properly prepare me for teaching but 1 locked the opportunity to discuss

the presentation of specific topics in chemistry. I would have benefited

fi'om a course where each prospective teacher had to present a chapter and

then discuss the problems they had with the material and its

presentations” (Schulke, et. al, 1991. P.20). [emphasis added]

Ruthann’s needs as a chemistry teacher raises questions about the nature and the

effectiveness of teacher preparation programs from which prospective teachers will

graduate. Those kinds of needs should motivate science educators and scientists to design
courses that integrate the content and pedagogy for the purpose of teaching. As Shulman
(1986, 1987) emphasized, teachers need to draw their transformations of a subject matter
from diverse kinds of pedagogical content knowledge-- amalgams of subject matter and
pedagogical knowledge.

An adequate base of pedagogical content knowledge could help chemistry teachers
break down the abstract nature of chemistry. For example, atoms and molecules are much
too small to be seen and difficult for students to conceptualize. The abstract nature of
chemistry as a subject makes it difficult to plan and teach effectively, but if prospective
chemistry teachers acquired pedagogical content (chemistry) knowledge through their
teacher preparation programs, they would be more able to move these chemical concepts
to a concrete level and their students would be more able to understand these concepts.

The weak connection between the lecture and the chemistry lab at the
undergraduate or high school level does not generally help students understand chemical
concepts. In general, chemistry instructors use demonstration activities or chemistry labs
to confirm the scientific facts in chemistry textbooks, rather than as investigations of
chemical concepts through inquiry activities. This inquiry orientation is believed to be
more effective in helping students understand the scientific concepts (Erwin & Pestel,
1992, a & b). This was confirmed by (Linn, et. al, 1997). They found that chemistry
laboratory typically is intended to illustrate facts and principles, but not to investigate

these facts through inquiry activities.

The way in which chemistry is being taught led me to think about how we can
promote students' understanding in chemistry, especially for prospective science
teachers. Research results and my professional experience (see Appendix A) indicate that
there are relationships among a chemistry teachers' background (i.e. the kind of science
training that each teacher had), teacher education programs, a chemistry teachers'
knowledge and beliefs, and the chemistry teachers' performance.

In this study, I explored several of these relationships in depth in order to gain a
better understanding of what characteristics of teacher preparation programs are effective

or not effective. The study is designed to answer the following research questions:

The Research Questions
1) What is the training of new high school chemistry teachers? In order to answer this
question, the following sub questions need to be answered:
a) What is the variety of subject matter background they experience during their
pre-service education?
b) What kind of courses did they take?
c) What kind of chemistry training and experience did they have?
(1) What is their background in mathematics and physics?
e) What is their pedagogical training in teacher education?
2) What are the features of the teacher preparation programs these teachers experienced?

3) What are their beliefs about the nature of science and teaching science?

4) What are the key features of the classroom performance of these new high school
chemistry teachers?
5) What kind of preparation experience and knowledge contributes to a teacher-centered,

conceptual, or a student-centered teacher?

A Review of literature

Educational reform is ideally seen as part of the social transformation of
contemporary schooling (Popkewitz, 1988). There is an enduring faith placed in schools
as an engine of social and individual improvement. Policy makers turn to schools as a tool
when social problems emerge (Cuban, 1990 & 1995). Countries all over the world try to
make changes and/or reforms to the educational systems in order to improve individuals
and societies.

In United States, many waves of reform have been initiated in the last three
decades. During the first wave of reforms in the 19605 & 19705, curricula were updated
and inquiry was added as an important focus of science programs. In the 19805, the
social consequences of science and technology became the focus through programs labeled
science-technology-society (DeBoer, 1991). In the 19905, reformers sought mainly to
expand or improve educational inputs by increasing the length of the school day and year,
increasing requirements for graduation, and recruiting better teachers. Also, efforts were
made to insure students learned desired knowledge and skills through standardized
graduation tests, specified curricula, and promotional criteria. It was during the decade of

the 19905 that national standards were developed and promulgated in science and other

fields. Other reformers in the middle to late 19805 called for fundamental rethinking and
restructuring of the process of schooling (Ramsey, 1993; Smith & O’Day, 1990).

Specific reforms in education have targeted science education. Recently, in science
education most of the partners are seeking systemic reform involving in science curricula,
students’ learning, teacher preparation and teacher education programs, teaching, student
achievement, administrative leadership, and school policies (American Association for the
Advancement of Science (AAAS): Benchmarks for Scientific Literacy, 1993; (AAAS):
Blueprints for Reform, 1998; (AAAS): Science for All Americans, 1990; Anderson, et. al,
1994; Atwater, 1996; F loden, et. al, 1995; Goodlad, 1990: National Research Council
(NRC), 1996; Ramsey, 1993; Smith & O’Day 1990).

Since the mid 19805, science teachers' professional knowledge has been the focus
of scholars. Many researchers call for the shift in the paradigm of teachers' knowledge
from "dual nature", (i.e., the dichotomy between content and pedagogy) to the missing
paradigm, "pedagogical content knowledge" (Shulman, 1986).

Gallagher (1993) described the historically dominant paradigm in secondary
science teaching as transmitting information to students, learning as the acquiring of that
information through memorization, and assessment as measurement of the students’
achievement in acquiring that information for the purpose of giving grades. Many teacher
education programs has been reorganized and structured to fit with a new theoretical
orientation that focuses more toward academic conceptual orientation and practice in

learning to teach (F eimen-Nemser, 1990; Holmes Group, 1990).

Recently, reform in science education has addressed many key issues that help
educators make changes in the content of instruction. The main features of this reform
movement is to focus more on the development of a student’s conceptual understanding
instead of on rote learning and the acquisition of facts and skills (see for example, AAAS:
Science for All Americans, 1990).

Conceptual understanding in science means that the learners are able to use
scientific knowledge to describe, explain, predict, and control the world around them.
Anderson and Roth (1989) analyzed these components of scientific understanding .
focusing on the functions or uses of scientific knowledge. This includes activities
(description, explanation, prediction, and control) in which successful learners of science
are engaged. The other component focuses on the structure of scientific knowledge
(conceptual frameworks) that science learners use to make the interconnections among
scientific knowledge, other kinds of knowledge, and their own personal understanding of
the world. The most significant part of their analysis was that scientific understanding
requires extensive conceptual integration and an ability to work out the complex
relationships between the structure and function of science.

This raises the question, what is important for a conceptual understanding in
chemistry?, clearly, it is not to ask learners to memorize all of these chemical formulas,
chemical reactions, chemical bonds, etc., but rather it is important to help learners acquire
this kind of knowledge through their involvement in activities that allow them to use
science process skills to develop valid, meaningful scientific understanding of these

concepts.

Through the process of integration of structure and function of scientific
knowledge, learners are part of a meaningful learning process. This process requires
students to go through a very complex process of conceptual change in which their own
ways of thinking and viewing the world must be challenged and tested in front of the
scientific conceptual frameworks.

Research on students’ learning science has indicated that learners hold different
conceptual frameworks than scientists. Many empirical studies (for example, Driver,
1995; Pfundt & Duit, 1994; Wandersee, Mintes, and Novak, 1993) provide evidence that
students hold pre-instructional conceptions in many fields and these are substantially
different from the scientific concepts taught in school.

Learners' conceptual frameworks include many misconceptions and naive
conceptions that are different from the experts’ conceptual frameworks. The experts in
various scientific domains hold well-structured conceptual frameworks or schemes that
include knowledge about the usefulness of that knowledge in a variety of specific
situations.

Several studies have shown that misconceptions are not just the domain of the
students. Often times teachers, especially elementary teachers, (Smith & Neale, 1991)
have misconceptions and naive conceptions about the subject matter they teach (Ball &
McDiarmid, 1989; Smith & Neale, 1991). The misconceptions held by teachers can blind
them to student misconceptions and cause the teacher to develop inappropriate
explanations resulting in the failure of teaching for understanding (Anderson & Smith,

1987; Smith & Neale, 1991).

10

However, Smith (1990) argued that, “learning science with understanding is
desirable for all students.” So, in order for students to understand science, Edward Smith
proposed two criteria for understanding in science (i.e., for conceptual change):
“connectedness” and “usefulness” of the scientific ideas in social contexts.”

Teaching science for conceptual understanding requires a richer understanding of
science than is held by most science teachers. One of the most important factors in
teaching science for conceptual understanding is teachers' knowledge, and how they
translate that knowledge into teaching practice. For example, data from the Salish 1
project (1993-1996) indicated that the practice (teaching) of new secondary science
teachers in the United States tends to be more didactic, i.e. new teachers believe that
knowledge is fixed and it is in the textbooks. Many research studies confirm that this
kind of practice is widespread. (For example, see Gallagher, 1993).

Teaching science for conceptual understanding requires teachers to understand
science concepts and to make connections between these concepts and its applications.
Conversations I was involved in at the conference on Revitalizing Undergraduate Science
and Mathematics Education, held at Michigan State University, May 8-10, 1997,
indicated that even student teachers who majored in science lack understanding of
important, fundamental science concepts. Even though they know many facts and laws
in science, they do not have an integrated comprehension of them nor do they know how
to apply them in everyday life. Their lack of understanding science certainly limits their

teaching science effectively.

11

To teach science for conceptual understanding, teachers need to understand the
nature and philosophy of science (Gallagher, 1991). Again, data from the Salish I project
indicated the lack of understanding of the nature of science by new secondary science
teachers. For example, many of them believed that scientific facts are always true. This
kind of understanding (of the nature of science) is essential for science teachers in order to
help their students understand the limitations and the nature of the scientific knowledge
(Driver, et. al, 1996).

Teaching science for conceptual understanding requires teachers to transform the
content knowledge using pedagogies that are sensitive to the students' ideas and
conceptions, however as pedagogical content knowledge. Pedagogical content knowledge
represents "that special amalgam of content and pedagogy that is uniquely the province of
teachers" (Shulman, 1987, p. 8). It refers to knowledge of the ways of representing and
formulating science topics that make them comprehensible to students. It includes an
understanding of what makes the learning of a specific science topic easy or difficult, for
example, the preconceptions and conceptions that learners bring to the topic.

So, in order to enforce a leamer’s understanding in chemistry at different levels,
teachers need to be prepared to teach for conceptual understanding. To do 50, teachers
need to match their knowledge/beliefs with their practices. This means that if a teacher
has a conceptual knowledge/beliefs, then we could expect that teacher to teach as a
conceptual and/or a constructivist teacher. Clark and Peterson (1986) have pointed out
that teachers’ conceptions affect their planning and classroom decision, while conversely

their teaching activities influence their conceptions. In addition to that, Briscoe (1991)

12

suggested that to make changes in science teachers’ practices, teachers must examine their
beliefs, judgments, and thoughts regarding what they do and how they do it.

The discrepancy between teachers’ knowledge/beliefs and their teaching practices
influences the way in which teachers teach science. It follows that science teachers could
deliver science instruction to the students as a body of knowledge without any
connections to science processes or to students’ lives in the real world. This conception
of scientific knowledge does not match the conception of teaching for conceptual
understanding (in which the integration between the structure and the function of science
is necessary).

There are many factors that would influence teacher's knowledge and beliefs. One
of them is related to the way they were taught science through K-college. If they were
taught science in didactic and traditional ways, then they generally try to teach the same
way (Ben-Peretz, 1995). Therefor, it is widely believed that teachers often teach the way
they have been taught. Subject and teacher education majors have had extensive
experiences as students in college and pre-college classrooms, which has a strong impact
on how they will organize and teach a course in their subject matter (Ball & McDiarmid,
1989; Ball & Wilson, 1990; Grossman, 1990, Gohlke, 1995). Consequently, a major
challenge will be how to change the very deeply enculturated ideas that teachers have
about scientific knowledge.

Teaching for conceptual understanding requires teachers to know both substantive
and syntactical structure of the scientific discipline (Schwab, 1978; Bruner, 1986).

Knowing the structure of the discipline is important in order to make a connection

13

between structure and functions of science. This kind of knowledge would help science
teachers in constructing their PCK. In other words, knowing the structure of a discipline
might help teachers to transfer science concepts to their students in a meaningful way,
and allow the teacher to use many metaphors, models, examples, and ideas to facilitate the
students' understanding (Wilson, & et. al., 1987). However, Deng (1997) found that
knowing the structure of the discipline of physics does not guarantee that physics teacher
has the specific kind of subject matter knowledge needed for teaching school physics.
Further, Dong found that the subject matter taught in college level physics was
substantially different from that taught in high school physics, as a result, college physics
did not provide background in important topics- the high school program.

What teachers need to know is more than personal understanding of the subject
matter they are expected to teach. It is clear for most scholars that teachers need to know
more than subject matter. They need to know something about theories in educational
psychology, teaching methods, the philosophical and social foundation of education,
students, curricula, and school context. However, it is very clear that teachers' subject
matter knowledge plays a crucial role in teachers' professional knowledge.

Subject matter knowledge includes knowledge of the content (substantive) of the
subject domain, and also, the knowledge of the syntactic structure of that discipline
(Schwab, 1978). Knowledge of the content includes facts, concepts, laws, theories, and
the relationships between facts and concepts in each subject area. While, the syntactic
structure of the discipline requires the understanding of evidence and proof within the

discipline, or how researchers of the discipline evaluate the knowledge claims. Wilson,

14

Shulman, and Richert (1987) claim that teachers must have two kinds of subject matter
knowledge, knowledge of the subject field and knowledge of how to help students come
to understand the field.

Many studies investigate the influence of teachers' subject matter knowledge on
their teaching. Hashweh (1985) examined the influence of subject matter knowledge
expertise on the pedagogical reasoning of experienced teachers. He found that prior
subject matter knowledge affects teachers' transformation of the curriculum. More
knowledgeable teachers rejected the organization of the textbooks materials. Also, they
used different representations to teach particular topics. The same results were found by
Wilson, Shulman, and Richert (1987). They found that teachers' subject matter
knowledge influences the different ways of representing or transforming subject matter
knowledge; metaphors, analogies, illustrations, examples, in-class activities, and home
work assignments.

However, in a study outside of science disciplines, Grossman (1990) compared
and contrasted different language teaching methods and goals between English teachers
who participated in teacher education program and those who did not. Jake, who had no
formal teacher education, represented the traditional way of instruction which
emphasized the linguistic aspects of Shakespeare's play. He attributed this to his college
courses and his experience as an English Major. Steven, who went through a teacher
education program, used a more progressive way in his instruction. Instead of focusing
on linguistic aspects of the play, Steven emphasized the application of the theme of play

into the real situation of students in order to find solution to problems in reality. He even

15

ignored the language analysis. Steven’s method stemmed from his teacher education
courses and his field experience.

Based on that, I can see how it is important for teachers to be knowledgeable
about the subject matter they need to teach for the purpose of teaching and how to
organize that knowledge for novice learners. They need to know the structures of their
discipline, because without this knowledge, they may misrepresent both the content and
the nature of the discipline itself (Shulman & Grossman, 1987). And the results of
misrepresentations will increase both students’ and teachers’ misconceptions about the
content to be taught by these teachers. They also need the pedagogical content
knowledge that will allow them to transform the conceptual content to their students.

There is no doubt about the importance of the subject matter for teaching
purposes. So, it is important to help teachers acquire this knowledge in their teacher
education programs and subject area courses.

I have suggested previously (Alshannag 1996) that in order to help teachers
acquire subject matter knowledge for teaching purposes, we need to know how the
teachers' knowledge of subject matter influences the processes of transformation. What
are the kind of skills, and knowledge, needed? And the major thing we need to know is
how different kinds of professional knowledge relate to each other. This understanding is
essential in order to design curricula that cover these kind of multidimensional
relationships. What kind of theoretical framework do we need to initiate these kinds of

relationships?

16

To do so, we need more research on how teachers' knowledge influences their
teaching. What is the nature of transformation processes in teaching a particular subject?
And how do teachers acquire knowledge of a particular subject matter during their
undergraduate studies and teacher preparation programs?

The teacher education programs should be organized and structured in such ways
to help teachers gain professional knowledge. They need to acquire different kinds of
knowledge. For example, Grossman’s (1990) model of teachers’ professional knowledge
includes four elements; subject matter content knowledge; pedagogical knowledge;
pedagogical content knowledge; and knowledge of context.

There are numerous strategies that teachers combine content and pedagogical
knowledge to help students learn subject matter. McDiarmid, Ball, and Anderson (1989)
discuss that teaching involves a wide range of strategies that relate to the essential
purpose of helping others understand. As just one example, Anderson and Smith (1987)
have investigated teaching strategies regarding teaching for conceptual change. They
found that to best organize lessons for understanding, a science lesson should have the

following components:

0 The lesson should allow students to voice their preconceptions and make
predictions about phenomena

0 The teacher should regularly ask students for clarification and explanation
of statements

0 The teacher should provide discrepant events to help the students
recognize their misconceptions.

0 The teacher should encourage debate and discussion about evidence with
the whole class and amongst themselves.

0 The teacher should provide viable alternative scientific explanations to replace the
misconceptions. (Anderson & Smith, 1987)

17

Also, reducing the gap between theory and practice would help teachers to be
more professional. One way to do that effectively, is by giving student-teachers more
practice inside schools within their program, because what they learned from their
experiences will become part of their professional knowledge (Ben-Peretz, 1995).
Furthermore, this will influence their teaching styles, decisions, beliefs, and attitudes
toward their teaching and teacher education program.

Teaching for conceptual understanding requires the teachers to develop a new
conception of what a teacher is. Based on the reform agenda, a science teacher inside the
classroom needs to be a facilitator and helper to the students, direct them in their inquires,
and not simply give them the right answer. Science teachers were required to perform
teaching which facilitates students’ interactions with the content in order to help students
understand scientific concepts and to become more scientifically literate. Students,
parents, and administrators have different conceptions of what a science teacher is. They
believe that science teachers need to “feed” students with knowledge, answer students'
questions, teach students in ways that help them to do very well in achievement on state
tests. Too often, these tests are designed to measure the lower level of thinking skills, and
are not compatible with teaching science for conceptual understanding.

A more realistic view holds that science teachers are decision-makers. For
example, they have some choice about ideas and concepts in science to teach, and power
to choose their own curricula, teaching strategies, and assessment based on the

background and capabilities of their students. This conception of science teachers

18

contradicts the traditional role of the teacher as implementers of programs and rules
established by authorities.

The problem also appears as a matter of a paradigm shift from the traditional
conception of science teachers (i.e., teacher-centered, where all classroom discourses
oriented and controlled by science teacher) to the new conception of teaching (i.e.,
student-centered, where teacher’s content, teacher’s actions, students’ actions and
classroom environment are mostly directed and controlled by the students with the
guidance of a teacher). The issues explored in the foregoing paragraphs in this section will
be explored in this dissertation in the context of case studies of four new teachers of

secondary school science who recently graduated from two large midwestem universities.

Th i ific n f This Stud

Review of the literature shows that many studies have been done in the domains of
science teachers’ knowledge and beliefs, science teachers’ performance, science teachers’
training, and science teacher education programs. But in fact, according to my knowledge
there is no research done to examine the relationship among these four domains together.
The Salish Project (1997) is the only research study at the national level that investigated
the influences of secondary science and mathematics teacher preparation programs on new
teachers and their students. The nature of our analysis process in this project was general.
We did not do any cross case analysis in-depth.

After the project was done, I started thinking, how could I do my research from

the data that we have from Salish? My personal interest, personal background, and

19

professional experiences led to focus on new high school chemistry teachers who were
part of this project. This study investigated in-depth the relationship among chemistry
teachers' characteristics (i.e. the kind of training that each teacher had), teacher education
programs, chemistry teachers' knowledge and beliefs, and chemistry teachers'
performance.

This study contributed to the field by providing concrete examples of the nature
of the relationship among these four domains especially for teachers who had chemistry
as a major or minor in their teacher preparation program.

The significance of this study was its in-depth investigation into the relationships
among teachers' characteristics, teacher education programs, teacher's knowledge and
beliefs, and teacher's performance.

Furthermore, this study highlighted the teacher preparation program features that
contributed to teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-centered teaching style. The
implications of this study deepened our understanding of how teacher education
programs, including the college science courses that comprise a major portion of
prospective science teachers' backgrounds, may be improved to provide a more
appropriate education for high school chemistry teachers as well as other science

disciplines.

An Shervr'efl e! the Dissertation
The dissertation contains six chapters. Chapter one provides an introduction of

the study problem, the research questions, and a literature review.

20

Chapter two discusses the conceptual framework of the dissertation. In addition,
it describes the methodology of the dissertation. Also, this chapter introduces to the
reader the four new high school chemistry teachers and the teacher preparation programs
from which they graduated.

Chapter three presents the findings of teacher preparation programs at North
Global University (N GU), and the cases of two new high school chemistry teachers who
graduated from this program.

Chapter four presents the findings of teacher preparation programs at South
Global University (SGU), and the other two cases of new high school chemistry teachers
who graduated from this program.

Chapter five provides findings about the linkages among teachers' characteristics,
teacher education programs, teacher's knowledge and beliefs, and teacher's performance.
Also, this chapter includes section about the limitations of the study that influenced
findings.

Chapter six provides conclusions form this study and the major implications to
improve teacher preparation programs. This chapter includes the following sections:
review of the study; discussion of the research questions; implications of the findings; and

recommendations for further research.

21

CHAPTER 2

METHODOLOGY

This chapter reports on several topics which relate to the specific focus of this
study. It provides a description of the Salish project from which the new high school
teachers were chosen. It provides an overview about the theoretical framework of the
study. Finally, it describes the study design in order to answer the research questions.
Seh’sh I Researeh Project

This study was carried out in conjunction with the Salish I Research Project‘. The
Salish study, named “Linking Teacher Preparation Outcomes and New Teacher
Performance” was funded by the US. Department of Education and sponsored by the
Council of Scientific Society Presidents (CSSP)2 (Yager, 1993). The Salish I Research
Project was an exploratory study of new secondary science and mathematics teachers from

nine universities3 in the United States during their first three years of teaching (1993-

 

’ Salish I Project is funded by a grant from the US. Department of Education and the Office
of Educational Research and Improvement (Grant No. R168U30004). However, this study
was carried out in conjunction with this project, so any opinions, findings, and conclusions
expressed in this dissertation are those of the investigator and do not reflect the views of the
US Department of Education.

2 This information was adapted from John Tilloston’s dissertation, “A study of the links
between features of a science teacher preparation program and new teacher performance with
regard to constructivist teaching” (1997).

3 There were originally ten universities Research Sites participating in this project. However,
Norfolk State University withdrew during the second year of the study because the Faculty
Associate who coordinated its Research Site activities left the University and no replacement
could be found to continue. The other nine universities were: California Sate University,
Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Michigan State University, Purdue University, Texas A
& M University, University of Georgia, University of Iowa, University of Northern
Colorado, And University of South Florida. The Salish reports (1997) lists the institution
names, so anonymity of Salish institutions is not possible.

22

1996). The Salish Project had several goals. One of them was to uncover relationships
among teacher preparation and teacher and student outcomes. Unmasking these
relationships is intended to inform reform to improve secondary science teacher education
programs.

At each site samples of faculty, new teachers who were graduates of their
programs, and students in the new teachers' classes participated. Each of the Research
Sites selected 10 new teachers (NTs) who were graduates of the participating university
and in their first year of teaching in 1993-1994. These NTs comprised Cohort 1. The
same procedure was used to select Cohort 2 for the academic year 1994-1995. Some of
the institutions also added a Cohort 3 for the academic year 1995-1996, if they had
problems of either retention or recruitment of teachers in the first two cohorts. Dropout
rates were high due to the heavy demands placed upon NTs and the fact that some of the
NTs left teaching during the study.

In total, 175 NTs participated in the study, 16 of these NTs were chemistry
teachers (see Table 1) who had chemistry as a major/minor and/or who taught chemistry
for high school students during the course of the study. Some of new high school
chemistry teachers had more than one year of data (i.e., 2 or 3 years), so the total number

of chemistry teacher-years is 32.

D . I 1' E r!
Based on several meetings that I attended through Salish study, there was

consistent agreement among faculty members and research associates that the orientation

23

Tablel: List of All New High School Chemistry Teachers in the National Sample

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Institution & Teacher Video Summary of VP Note
ID # or Name" Portfolio (VP)
ASU208 No
ZUP 1 06 Yes Conceptual
NGU105 No Drop-out
NGU(Steve) Yes Teacher-centered &
Conceptual
NGU208 No
NGU(Terry) Yes Teacher-centered, with
some aspect of student-
centered
NGU3 23 No
PUAl 06 Yes Teacher-centered
PUA204 No
AMT5 ?? ?? ??
NGAlOl Yes Student-centered
SGU(Kathy) Yes Teacher-centered, with

some aspect of
conceptual and student-

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

centered
SGU(Don) Yes Conceptual & Student-
centered
YNC No One is a
Chemistry Teacher
J 0R1 07 No
J 0R2 106 Yes Conceptual & Student-
centered
J OR212 Yes Teacher-centered
J 0R2 14 No

 

of teacher education programs in all of the institutions that participated in Salish study is

to help new secondary science teachers to grasp the knowledge and skills that allow them

 

" All institution names or abbreviations, and teachers’ names are pseudonyms.
5After several phone calls and e-mail, I could not get information from this university,
whether they have chemistry teachers who participated 1n Salish project or not.
6During her videotaped lessons, she taught Algebra for 9th grade students, not science or
chemistry. So, she was excluded from the study.

24

to practice constructivist teaching. In other words, all teacher education programs in these
universities are designed to help their graduates to practice constructivist teaching.

For the purpose of this study, I selected two of these institutions that had new
high school chemistry teachers who demonstrated different teaching styles and who had
video portfolios. The two institutions were North Global University (NGU), and South
Global University (SGU).

The goals of teacher preparation programs at North Global University is to help
prospective secondary science teachers to acquire the knowledge and skills that are
essential for them to be a constructivist teachers (teacher education faculty and their
courses syllabi reflect this view). After the first Salish cohort, NGU overhauled its teacher
education. NGU was a member of the Holmes Group, and reshaped its program from a
four year program with a semester of student teaching to a five year program with a full-
year internship program (See Holmes Group, 1986).

Also, Steve, a new high school chemistry teachers who graduated from this
program believes that the philosophy of teacher education program at NGU is a
“constructivist-orientation.” When he was asked, “what was the philosophy of your
teacher education program related to science education and to science teaching?” He says:

“Um, to take science constructively and to make it something that the students

can use to better themselves and make themselves more functional in society

instead of making science a set of facts or set of knowledge that some people have
and some people don't, so it was kind of that everyone can learn science, everyone

can use science, the more that students can use science to solve problems the
better. That was kind of the idea that I got” (N TI, 1996). [emphasis added]

25

So, the message that Steve processed about the philosophy of his teacher education
programs is that science should be taught to ALL students, and all students are able to
learn, understand, and use science in a way that could help them solve problems. Thus,
Steve’s image about the philosophy of teacher education programs at NGU fits with the
mission of AAAS’s, “Science for All Americans” in order to help students become
“scientifically literate” and promote scientific literacy (AAAS: Science for All Americans,
1990). The only way to achieve this goal is by designing teacher education programs that
are structured in a way to teach for conceptual understanding.

Likewise, the teacher education program at SGU is also designed to support
prospective science teachers with knowledge and skills that help them to become
constructivist teachers. Tilloston (1997) in his study found that several features of science
education program at SGU were linked to constructivist teaching behaviors exhibited by
the new secondary science teachers. For example, he found that NTs displayed student-
centered learning activities in their science teaching which mirrored the use of these same
strategies in the SGU teacher education program. Also, NTs used many authentic
assessment strategies in their teaching that were advocated and implemented by SGU
program faculty in their courses.

Moreover, most of the faculty at this program believes that the primary goal of
this program is to prepare prospective science teachers to become constructivist teachers.
This view about the philosophy of the program was mentioned by the program director,

when he said that, “STS [science-technology-society viewpoints] and constructivism fit

26

together.” When the interviewer asked him to elaborate more about how those two things
play a part in the program in terms of philosophy of teaching science, he says:

“Taking advantage about what we know about learning, which they you have to
change your teaching of that if you want to use the word, ‘constructivist,’ teaching.
Although, the constructivist never really talk about teaching. STS to me is doing
two big things-it’s making it legitimate to use the human made role as a match as
well the natural world and it also is providing a social context for both study and
learning. I argue that science is a social activity. It’s what human beings do, there
is a society there and that science is a social activity because you can’t have science
by one person doing an experiment and being convinced by him or herself The
mere fact that science demands a community of people to agree with the
interpretation of nature makes it a very social activity. That to me are the two
aspects of STS that I think characterize it” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher
Education Faculty Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

The study aimed to investigate in depth how the teacher preparation program
features influence new high school chemistry teachers’ knowledge, beliefs, and
performance. More precisely, the study investigated how those program features in the
two institutions (i.e., both programs emphasize that prospective science teachers need to
acquire the knowledge and skills that could help them to teach for understanding) could
contribute to different teaching styles: teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-centered.

For the purpose of this study, the definitions of these terms are adopted from (The
Final Report of the Salish I Research Project, June 1997, P. 9):

Teacher-centered, defined as beliefs and actions in which the teacher: is the chief
conduit of most of the content knowledge to be transmitted to students, has
responsibility to organize and “deliver” content knowledge to students, stresses
the factual and descriptive nature of science (content and process), seldom
employs examples or connections in science, emphasizes the scientific methods
and rote learning, employs principally teacher-directed instructional methods with
minimal students’ input, allows students rarely or infrequently to generate

questions or procedures, permits few student-student interactions to occur,
focuses the majority of assessment on short answers. Typical teacher actions

27

include: a) presentation of information to students; b) use of textbooks, videos,
and other resources as a source of instructional content and learning activities; c)
drill and rehearsal of information in varied ways including review games that mimic
TV quiz programs like “Jeopardy”; and d) fact-centered tests with only small
emphasis on applications of information to evaluate student learning. For
example, teacher—centered teachers tend toward more factual content with very
little real world applications, a more limited repertoire of teaching strategies, more
student seat work, and tests that are fact-centered.

Conceptual, defined as those beliefs and actions in which the teacher emphasizes
the explanatory nature of science (content and processes are integrated, generates
examples and connections in science, employs many teacher-centered instructional
methods, focuses labs and demonstrations on concepts, seeks to change
unscientific ideas, encourages some student-student interactions and student-
initiated activity, encourages students’ questions to be procedural and conceptual.
Teachers in this category appear to place subject matter knowledge as the central
focus of their beliefs and actions instead of placing teaching or students at the
center. Content tends to be explanatory, organized around important ideas (key
concepts). For example, processes of science address “how we have come to
know” and other important ideas of science. Teaching strategies tend to be
teacher-centered, but also include hands-on activities, group work and discussion
as ways of helping students to clarify understanding of ideas. Conceptual teachers
tend to use frequent homework, quizzes, and tests to reinforce and check on
students’ understanding of important concepts.

Student-centered, defined as those beliefs and actions in which the teacher
stresses the nature of science as negotiated understanding and inquiry, shares the
construction of science examples and connections with students, employs more
student-centered instructional methods and investigations, focuses questions on
students’ ideas and instructional goals, focuses assessment on understanding and
applying ideas, encourages students’ questions to be conceptual, encourages
student-student interactions to focus on understanding, encourages students to
initiate activities and to contribute examples and analysis (inquiry-orientation).
Students gain knowledge through their own actions including hands-on activities,
group work, project work, and laboratory investigations. It is the students’
responsibility to acquire and process their own knowledge of science. The
teacher acts as the facilitator and guide in this activity. Teachers’ actions in this
category include: a) organizing activities for students to gain experiences that will
lead to learning, b) asking questions of students to guide them in learning from
activities, and c) using alternative forms of assessment to appraise students’
learning. In practice, there sometimes is a dissonance between student-centered

28

teachers’ interactions with students and their emphasis on content. Some
student-centered teachers provide “fun” activities for students, but fail to place
sufficient emphasis on science content to provide sound learning opportunities
for them.

The terms; Teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-centered are general
categories used to describe three teaching styles or teaching beliefs. One rich instrument
used to analyze videotapes to identify teaching style was the Secondary Teacher Analysis
Matrix (STAM-Science version) (Gallagher, & Parker, 1995). This instrument
differentiates teaching styles into six categories: Didactic, Transitional, Conceptual, Early
Constructivist, Experienced Constructivist, and Inquiry Constructivist.

The Teachers' Pedagogical Philosophy Interview instrument (TPPI) (Richardson,
& Simmons, 1994), which presents information about teachers' knowledge and beliefs, did
not have a special categorization like didactic, conceptual, constructivist, and etc., In order
to be coherent with other instruments, Richardson and Simmons developed a
categorization which includes Prescriptive, Didactic, Conceptual, and Constructivist
levels. In the Salish Project report we agreed on a common language for categorization of
teaching styles and beliefs. The categories were as follows: (a) teacher-centered
(prescriptive, didactic, and transitional), (b) conceptual, and (c) student-centered (early
constructivist, experienced constructivist, and inquiry constructivist).

In order to analyze teachers’ knowledge and beliefs, an elaborate coding scheme for
the Teachers’ Pedagogical Philosophy Interview was developed. The length of the

interview and the number of participants required that a scheme be developed to collapse

those codes so that analysis could involve all one hundred focus teachers and the TPPI

29

interviews they completed “Supercodes” were developed for this purpose at the
University of Georgia under the tight time constraints of the Salish Project. Sometimes,
these supercodes created some problems in analyzing teacher’s knowledge and beliefs for
two reasons.

The first problem is that these supercodes were forced to fit with the other
instruments’ conceptual framework (i.e., STAM). So, this caused some difficulties in
finding practical meaning for some categories. For example, these supercodes describe a
teacher who supports a state or mandated curricula as a teacher who has didactic teaching
beliefs, but in fact some of these curricula or state objectives aimed to help teachers to
teach for understanding. So, in this case, these teaching beliefs could be coded as an early
constructivist teaching beliefs in stead of didactic.

The second problem arises for any questions that were coded with an “other” code.
This led to classifying some of the teacher’s knowledge and beliefs under this category
without having any ideas about where that kind of belief belongs. For example, if a teacher
believes that he can decide when to move from one concept to another by asking students
to draw concept maps, he receives an “other” code. This kind of teaching beliefs could be
categorized as other, but in fact this kind of teaching beliefs suggests that this teachers is
focusing on students’ understanding and that teaching beliefs could be coded as early or
experienced constructivist teaching styles. So, the limits (i.e., a few practical codes were
defined for each question) of these codes for each question made the analysis of teacher’s

knowledge and beliefs difficult.

30

To overcome this problem in analyzing teacher’s knowledge and beliefs, I
discussed any teacher’s responses that I faced a problem with the supercodes with a
senior research associate who was involved in Salish project from the beginning and who
represented NGU in most of the Salish meetings. Some of these meetings were organized

to address issues related with study methodology and analysis.

Sample Selection

This study used these three general terms that describe teaching styles or beliefs,
teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-centered, to select the new high school
chemistry teachers from the national sample. I selected those new high school chemistry
teachers in their second year of teaching. My rationale for this selection is that teachers in
their first year of teaching almost always spend more time working overcome their
constraints (for example, time/opportunity, classroom management, students’ personal
life, and etc.). And the number of teachers who had three years set of data was very small.

From new high school chemistry teachers with two years of teaching experience I
selected those who had video portfolio data. The total number of those teachers is 9
(Teachers from AMT University are not included because they are not determined yet,
plus it is not allowed to watch these videotapes). Table 2 shows those teachers, the
institutions from which they were graduated, and their teaching style. Based on their
teaching style, I chose two teachers from the same institution who had different teaching
styles (i.e. Teacher-centered vs. Conceptual & student-centered). After a long process of

communication that I did with these institutions in order to get a significant data that fit

31

Table 2: New High School Chemistry Teachers Who Had Two Years of Experience
Across the National Sample and Their Teaching Styles

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Institution & Video Portfolio Summary of VP

Teacher ID # (VP)

ZUP 1 06 Yes Conceptual

NGU (Steve) * Yes Teacher-centered & Conceptual

NGU (Terry) * Yes Teacher-centered, with some aspect of
student-centered

PUAl 06 Yes Teacher-centered

NGA 1 0 1 Yes Student-centered

SGU (Kathy) * Yes Teacher-centered, with some aspect of
conceptual and student-centered

SGU (Don) * Yes Conceptual & Student-centered

JOR210 Yes Conceptual & Student-centered

J 0R2 1 2 Yes Teacher-centered

 

with the sampling criteria. I ended up with two institutions that each had two new high
school chemistry teachers. The total number of subjects in this study was 4 new high
school chemistry teachers with two years of teaching experience (those teachers are

identified with * by the end Of their pseudonyms, see Table 2).

North lobal Universi GU

The teacher preparation programs at NGU consist of two main parts: The science
content program which took place at the science disciplinary departments; and the teacher
education part which took place in the college of education. This program was selected in
Salish study because it was recognized as leading reform efforts in teacher preparation in
the United States. This included the implementation of a five-year, research-based teacher
certification program that culminates with a full-year internship. The internship and field

experience prior to that are designed to be “guided practice” for the teacher candidate. One

32

of the primary goals of NGU’s program is to certify teachers who are “well-tumed
novices.” These well-turned novices are hopefully well prepared to become constructivist
teachers.

From this program I selected two new high school chemistry teachers as case
studies in order to investigate the influences of teacher preparations programs features on
their performance, knowledge, and beliefs. Both teachers graduated in the same year with

the same major and minor7.

Terry Wheaton (a pseudonym) is a new high school chemistry teacher in her early
twenties. She earned her degree from NGU in 1994. She was a biology major and
chemistry minor. Her areas of teaching certification are in biology and chemistry. She
taught 9th grade general science to at-risk students. Her school was in a medium-sized city
with typical urban problems. Her students were at-risk and generally from lower SES
families.

Steve Brook (a pseudonym) is a new high school chemistry teacher in his early
twenties. He earned his degree from NGU in 1994. He was a biology major and chemistry
minor, and certified to teach in both areas. He taught 10'h grade biology and 11'" grade and
12'h grade chemistry. His school was in a small town where local employers include
agriculture, an insurance company headquarters in the nearby small city and a large

complex of state prisons.

 

7 NGU graduates in this study had one year of experience as an internship and the second
year of their teaching is a first year they got paid. So, in interpreting their data we need to
keep this point in our mind.

33

Soath Global Universig (SGU)

The teacher preparation programs at SGU also consists of two main parts: The
science content program which took place at the science disciplinary departments; and the
teacher education part which took place in the college of education and the science
education center. This program was selected in Salish study because one of easy access to
the site (Marshall & Rossman, 1989), and for the rich mix of the many processes,
programs, features, and experiences present when compared to several of the nine
institutions participating in the Salish I Research Project (Salish Program Description,
1994)

For the purpose of this study, I chose from this program two high school
chemistry teachers who demonstrated two different teaching styles in order to see the
influences of teacher preparation program on their knowledge, beliefs, and performance.
These two teachers graduated from the same teacher education program at SGU, but they
experienced two different science content programs. The two cases are:

Don Miller (a pseudonym) is a second year high school chemistry teacher in his
mid-twenties. In1994, he graduated from SGU with a biology major and
chemistry/physics a minor. His area of teaching certification are biology, chemistry,
physics, and general science. He taught 9th grade physical science at 5 small town in a
rural, mid-western community of 2,500 people.

Kathy Brown (a pseudonym) is a second year high school chemistry teacher in her
upper-thirties. She was a biology major and chemistry minor. She graduated with a

science degree in 1978 from a large mid-western university that was not SGU. Her areas

34

of certification are biology, chemistry, physics, and general science. She taught 9'h grade
physical science and college credit-biology at a small school in a small city of population

under 25,000.

D r e

This study used data from Salish I Research Project. More data about teachers’
characteristics were collected through e-mail interviews that occurred as l was writing the
dissertation, more than one year after the end of the Salish study. The following are the
specific domains investigated and the data sources which support these findings:

0 New teachers' characteristics which were investigated through the Salish Inventory
for Demographic Evaluation of Schools and Teacher Education Programs
(SIDESTEP). This instrument was a source of contextual and demographic data
related to each new teacher. More data about teachers’ characteristics were
collected through phone e-mail interviews.

0 Teacher preparation program features which were investigated through science and
teacher education faculty perceptions of the nature of study in science and teacher
education (Preservice Program Interview: Science Faculty Form and Teacher
Education Faculty Form), new teachers perceptions of the nature of their science
and teacher education study (Preservice Program Interview: New Teacher Form),
syllabus analysis form, and catalog description of teacher education program

requirements.

35

0 New teachers’ knowledge and beliefs which were measured using their responses
on the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES), the Teachers’
Pedagogical Philosophic Inventory (TPPI), and the New Teacher Interview (N TI);

0 Classroom performance of new high school chemistry teachers in their second year
of teaching which were investigated through the video portfolio which were
analyzed using STAM, and their students' responses on the Constructivist

Learning Environment Survey (CLES).

Data Analysis

This study used Salish methodology in coding and analyzing data in order to
describe the knowledge, beliefs, and performance of those four teachers. A case study
design was used to describe each teacher’s knowledge, beliefs, performance (Yin, 1984). In
addition to that the case studies covered each teacher’s background. It explained the kind
of subject matter that each teacher had experienced during his/her pre-service teacher
education program, the kind of chemistry training they had, the background in math and
physics they had, and the teacher education training they experienced.

Furthermore, this design would help to explore in depth the linkages among
different teacher preparation program features and new secondary science teacher’s
knowledge and beliefs, and their teaching. Using the case study design in this dissertation
is essential because of the richly detailed data from this study that includes surveys,

questionnaires, interviews, video-portfolios, and documents (Stake, 1995; Yin, 1984)

36

Teacher preparation programs were analyzed by using data from Preservice
Program interview for both science and science educators faculty, Syllabus Analysis Form,
and catalog description of teacher education program requirements. After there, data were
organized in a matrix, descriptions were developed of the features of different teacher
preparation programs.

TPPI supercodes were used to describe new chemistry teacher’s knowledge and
beliefs. By using these supercodes teachers’ knowledge and beliefs in the following
domains could be explained: teacher’s view of content; self as a teacher; teacher’s actions;
students’ actions; environment; context; diversity; and philosophy of teaching.

Video portfolios were used to analyze the teaching performance for each new high
school chemistry teacher. The video portfolio includes; three consecutive class period
videotaped for science lessons; classroom observation unit content journal and daily
journal. The Secondary Science Teacher Analysis Matrix (STAM) was used to analyze
teachers’ performance inside the classroom. This instrument helped me to differentiate
teaching style for each teacher into six categories (didactic, transitional, conceptual, early
constructivist, experience constructivist, and inquiry constructivist). By using STAM, the
teaching style for each teacher in the following domains could be explained: teacher’s
content, teacher’s actions, students’ actions, resources, and environment.

More information about teacher’s and his students’ beliefs can be identified by
using the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES). There are separate but
comparable forms for students and teacher. This instrument contains six sub scales:

personal relevance scale, scientific uncertainty scale, critical voice scale, shared control

37

scale, student negotiation scale, and attitude scale. However, CLES data for the two NGU
graduates very limited. As a result, CLES data were presented only for the two SGU
graduates.

The maximum score for each sub scale is 35 and the minimum is 7. A scale score of
35 meant that the students’/teacher responded “almost always” on each item. A scale of
28 meant the students’ average/teacher response to the item on that scale was “often.” A
scale score of 21 corresponded to response of “sometimes” and a scale score of 14, to a
response of “seldom.” Finally, a scale score of 7 meant that the student/teacher responded
“almost never” to each item, (Adapted from Salish, 1997, P. 7-8).

A cross case analysis was done to investigate in depth the relationships that may
exist among chemistry teachers' characteristics (i.e. the kind of training that each teacher
has), teacher education program features, chemistry teachers' knowledge and beliefs, and
chemistry teachers' performance. Also, cross case analysis could highlight which program
features or teachers’ characteristics contributed to teacher-centered, conceptual, or

student-centered teaching.

38

CHAPTER 3
TEA HER PREPARATI N PR GRAMS A RT L BAL IVER I
AND THE CASES OF TERRY 8; STEVE WHO GRADUATED
FROM THIS PROGRAM

This chapter consists of three interrelated sections. The first section focuses on
the teacher preparation programs at North Global University. This section divided into
two parts: Part (a) focuses on science content program which reported the analysis results
of the science content courses that new secondary science teachers completed in the
science disciplinary departments. Part (b) focuses on education courses that new
secondary science teachers experienced in the college of education, including general
education courses.

The second section focuses on the knowledge, beliefs, and performance of Terry,
a graduate of teacher preparation program at North Global University. Finally, the third

section focuses on another graduate of North Global’s program, Steve.

tin n 'N rth lb 1 niveri Teach rPr rai nP

In this section I described features of teacher preparation programs at North
Global University. Whenever teacher preparation programs mentioned, it means the two
main parts of this program: the science content program which took place within the
science departments; and the education component which took place in the College of
Education.

The following sources were used to collect data as part of the Salish study: a)
Data Sheet for describing formal program operated by institution; b) Preservice Program

Interview-Science Faculty Form; c) Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education

39

Faculty Form; d) Syllabus Analysis Form; and e) Preservice Program Interview-New
Teacher Interview Form. Data were transcribed, coded, and analyzed according to the
plan laid out by the Salish Project planners (Salish, 1997).

In order to gain a clear vision about teacher preparation program features at North
Global University I divided the analysis outcomes into two parts: 1) Science Content
Program, and 2) Education Program. The reasons for separation the two components lie
in the substantial differences between them. After initial analysis of these data, it was

evident that it would be appropriate to treat them as a two separate programs (Duggan-
Haas, 1998).
i e ontent Pro ram at N rth lob l niver i

Science content program features at North Global University were mainly
extracted from Steve’s and Terry’s responses on the Preservice Program Interview (New
Teacher Interview, NTI), Academic Program: Descriptions of courses, (1995-1997), and
Preservice Program Interview- Science Faculty Form. A summary of science content
program features is included in Table 3.
1 'r n

Prospective secondary science teachers are required to take their major/minor
courses in the science disciplines departments. Science majors are required to complete
41 -47 semester hours in their majors and 18—24 semester hours in their minors. Also,

they are required to take 5-8 semester hours in mathematics.

40

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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42

2. Course Objectives

Terry and Steve mentioned that transmission of factual content was the primary

purpose of the science courses (i.e., science courses were content oriented). Steve

described the objectives of these science courses, as he says:

“A typical science course, uh, included probably three days a week of lecture in
varied size lecture halls and may or may not have included a lab, it was pretty
content-intensive, um, trying to cover as much material as possible within a ten or
fifteen week period, depending on whether I was on semesters or terms” (NTI,
1996). [emphasis added]

This image of the science courses was confirmed by Jean (a pseudonym), who

was doing a research on the Chemistry 141 course, an introductory chemistry course that

offers by the Chemistry Department at North Global University. She says that:

“The course is designed to teach the traditional objectives of general chemistry:
stoichiometry, atomic structures, bonding, phase changes, gas laws, some basic
reaction types including acids and bases, basic thermodynamics, and equilibrium”
(Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

Even though this is the predominant image of science courses, Diane

(a pseudonym) who taught a lab for prospective secondary science teachers (ASC

409) in the College of Arts and Sciences sees that the objectives for her course is not

content oriented, but in fact it is to help new secondary science teachers to rethink about

the “stuff” they have learned (i.e., it is a reflection on their previous learning), as she

says:

“The objectives for the course are basically for students to rethink stuff they have
learned already, so nothing is new. At least it's not supposed to be, though that's
not always true. But it's pretty much old stuff they have had in introductory level
courses. Some of the chemistry goes beyond that, but it's not very complicated

43

stuff. So it's to rethink it, relearn it, put it together in some way in their heads”
(Preservice Program Interview—Science Faculty Form, 1996).

3. Instructional Strategies

The most common instructional strategies in these science courses were lectures,

recitations, and labs, as Terry says:

“Mostly lecture. Big huge lecture hall, and then there would be recitations, like,
once a week. And then labs. We would have, like a three hour lab or whatever,
that we'd have, so, mostly, if I was to succeed in a science class at Global I'd just

take really good notes” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]
Steve supported this picture, as did evidence from program description and
interview with the two faculty members in science.
4. Instructional Resources
Instructional resources in these courses were mostly textbooks, lab manuals,
equipment, and computer home work assignments. Steve in his NTI mentioned some of
these resources, as he says:
“Usually it was an overhead projector with some notes and the, uh, professor
discussing them, talking about them. It wasn't always like that. I had classes with
lab sections where a grad assistant would, we did discussions in the lab section or
the recitation, but usually it was lecture hall” (N TI, 1996).
In contrast to this image, Terry had an interesting biology class in her science
content program where students used many instructional resources, as she says:
“I had one biology class where we did a lot of stuff with the kingdoms and mostly
we looked at slides that were already prepared, and then there was one day where
we looked at squids. And I think we might have looked at a couple of other
things that day. Um, and then books, and then what else? As far as, like,
equipment that I had to buy, I think I just bought goggles and then I bought a

molecular model set for my organic chemistry class, cause I was really confitsed,
so the teacher suggested I get that” (NTI, 1996).

5. Methods of Assessment

Students in these classes were typically evaluated by using multiple choice tests.
In the lab, students were evaluated through lab write-ups. For example, Diane says, "We
do a lot of microbial biology and we have a lot of lab write-ups for that." Also, practical
exams were used in the science labs. In addition to that in Chemistry 141 students were
evaluated through the final exam, quizzes, and computer graded homework assignments
which consisted of numerical problems, true/false, and multiple choice questions.
6. Cooperative Learning

In science classes, Steve and Terry refer to their group work in the lab as a
cooperative learning. However, they worked in groups in lab (i.e., lab partner) but the
nature of that work in the lab usually does not reflect that instructors used cooperative
learning as an instructional strategy. For example, Steve had 40% of the lab time worked
with partner. Terry worked most of the time in the lab in groups. Also, students in
Diane's Class worked in groups, too. She thinks that working in groups is good and bad,
as she says:

“They work in groups. They do certainly all of the lab stuff in class in groups and

usually in groups of four, because that's what works out at the tables. That's good

and bad. The good part is that they work in groups, and the bad part is that they

do what we don't want students to do, and that is to split up the work so that not

everybody is doing what needs to be done. That's just something I need to help

them with. The independent projects, I encourage them to work in pairs, but it's

not a requirement. It turns out that some do it alone and some do it in pairs. I'd

say it comes out that slightly more work in pairs than do it alone” (Preservice
Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).

7. Course Audience

Both Steve and Terry took Diane's class (science lab for new secondary science

teachers), and that was the only class designed for preservice teachers in the science

45

disciplinary departments. In this class Diane tried to cover the four basic disciplines in
science: physics, chemistry, earth science, and biology. Because of her expertise in
biology and chemistry, "it tends to be more of that." In other words, based on her

expertise, she focused more in chemistry and biology.

8. Acme] Researeh

Neither Terry, nor Steve reported that they had an actual research experience in
their science courses. However, Terry mentioned that she did a project in her physical
chemistry class. Actually, she did not give any information about this project. Students
in Diane's class did independent research projects as she mentioned. However, both
Steve and Terry said they did not complete a research project but Diane says that it is part

of her course, which both of them completed. Jean mentioned that:

“None of the students in this course [chemistry 141] do research or work in labs.
However students in the equivalent honors course take a lab which consists of
doing independent projects. However they are done in a teaching lab', not a
research lab” (Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).

It appears that Terry and Steve did not view the projects in Diane’s class as research, in

the traditional sense.

9. Impertent experiences

Terry considered her physical chemistry class as an exceptional experience which
stands out in her mind. She thinks that this class was different because it was smaller

size, so people can have discussion. Furthermore, the instructor in her Opinion was an

 

' Jean refers here to Diane’s class, a lab for prospective secondary science teachers (ASC
409)

46

excellent chemistry instructor because he taught chemistry by using a lot of
demonstrations. Terry found that this class helped her to understand the chemistry

concepts, as well as influencing her teaching. As she says:

“Physical chemistry, my p-chem class, was really important because I kind of,
there was a lot of things I didn't understand about chemistry before I took that
class And I find myself now going back to that a lot, especially when I taught
chemistry this fall Like, when we talked about the gas laws and stuff, I took a lot
with me from that class” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

This class helped her not only to understand the content of the physical chemistry class

itself, but also to understand chemistry in more general:

“Yeah, cause chemistry always, I didn't do, chemistry I didn't do as good in my
classes a biology. I don't know, there's a couple reasons why, but that class made
me actually like chemistry. Before that I didn't even like it. I just kind of did it
because it was, I had to take chemistry for my biology major, so. And then, while
I was taking this class, I almost, changed my major to chemistry cause I thought
chemistry was so cool. Ha, ha” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

For Steve, the most influential science courses that stands in his mind was a

botany class. This class was an important one to him because it linked lab and lecture, as
he says:
“It seemed like the lab tied into the lecture part of the class instead of being
completely separate. They related to each other so you could, uh, you know, link

ideas between the two instead of in most science class I had, like chemistry and

that, the lecture portions and the lab portions seemed unrelated to me, totally
difl'erent” (NTI, 1996). [emphases added]

1 . t d n - I R lationshi
The nature of student-faculty relationships seemed to be informal. Steve

describes this relation as it “wasn't bad, I'd say most of the grad assistants and professors

47

were real open to discussion and talking to their students, for the most part.” Terry thinks
that, “most professors were helpful if you went to office hours!”
11. Fromm Structure/ Cohort

None of them were members of a cohort in science classes. In these science
classes the students were from many different majors. Pre-medical students were
dominant.
13_._l_’t_irrpose of Science Study

Steve and Terry mentioned that they had science as an area of study because they
want to enter into the medical field. As Steve says:

“. . .originally I started out in medical technology just to be pre-med. and uh, I had

noticed that a fair number of the students in my classes were um, pre-med. majors

so I'd say that was kind of the track I was in, anyway, even though I had switched
the first or second year over to education” NTI, 1996).

13. Philosophy of Science

Neither Diane nor the program description reported anything about the philosophy
of science program. However, Jean who had joint appointment within College of
Education and College of Natural Science, reported that science is recognized as a, “body
of knowledge.” She believes that science courses should promote “science literacy.”
Jean says:

“My personal interest in this and similar courses is a desire to promote science

literacy. A quarter of the students fail this course [chemistry 1 41] and many pass

without understanding much at all” (Preservice Program Interview-Science
Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

48

Therefore, according to Jean’s views, science courses need to be reorganized to
help college students to become scientifically literate, even students who major in science

(AAAS, 1998; AAAS, 1990; NRC, 1996).

Part D: Teacher Education Program at North Global University

Teacher education program features at North Global University were mainly
extracted from Steve’s and Terry’s responses on the Preservice Program Interview (New
Teacher Interview, NTI), Preservice Program Interview- Teacher Education Faculty
Form, Academic Programs: Descriptions of Courses (1995-1997), and some of the
Teacher education Courses Syllabi. A summary of teacher education program features is
included in Table 4.
l. Admission Requirements

At North Global University no undergraduate degree were required for admission
at teacher education program, yet 56 semester hours with a cumulative grade-point
average (GPA) of 2.5 or higher is required. Additional requirements were completion of
specific courses with a minimum grade. Interviews and writing samples were also

requiredz.

 

2Note: some program requirements have changed.

49

 

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52

2. Types of Certification Awarded

The program awards state certification in secondary (7-12), by subject matter. Students
typically receive dual certificates; that is they are certified in both their majors. The
college certifies over 20 secondary science teachers/year.

3, Semester Hog: Requirements

Science majors are required to complete 41-47 semester hours in their majors and
21 semester hours in a teaching minor. They are required to take 5-8 semester hours in
mathematics. There are 17 semester hours of required science methods courses. There
are 3 semester hours of required general methods courses. No semester hours are
required in history and philosophy of science courses, but it is offered as an elective
course.

There are no semester hours of required STS course work. There are 5-8 semester
hours of required psychology foundation courses. There are 5-8 semester hours of
required social foundation courses. There are 5-8 semester hours of required
multicultural education (diversity) courses. No semester hours are required in history of
science, philosophy of science, or in computers and related communications technology
courses for prospective secondary science teachers, technology and art in the nature of

science are embedded in several teacher education courses.

4. Program Purpose/Goals

Jack & J eff (pseudonyms) are professors in Teacher Education department at
North Global University. Jeff interviewed Jack through Salish-I Research Project by
using Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form (1996). The nature

of this interview was not a traditional interview between interviewer and interviewee, but

53

in fact, it was a conversation between two faculty members who are teaching on the same
department for a long period of time. This conversation took place in Jack's car while
they were going to lead a workshop for science teachers in a city lies in the northern part

of the state.

Jack & Jeff taught these courses: curriculum; methods; and student teaching in the
academic learning program, a former program in the department of teacher education.
The sequence of these courses in this program were mentioned by Jack, as he says "that
was winter of Junior year was the curriculum course; spring of the Junior Year was the
methods course followed by the Senior Year was student teaching." So, preservice

science teachers had one and half years of field experience in this program.

Since 1993 the structure of teacher education program has been changed into a
new program, which is referred to as the "Standard Program," a program with over two
years of field teaching experience. Jack and Jeff still teach science education courses in
this program from which Terry and Steve graduated. Both Terry and Steve had Jack and
other faculty as instructors. This program consists of the following courses: TE 301; TE

401; TE 402; TE 501, TE 502, TE 802; and TE 804.
Jack says that:

“The new program was, the group that you [Jeff] had was the very first group that
started the new program [it was in Fall 1993], so [instructor name) and [instructor
name] and I had them for 2 years. . .we had picked them up at the beginning of
their Senior year and continue with them through their intern year and this is a
model that I think in retrospect has become very power/ill” (Preservice Program
Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

54

The goals for TE 301 (Learners and Learning in Context) as mentioned on the

Description of courses (1995-1997) is to help prospective teachers understand :

“Role of social context and sociocultural background in learning. Natural and
socially constructed differences among learners. Relationship among subject-
specific knowledge, teaching and learning that subject, and the institutional and
communal context. Multiple literacies”

The course goals for TB 401 & TE 402 were included on the course syllabus

(Fall, 1993), by the instructors stated:

“Next Fall at this time you will be preparing to take over the science classes of
your own. You will be responsible for the well being and learning of the students
in those classes. Our goal for this course and for TB 402 is to prepare you for
those responsibilities. No one will expect you to be an accomplished
professional--that will take years--but we hope that you will be a "well-started
beginner," prepared to learn from your experiences as an intern and from your
work other interns, cooperating teachers, and members of the NGU faculty.
There is a lot you will have to learn to become a well-started beginner.”

TE 501 & TE 502 are the fall and spring components of a year long seminar
where interns from a school or group of schools share concerns and strategies related to
the contexts in which they teach. TB 501 and TE 502 included all secondary interns in
the school or small set of schools. The goals of these courses varied considerably by
instructor, more so than in the other internship year courses. Generally, the goals were to
offer support related to general concerns about teaching and to bring interns together to
share strategies related to those concerns. This course has recently been changed

significantly in structure.

55

The major goal for TB 802 & TB 804 is to continue to help prospective secondary
science teachers develop as an effective classroom teacher and prepare them to seek and

obtain a job in this profession. There are many goals shared with TB 501 and TB 502.

5. Course Objectives

General speaking, the objectives for TB courses are much more ambiguous, but it
is clear that they differ vastly in purpose from science courses, science courses are
content oriented, while TE courses vary in purposes. In general, the objectives of science
teacher education courses were addressed by Jeff. He responded to the Preservice
Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form (1996) by using the Coding Scheme
for Teacher Education Faculty Interviews and Course Syllabi (for more information see
Salish instrument Package & User’s guide, 1997). Jeff addressed most of the objectives

for TB classes. He coded his beliefs for TB courses objectives as follows:

0 Teacher as a reflective practitioner.

0 Teaching as a profession by sharing ideas, by discussing content relevant to teaching,
teacher organizations, professional issues (e.g., education reform, standards, legal
issues, etc.)

0 Psychology of teaching and learning especially conceptual and constructivist
teaching.

0 Testing, evaluation, and assessment in service to teaching and learning.
0 Creating a constructivist learning environment.

0 Instructional design, e.g., lesson /or unit planning.

0 Nature of science as developmental inquiry.

0 Computer applications in science teaching.

Steve shares his beliefs with Jeff that education is a profession, “I think a lot of

the time they meant to sell to us or give us the idea that education was a profession and

56

not just a, you know, some job that had good benefits.” Terry believes that diversity, and

teaching science for all students are the most common objectives for TB classes.

6. Instructional Strategies

In TE classes many instructional strategies were used, especially in the methods
courses. Instructors and students reported that they used lectures, group work,
cooperative learning, problem solving, discussion, projects, observations, videotapes

analysis, hands-on, labs, modeling, & technology-based.
7 ns tianes res

In science education courses many instructional resources were used such as State
Essential Goals & Objectives, National Science Education Standards (NRC, 1996),
Project 2061 Benchmarks, intemet, readings, lab manuals, textbooks, audio-visual,
computer software, course packets, & field experience guides. While, in the science
courses Terry and Steve reported that they used only a few resources like textbooks, lab

manuals, and computer sofiware.

8. Metheds of Assessment

The evaluation methods used in science education program varied. Jeff and Jack
used the following evaluation methods in their teaching: field assignments, portfolio,
reports, papers, working labs, essay exams, oral exams, home works, performance,
presentations, actual teaching, projects, lessons/unit plans, journals, & interviews. Steve
and Terry reported that they only experienced papers, interviews, and projects in their
science education program. On the other hand, they mostly experienced multiple choice

tests and lab reports in their science content courses.

57

9. Cooperative Learning

Teacher education faculty and prospective secondary science teachers agreed that
cooperative learning and small group work were the most common instructional
strategies in education courses. Terry indicated that they experienced cooperative
learning, “More often in my methods classes than my general classes. Every methods
class had at least part of the time in groups to model group work.” In contrast, both of
them only rarely experienced cooperative learning in science content courses. They had

this experience sometimes in the labs (i.e., lab partners).

10. Research Experience

Neither prospective secondary science teachers nor faculty at science education
program mentioned that they used actual student research in science education classes,
except Jeff who was just beginning to use this approach in his teaching. Instead, all of
them agreed that they did a lot of individual projects and/ or small group works in the
science education classes, especially in the methods courses.

11. The Internship

It is a one year internship. Prospective secondary science teachers are required to
go out to the field and teach for one year. The internship is both part of separate course
and incorporated into existing courses. Throughout the internship, students stay in one
placement, selected by the university, but with interviews between intern and
collaborating teacher. Collaborating teachers are sometimes screened.

12. Field Experiences
Terry and Steve valued their field experience. They appreciated the science

related TE courses because they were the first courses that provided opportunities to

58

teach the material they intended to teach. Teaching was mentioned as an important tool
that helped new secondary science teachers grasped the skills and habits of mind to

become an effective science classroom teacher.

Prospective secondary science teachers acquired valued experience on teaching
through their science education program. In TB 401 they had a chance to observe
teaching inside a real classroom. They had the opportunity to teach one unit in science in
TE402. In TE 501 & TE502, the internship year, they started to practice teaching
extensively with the help of mentor teacher. In TE 802 & TE 804, they did most of the
responsibilities of a teacher, but they were still prospective science teachers. They were
responsible to their own classes. I n this program prospective secondary science teachers
accumulated many classroom teaching experiences before they started their formal job as

a science teacher.

13. Supervision

The goal of supervision in teacher education program was to support prospective
secondary science teachers with a feedback about their student teaching. Usually, mentor
teachers and field instructors were responsible to supervise them. The nature and process
of supervision were described in Terry's response to a question on this matter, as she
says:

“I did my internship for one year at Elvira High School. I taught 4 biology

classes and co taught a Chemistry class. I was supervised every other week by

either a content area person or a general person. After supervision we discussed

my teaching and possible ways to improve my methods. We also discussed areas
in which I had improved or did well” (NTI, 1996).

Steve was supervised by Jack, a full professor, (instructor for many science

methods courses) and field instructor, as he says:

59

“Let's see. There's a field experience, I think Jack was kind of in charge of that,
but I don't know if that was really evaluated at all. I think of the one who graded
my papers that I wrote about the field experience, basically, ha, ha. And then my
internship year, my field instructor was Bonnie” (N TI, 1996).

14. Important Experiences

Terry and Steve recognized their TE courses that related to science (science
methods) as important experiences because courses were designed to help them how to

teach. The internship was also regarded as an important experience.

Both of them mentioned that their field experience and internship stand in their

mind as important experiences. Terry describes this experience as:

“The most useful part of my TE experiences were the classes taught with my
cooperating teacher. She was an inspiration for me from the start. Having the
ideas and insights of a current classroom teacher was by far the most important
and influential part of my experience” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

Also, Steve agreed with Terry that it is helpful to learn from teacher education
experiences and having a chance to talk to other science teachers, as he says:

“I'd say the field experience and the internship, I can't remember the numbers
now, what course numbers they were, um, some of the classes that we took right
along with our internship, um, the eight-o-whatever, um, some of those were
helpful. At times it was a little bit taxing because we were trying to figure out
how to be teachers and at that point we weren't too happy about it, I mean, to
write a paper or do a project or do a test with a grade or something like that. But,
some of them were helpful but, mostly they tried to give us a clue of what
teaching would be like outside of the classroom and like, uh, you know, what
you're going to have to do at staff meetings and, you know, education things
outside of the classroom....science related classes that we had, um, let us kind of,
and the most supportive thing there, I think, was that we got to talk to other
science teachers maybe our age or our internship level or other experienced
teachers, just to talk about things and share ideas and share information. Those
were helpful for that, I mean, that was good” (N TI, 1996). [emphasis added]

The importance of these courses comes from their content. In these courses,

instructors used Wilson’s, Shulman’s, and Richet’s (1987) terminology, who describe

6O

teaching as a cyclical process involving five steps: comprehension; transformation;
instruction; evaluation; & reflection. In order to master teaching, new secondary science
teachers need to be engaged in these dynamic cycle activities.

The first activity, comprehension, which will help new secondary science teachers
understand the content that they need for the purpose of teaching which is deeper and
more complex than just having specific subject matter knowledge.

The second activity, transformation, which will help new secondary science
teachers transform the content into forms that will make it understandable, interesting,
and meaningful for their students.

The third activity, instruction, which will help new secondary science teachers
promote their students' understanding by using different instructional strategies.

The fourth activity, evaluation, will help new secondary science teachers use
different ways to assess their students' understanding.

Finally, reflection will help them learn fi'om their experiences. Learning from
experience depends on the reflection that they do before, during, and afier teaching. If
they do it well, reflection leads to new comprehension, and they start a new cycle again.
So, according to this perspective, learning from experience is a dynamic and continuous
process.

These courses were designed to help new secondary science teachers to widen
their understanding to the science content for the purpose of teaching. Jack and his
colleagues set up the course in a way that would help them acquire specific teaching
strategies within a science discipline, as he says:

“The ways the class was set up, um, you know, we had the field instructors
coming in and so um, the first half hour of class we would meet in small groups

61

with the field instructors leading the small groups and, uh, then we switched over
to, uh, we had a set of subject matter groups and so, like, I worked with the, uh,
people who were teaching chemistry and physical science and, uh, you know that
was about a third. The other two thirds were about biology and . Urn, and within
the subject matter groups, um, we would talk about specific strategies and things
like that, within the small groups we talked about specific strategies” (Preservice
Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

Jack believes that his students' subject matter deficit comes because they do not

have, "really excellent teaching." He means that teaching in their science disciplinary

departments is not adequate. F urthermore, he thinks that:

“Teaching is just really diflerentfiom taking courses, even if they're well taught
courses and so this problem of transforming their subject matter knowledge is not
going to go away regardless of how much we improve the, uh, curriculum in the
colleges. There's no doubt that some of the deficiencies in the curriculum make it
worse, but um, I 'd think probably the way they make it worse is, uh, leaving them
kind of totally puzzled about why we would even ask them to do this, uh, as
opposed to recognizing the importance of being able to do this and not knowing
how. I'd say if we did a better job they would be in that latter position, they’d
recognize why it '3 important to do this and to know how. And this that, turned out
to be our focus on negotiation was writing objectives and a form, using form,
some form of “describe, explain, predict, control” and then some piece of the real
world. And, you know, they would say, “I want them to explain photosynthesis”
and go through this thing and, well, photosynthesis is a theoretical construct and
so, uh, use the concept of photosynthesis to explain X. what in the world is it that
photosynthesis explains, or helps you describe, predict, design, whatever. And,
uh that was a very important thing that they got better at over time and I think our
insistence that a decent unit had to have some objectives of that form, um, was
something that I would definitely do over again. It is productive, although they
resisted terribly” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form,
1996). [emphasis added]

As a result of subject matter deficit, prospective secondary science teachers would

not be able to move from the comprehension level to the reflecting and constructing

levels according to the state objectives. Jack elaborated more in this issue, and he adds

that:

62

“The way in which we engaged it was, um, requiring them to write objectives for
their unit who were in the general form of the state objectives and which, uh, and
the general form there is, uh, a verb, which is some form of “describe, explain,
predict, control,” and we found, the state objectives are divided into using “using,
reflecting, constructing.” Um, with this particular group, we really never got past
the "using." We would keep reminding them that they ought to be thinking about
reflecting and constructing but they never got to the point where they had the
mental space to do that” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education
Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

Even science discipline majors lack understanding to the big ideas in their

disciplines (i.e., chemistry). This was confirmed by Jean, as she says:

“This is not my program, but my dissatisfaction comes from working with
chemistry majors who choose to become secondary science teachers. They are
true chemistry majors with high grades, but their understanding often lacks a big
picture, an understanding of the big ideas” (Preservice Program Interview-Science
Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

1 . n -F l l tionshi

New secondary science teachers and their faculty agreed that they have an
informal relationship (i.e., personal). Steve says in the TE program “people knew each
other well enough.” Terry also confirms that, as she says: “We were on a first name basis
and had open communication.”
16. Professional Linkages

In teacher education program professional linkages are required and encouraged.
Prospective secondary science teachers were encouraged to have a membership in State
Science Teacher Association, NSTA, and other content area organizations. For example,
some prospective teachers are members in National Association of Biology Teachers
(N ABT). Jack in his class organized a session for them to present at the State Science

Teachers’ Association annual conference and encouraged all of them to go. Steve is a

63

member of NSTA and State Science Teachers' Association. Terry is a member of NABT

and State Science Teachers' Association.

17. Program Structure/ Teacher education Cohort

While cohorts do formally exist in TE, they are not seen as useful, functional or
purposeful. The cohorts are formal, but weak. Steve described the feeling of most
prospective secondary teachers when he asked, if he was a member of a student cohort,
he said yes, “but I did not know really what the whole idea between team one, team two,
and team three was.” Also, Jeffs perception of TE program coherence was, "not too
strong, but getting better."

18. Program Relationships

Both faculty groups from the TE department and the College of Arts and Science
admitted that the nature of the relationships between the faculty members on those two
programs (teacher education program and science content program) are informal, Diane
said: “it's very informal.” Furthermore, she thinks that Jean and other faculty members
at TE department are, “ a great bridge between the two groups.” Since Terry and Steve
completed their programs, some new structures have been developed to improve
communication and collaboration among faculty in the two colleges. While ties have
strengthened, there is much more work to be done.

Jean believes that the number of students in her chemistry class and diversity are
big obstacles to reform. On the other hand, Jack sees that a close coordination between
the two programs will not be able to happen, as he says:

“I think in a university the size of North Global, urn, you could hope to engender

more of a culture of teaching environment at the subject matter departments but I
think the idea that there would ever be close coordination between two large

departments like chemistry or biology and teacher education, um, it's hopeless.
It's just never going to happen“ (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education
Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

19. Prior Career Influences

Neither Terry nor Steve had prior career experiences.

20, Philosophy 91‘ Teaching

Jeff in his coding interview addressed most of the philosophy of teaching science
in teacher education program at NGU. His view about the philosophy of teacher
education program includes that secondary school students should be provided with
opportunities designed for them to construct their own knowledge, with teachers acting as
reflective practitioners who empower students as learners. Learning is recognized as an
interactive process while teaching involves interactive decision making. And that, “less
is more,” knowledge is a tool, not an end in itself. Diversity is valuable. Teachers should
stimulate thinking on the nature of science, and while content transmission is part of a
teacher’s job, it is only a small part. Teaching is a profession. Learning should be
relevant to the students. Assessment should be used to guide and modify instruction.

The broad scope of this philosophy may be confusing to teacher candidates as no singular
philosophy of teaching emerges from the NTI. Hands-on learning and using a variety of
ways to teach are often mentioned. However, the philosophy of teaching in teacher
education program is consistent with the contemporary reform agenda expressed in

National Science Education Standards (N CR, 1996) and Project 2061 (1996).

65

Section two: Terg’s Case Study

Terry Wheaton (a pseudonym) is a second year secondary science teacher in her
early twenties. She earned her degree from North Global University (also a pseudonym)
in 1994, which is one of the biggest research universities in the United States. She was a
biology major and chemistry minor. Her areas of teaching certification are biology and
chemistry.

Terry had about 15 hours of field experience at the middle /junior high school
level, and about 90 hours at the high school level before she began student teaching. Her
student teaching assignment was two biology and two chemistry classes at the high

school level (grades 9-12).

B r un

During her preservice education (teacher certification course work), Terry took
courses in biology, chemistry, social science, and language arts. Her chemistry training
and experience was one year-inorganic chemistry, one year-organic chemistry, one
semester-physical chemistry, and two years-chemistry lab (organic and inorganic).

Terry’s background in math and physics was math through calculus (3 years) and
one year of introductory physics with lab.

Her science-specific training in teacher education was two years of science
methods courses and the internship year which included science methods courses and
science methods practical experience in the classroom. Terry's training in general
education was three years of general education courses and the internship included

seminars and practical experience.

66

Teaching Context

She began teaching at Target High School (also a pseudonym) in 1995. This was
also the school where she student taught. Terry taught 9th grade students global science
for two hours during the day and then taught to the lower track students what was called
“Problem Solving Through Science” after school for three hours. She worked in a
program for at risk students, virtually all of whom could be classified as having special
needs. This created a situation where Terry taught the most difficult students in a
difficult school.

Her school was in an inner-city of population more than 100,000, which includes
low income families and area with high level of crime and drug use. 22% of the families
earned less than $15,000/year; 33% of the families earned between $15,001 and $34,999;
38% earned between $35,000 and $74,999; 4% earned $75,000 and $99,999 and 2%
earned more than $100,000. There were approximately 1700 students in the 9-12 high
school she works in, one of four public high schools in the city.

She had several ESL (English as a second language) students. The gender and
ethnic make-up of her classes was not filled in SIDESTEP questionnaire, but her classes
were quite diverse. In this questionnaire, she reported that she addressed gender equity
through equal treatment of boys and girls, equal use of male and female names in
assignments, and by studying famous female scientists. Her videotaped lessons indicated
that she treated them equally. For example, she assigned both boys and girls to activities
in the videotape lessons.

Like many new science teachers, Terry did not know the science budget (e. g., lab

equipment, textbooks, duplication, and media and sofiware) for her school. This

67

information would help new teachers to include more resources in their unit and lesson
plans to teach for conceptual understanding.

In her classroom, Terry had one computer, but she did not have access to a
computer lab. She had access to laser disc players, CD-ROMs, and a modem.

Like most other new teachers, beside teaching, Terry served as advisor to
extracurricular activities. She was a Science Olympiad coach and she was active in the
area high school rowing club. She spent approximately 15 hours per week preparing to
teach science.

Terry attended two state, regional or national science teacher conferences. She
presented at both of these conferences. She is a member of NBTA and State Science
Teachers’ Association.

In her questionnaire, Terry listed the following methods of assessment of student
understanding: group work, worksheets, discussion, essay/short answer, projects, oral
reports, homework, concept maps, multiple choice tests, quizzes from the curriculum, lab

write-ups, and participation.

' wl Belief
Terry's knowledge and beliefs were documented by using Teachers' Pedagogical
Philosophy Interview (TPPI). Her interview was audio taped, transcribed, coded, and
analyzed. HyperRESEARCH software was used in the process of coding and analysis.
Most of Terry’s knowledge and beliefs were coded as early constructivist in nature with
some aspects of didactic, conceptual, and experienced constructivist teaching. The

summary of the analysis process of her knowledge and beliefs is included in Table 5.

68

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Tera ‘s View of Content

The coded interview indicates that Terry’s views of teaching science content are
mostly didactic with some aspect of transitional and early constructivist.

In her questionnaire (SIDESTEP, 1996), Terry listed the top three goals in order of
importance that she holds for her students are:

0 “To gain confidence that they can succeed in learning science.”
0 “To see science as a way of thinking applicable to everyday.”

0 “To learn how to write in creative ways to solve problems.”

She believes that facts in science are bits of information that are true. Also, she
believes that laws are rules and regulations that always hold, while theories are not really
laws because they are not proven yet.

Terry views science as a way of inquiring about the world by using a defined
method. Her views of science reflect that as she says:

“Science to me is uh, basically inquiry into the world around you, trying to figure
things out around you, and doing it in a method that can be, in a way that other
people can repeat what you've done and doing it in the like, you know, going
through a method where you have a question and you try and figure out the
answer and then you decide from that answer where to go next. Basically trying
to figure out the world around you through a defined method” (TPPI Interview,
1996). [emphasis added]

For Terry, science is a method to discover the world (i.e., understanding the world

by using the scientific method) not as inquiry-oriented that helps students construct their

understanding and make sense of the real world.

She values problem solving in science and values the use of science to approach

environmental problems. “I guess my biggest thing is for them to know that they have an

70

effect on the world around them and that the world around them also affects them and
their quality of life.” She also believes in the usefulness of science, and she values the
effectiveness of science to solve real problem.

Self as a teacher

The coded interview indicates that Terry's view of herself as a teacher is mostly
that of an early constructivist with some didactic aspects.

She wants to work more on her discipline and classroom management.

“What happens is that other kids sufler, or they don't learn as much because, you

know, what's-his-face is climbing off the walls, and so I've got to kind of learn

how to deal with that. But it's really hard for me cause it conflicts with a lot of

things that I think are important as a teacher, and that's making everyone feel

good about being there” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]
According to the TPPI Super Codes, these teaching beliefs would place her in the
didactic domain in terms of her knowledge and beliefs. But I do not think that a teacher
who worries about her kids misbehaving makes her a didactic teacher. Such beliefs are
not particularly telling as to whether the teacher is didactic, conceptual or constructivist.
This quotation is telling about who Terry is as a teacher, but it does not directly
correspond to the primary set of labels used in this study.

She believes that her main strengths are self-attributes. She believes she has a
positive impact on her students. Also, she believes that it is important to know her
students and their learning needs. In the TPPI (1996) interview she said the following
about her main strengths:

“I'm pretty positive. And that's, um, something I work at, too. But that's, like, my

main thing that I try and get across to the kids is that, you know, we're all going to
be here everyday. We might as well enjoy the time while we're here.”

71

Also, Terry cares a lot about her students. In the TPPI (1996) interview, she says:
“I care a lot about the kids, and my main reason to be there is for them. And,
um, the goals that I have are mainly to see how many kids that I can get to be
successful in my classroom, and that's kind of what I work towards. And I try to
be fair, I try to be...still keep things under control anyway, but sometimes I think
I'm a little bit too nice which is what one of my kids said to me the other day.
Made me think about it, but...My main thing, though, is just, I mean 1, every time
I want to see how many kids can I get to pass my class because I, it just drives me
crazy to see a list where I've got all these E's at the bottom of it, you know. When
I do the little shuffle on my grades, put it in order by grade, Oh my God!”
[emphasis added]
Her view of a well organized classroom is one that, “runs without me... my
favorite thing is when I can sit there and look and see kids working together on stuff that

they're supposed to be working on” (TPPI, 1996).

These statements show that Terry cares about her students’ learning and wants
them to be successful in their learning, she has positive feedback on them, and she wants
her classroom to be run smoothly with students taking responsibility for the classroom
environment.

Teacher's Actions

The coded interview indicates that Terry's actions are didactic, transitional, early
constructivist, and experienced constructivist. But her knowledge and beliefs about her
actions in side the classroom suggest that her teaching style is predominantly that of an
early constructivist.

Terry likes certain aspects of the state mandated curriculum, but also has
considerable freedom in determining what to teach. Mainly, she decides what to teach
and what not to teach based on the state objectives book and school district objectives.

According to the TPPI super codes, these teaching beliefs would place her in the didactic

72

domain. But, in fact she does not want to follow these objectives as a mandated
curriculum, she wants to follow them in order to improve her students’ achievement in
the proficiency test. Mainly, this test is designed to assess students’ conceptual
understanding in science. Based on that, her teaching beliefs suggest her an early
constructivist teacher, because she wants to direct her teaching toward students’
understanding, as she says:

“Well, the [state objectives] book would probably be the biggest one. That

definitely influences the way I teach cause I use their objectives, 1 know my kids

are going to have to take that high school proficiency test ” (TPPI, 1996).

[emphasis added]

When Terry was asked, “In what ways do manipulate the educational
environment to maximize students understanding,” she said she manipulates both the
physical and emotional environment. The physical environment is manipulated by
moving desks so that they face each other rather than the front of the room. The
emotional environment is manipulated by creating a comfortable environment and
“...make them feel good about being there and wanting to be there and not dragging every
day going ‘Oh, I hate it. I hate this class!"'

Terry recognizes that students without motivation to learn and taking
responsibility about their learning inside the classroom are impediments for her teaching
the way she would like to teach. She attempts to overcome these constraints by praising
and rewarding students for doing their work by,

“...just going around and saying, you know, ‘Look at you, doing all your work.

That's great! And trying to say it loud enough so that the person next to him can

hear and so they'll say ‘Hey, Miss Wheaton, I'm doing my work, too” (TPPI
Interview, 1996).

73

If she believes students do not understand, she will not move onto the next
concept, “I try not to move on if there's too many kids that really don't know what I'm
wanting them to know.” She uses students’ understanding as criteria to move from one
concept to another (i.e., her teaching decisions are based on students’ understanding).
Students' Aetions

The coded interview indicates that Terry's students’ actions range from
transitional to early constructivist. Also, the most dominant teaching knowledge and
beliefs about her students’ actions are early constructivist.

She said, “...all my kids have special needs,” but she has not determined how best
to address these special needs. The only way that she deals with it is by, “trying to do
different ways of getting things...across to her students.” Terry uses different ways to
accommodate students with special needs. However, it is not explicit whether she wants
to make changes in curriculum covered, instructional strategies, or in her expectations.

Terry believes students can demonstrate their learning when they can answer a
question, be able to explain the material to other students and through social interactions,
or make applications. One of these ways of students understanding were mentioned
when she described how learning has occurred in her classroom, she said:

“I can think of one instance this year that was really cool. I had a project that

they had to do where they had to make a carnival energy game and they had to

show energy transformations in the game that they made, and there were all
different ones. But one of them that they made was the one where they have to do
that coordination thing...Jenny did it, too. You put this wire and you hook it up to
battery so that you complete the circuit with the one in your hand and you have to
go around it without touching it or a light bulb lights. And I had these two girls
working on it and they were, like, they were kind of frustrated with it and they
had trouble with it. But then, like, they got it all done and, um, they finally got it

to work, you know, they finally got the light bulb to light. And I really didn't
show them how to do it exactly, and they were like "We did it Miss Wheatonl",

74

you know, ha, ha. And, like, that was really cool cause they were excited about it
and I think when a kid gets excited about that, that's some thing that, you know,
they did that they didn't think they could do, which means to me that they learned
something that they didn't know before” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis
added]

She also believes that her students learn best in a variety of ways, including
listening, group work, and hands-on activities. She emphasizes the importance of using

different teaching strategies, as she says:

“For everybody to get all around different ways of getting information and
learning about stuff, but also because some kids are just better at different things.
Some kids are really good at learning about things just by hearing them. And I
don't know why, but some kids need that. But other kids are really good at
working with students and groups, 50...] like variety” (TPPI Interview, 1996).
[emphasis added]
All these teaching beliefs would reflect her being an early constructivist teacher in terms
of her knowledge and beliefs about students’ actions, because she emphasizes the need to
attend to students’ diverse ways of learning (i.e., individual learning, hands-on, groups
work).

Environment

Terry believes students like her class because of the teaching methods she uses
and the students in her class are active learners. She cites one of her student’s
explanation of the class:

“...on the first day [of the second semester] this one kid said, you know, 'What do

we do in here? What do we do in here?’ And this kid who had me last marking

period was like ’We're always doing stuff in here!’ He was like 'We're going to be
up doing...we're going to be up at those back tables all the time doing stuffl"

These teaching beliefs suggest that her classroom environment is student-

centered, because she believes that students should be active learners, and she emphasis

75

her ability to use different teaching methods (i.e., hands-on, work in groups) that engage
them in meaningful task. For example, in the videotaped lessons, Terry’s students

worked in groups to design commercials about energy transformations and applications.

Context

Terry recognizes the lack of student motivation and responsibility as impediments
to her teaching in the way she would like to. She thinks strongly that some of her
students' behaviors, especially high rates of absenteeism would affect her teaching as she
says:

“kids not showing up is so irritating. Because what I would like to be able to do,
um, is have the kids work with the same people every day, and be able to go back
to what we did yesterday every day, and that is just so frustrating when they don't
come. Um, that's probably one that really bothers me. And the other ones is
sometimes is just motivation. Like, trying to get the kids to want to do that stuff.
And I can, like, break my back trying to figure out something interesting and fun
to do and sometimes it just, you know, doesn't work Sometimes it does work and
it goes great, but, you know. My seventh hour it's pretty hard. Those guys have
had a long day. And to get them really fired up about something is not always
easy. So that's kind of an impediment, probably, is that. And then, like, um,
there's kind of a feeling, I think, right now, that students have that is very passive.
Um, like I said, there'll be kids that'll show up with nothing, just themselves.
Like, you know, "Do it to me," you know, ha, ha. Just, somehow, "Learn me the
stufif " like I 'm going to just throw it in their head or something, ha, ha” (TPPI
Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

Terry recognizes that students’ motivations and acceptance of responsibilities are
essential for students to learn. She recognizes that she needs to help her students to be
self motivated to involve them in the learning tasks.

Diversity

Again, Terry recognizes that, “...all my kids have special needs.” She is trying to

determine how to address these needs, but does not feel she is meeting them. “But I

really don't do anything so different for them, yet. I have to go to an IEPC [Individual

76

Education Plan Committee] meeting next week so maybe I'll answer that question
differently in the future.” Failure to address the needs of these students indicates that she
may be didactic in addressing diversity, or she just not know how to, however,
recognition and forward thinking may indicate that she is moving away from a didactic
position to an early constructivist.

Careful reading of her TPPI transcript indicate that Terry has a strong tendency
toward constructivist views about her classroom diversity because she is actively seeking
ways that will help her to deal with students with special needs. Her awareness about her
students learning suggests the beliefs of an early constructivist teacher.

Philosophy of Teaching

The coded interview indicates that Terry’s philosophy of teaching includes
aspects of conceptual and early constructivist teaching models.

She believes that a good learner can come to class with a pencil and a notebook.
Terry works hard to convince all her students to come to class with these basic
requirements. These may sound like a minimal expectations, but it is important to
remember that she deals primarily with a very high risk population of students, many of
whom have already dropped out and have re-enrolled to be in her class. Without first
meeting these minimal expectations, it is virtually impossible to exceed them.

Terry states several times that students demonstrate what they have learned or that
they understand a concept, “...when they can explain it to somebody else.” She also
believes this about her own understanding. Terry values science as a way to solve

problems and she wants her students to understand this as well,

77

“As far as science goes, I mean, the main thing I want them to know is that it's a

way of solving problems, and that they can use that way of solving problems all

the time” (TPPI, 1996).

For Terry, science is as a way to solve problems (i.e., science connects to the real world
as a way to go about solving problems).

Terry recognizes that she and her students learn in a variety of ways, (see source
material in students' actions section), “but my favorite way to do it [learn] is just to ask
other people.” Her interview makes repeated references to asking questions and
discussing as ways that she learns best. Six different citations are coded where she
mentions these methods of learning as important or useful.

She believes her teaching can be important in students’ lives, that, “having
positive experiences in my classroom carry over to how they feel about, you know,
themselves and how successful they can be,” and her ultimate goals in her teaching are
expressed when she says,

“The founding principle for me that underlies everything is trying to make kids

feel good about science, and them doing science, and them being students, and I

mean, ultimately, them being good people” (TPPI, 1996).

Clearly, the self-esteem of her students is important. This kind of teaching belief
would place her knowledge and beliefs about philosophy of teaching in the early

constructivist domain, because the center of her philosophy of teaching is students. She

wants them to be good learners. Moreover, she wants her students to be good citizens.

78

Terry's Teaehing Performance

During the three consecutive days that Terry was taped, she taught
"Transformations and Applications of Energy" to 9th grade students at Target High
School. In the first lesson she explained to the students the instructions of how to design
commercials about energy transformations and applications and what things should be
included in their commercials. After that students worked in groups of two or three from
the second half of the first lesson through the first half of the third lesson. On the last
half of the third lesson, students presented their works as a group to their classmates.
During the groups’ work, Terry was moving from one table to another to answer students'
questions or explain instructions to them.

These three consecutive videotaped lessons were analyzed by using Secondary
Teacher Analysis Matrix-Science Version (STAM). The STAM analysis of the video
portfolio for Terry's teaching performance is reported under several subtitles that include:
overview; teacher's content; teacher's actions; students' actions; resources; environment;
and other, (for more information about the categorization of Terry's teaching performance
see Table 6.

ervi
The characterization of Terry's teaching performance is very difficult because of the lack
of students' engagement in the classroom activities. The majority of her teaching
performance lies in the didactic and transitional domains, with some exceptions in the
early constructivist domain (i.e., students’ actions, teachers' method, decision making,
and students' work displayed). Most of the teaching time was spent in attempting to

control the class. Her difficulty in managing the class influenced her teaching. Her

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students’ behaviors, as she mentioned on the TPPI (1996) interview, were irritating and
clearly affected her teaching. So, her students’ behaviors were one of the limitations of
this study that influenced the analysis of her teaching performance.

Leacher's Content

Terry asked her students to create a commercial for energy transformations and its
applications. She gave them the instructions and explained what should be included on
that commercial. The commercial components were determined by Terry. She told the
students that the commercial should cover the following issues: energy source;
applications; information about this source of energy; damages, advantages, and
disadvantages; safe instructions; how it works; and whether this source is renewable or
not. She told her students that she was going to offer extra articles and books to support
them with more information about this topic.

Most of the content was presented by students, and tended to be descriptive. In a
few activities, examples and connections were integrated with the subject matter of
science. In one activity, students and teacher offered examples for energy sources (e.g.,
gas, water, trees, etc.). Also, in the commercial activity, students offered some examples
in their presentations. There were no exceptions because there were no explanations, just
some description from a very general prospective. No explicit mention was made of the

process or the history of science.

Te er' A
She used some student-centered methods in her teaching (working in groups,
group presentations, etc.). Labs, demonstrations, or hands-on were absent from her

teaching on these three days. Terr'y had little interaction about subject matter with her

81

students. Terry’s questions were not directed toward scientific knowledge, nor factual
information, most of the time was directed toward discipline. When she circulated to the
groups, Terry tried to clarify procedural issues to her students.

She used tests, quizzes, and journals to assess her students’ understanding. But,
the video did not show how she used the assessment information. Occasionally, she used
assessment to check her students’ scientific knowledge (for example, she was looking for
valid scientific knowledge). It was clear from group presentations that Terry accepted all
students’ ideas about subject matter. However, she did not raise any questions afier each
group presentation to push or stimulate her students thinking.

Students' Actions

Students in Terry’s class used some representation of ideas like displays (in their
commercials) and journals, some of them were reconfigurations of textbook information,
few were their own contributions. Mostly, students’ question focused on clarifying
procedures. Some questions asked for clarification of terminology or repeat of
information. Student-student interactions about subject matter were hard to observe
because of the sound quality on the tape. Based on the students’ group presentations, I
can speculate that there were some student-student interaction about procedure and some
about understanding. Although students did not initiate any activity, they volunteered a
few examples about energy applications, but connections to class activities were weak.
Usually, students ignored teacher’s procedures and showed confusion over procedure

because they were worried about social problems rather than academic problems related

to content.

82

Resources

Few resources were used such as journal and textbook. Also, she provided some
resources (i.e., articles and books) to support her students with more information that
would need in producing their commercials. Resources were related to the production of
commercial on transformations of energy and its applications. Mainly, these resources
were controlled by Terry. Most of Terry’s students were involved in the process of
videotaping through the three lessons. She assigned a student every ten-fifteen minutes
for this task. However, this action showed a degree of trust between Terry and her
students, but some students used this time to introduce his or her classmates to the
camera. These events plus other disciplinary issues shifted students from being on-task.
Epvirenment

The students in Terry’s class had a role in making decision about how to record
and design their commercial. Students used different ways to present their commercial.
For example, some groups used poster presentation, one group used dialog format in the
question/answer form, and another group told a story. Many decisions in this class were
made by Terry. There were few teaching aids displayed which were not related to
content (e.g. periodic table of the elements and skeleton), and some students’ posters that
some of them used in their group presentations. Jean one of Terry’s teacher education
instructors told me that Terry did not have her own classroom, she was moving from one
class to another, and transporting her materials on a cart.
m

The accuracy of content for Terry was largely unknown because she seldom

offered direct instruction. The quality of student-teacher interactions was often

83

cooperative, but mostly the focus of interaction was about procedure. Most of the time,
students were off-task. Terry spent time getting her students back to work on their
commercial. Much downtime was observed in her classroom. Transitions were poorly
organized and were not naturally smooth. For example, she spent ten minutes to collect
students’ journals.

Terry was not lecturing or portraying science as a body of facts. She was teaching
the most difficult students to teach in a high school plagued with discipline problems and
high absenteeism. She chose this class to be videotaped because she had a lot of
difficulties teaching science in this context. Choosing difficult classes did not appear to
be the norm in the national sample, however. Also, she chose these physics subjects
(energy transformations and applications) as a content for instruction, because she
realized that her background in physics and chemistry were not so good. So, she
attempted to have feedback from the Salish staff in order to improve her teaching in these

two science areas within a difficult school context.

gamma! of Terry’s Case

Terry is a new secondary science teacher in her early twenties. She earned her
degree from North Global University in 1994, which is one of the biggest research
universities in the United States. She was a biology major and chemistry minor. Her
areas of teaching certification are biology and chemistry.

She began teaching at Target High school in 1995. Terry taught 9th grade students
global science for two hours during the day and then taught the lower track students what

was called “Problem Solving Through Science” after school for three hours. She worked

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in a program for at risk students, virtually all of whom could be classified as having
special needs. Terr'y spent much time in her classroom on motivating and guiding
students to be involved on their learning tasks. It was clear from her videotaped lessons
that she was more concerned about classroom discipline more than any thing else.

Terry provides evidence that she had inconsistency among her knowledge, beliefs,
and performance. Most of Terry’s knowledge and beliefs turn out to be student-centered
in nature with some aspects of conceptual and teacher-centered. While, she displayed
teacher-centered teaching performance, with some exceptions in the student-centered
domain (students’ actions, teachers' method, decision making, and students' work
displayed). However, Terry did not display any conceptual teaching performance
through her three videotaped lessons, except in one activity that related to the
composition and formation of one of the energy sources, coal. Smnmary of the analysis

results for Terry’s knowledge, beliefs, and performance is included in Table 7.

Seetien flfhree: Steve's Case study

Steve Brook (a pseudonym) is a second year secondary science teacher in his
early twenties. He earned his degree from North Global University (also a pseudonym),
which is one of the largest research universities in the United States. He was a biology
major and chemistry minor, and is certified to teach in both areas.

Steve had about 90 hours of field experience in a high school before he became an
intern. During his internship, he taught half days in the first semester and full days in the
second semester. His student teaching assignment was eight biology classes for high

school level (9-12) in two semesters.

86

Data about his preservice education (teacher certification course work) is not
accessible because, currently, he is teaching English as a second language in Japan, so he
could not be interviewed through phone or e-mail. Steve and Terry3 both graduated from
North Global University in the same year, with the same major and minor, so it is likely
that they share a lot of their preservice education program. They were in many of the
same teacher education classes, and because the major and minor at NGU are clearly
delineated it is quite likely they shared many of their science content courses.

Steve taught tenth grade biology and eleventh and twelfth grade chemistry.
Teaching eontext

He began teaching at Kroger High School (also a pseudonym) in 1995. His
school was in a small town with a population 3,500. In this community 14% of the
families earned less than $15,000/year; 39% of the families earned between $15,001 and
$34,999; 43% earned between $35,000 and $74,999; 3% earned $75,000 and $99,999 and
1% earned more than $100,000. There are approximately 550 students in this 9-12 high
school.

In his classes, Steve had 53 males (50 Caucasian and 3 Hispanic or Latino) and 57
females (55 Caucasian and 2 Hispanic or Latino). Regardless of their gender, Steve
believed he treated all of his students with same respect. He said that, “he did not
differentiate among them with grading and questioning” (SIDESTEP, 1996). His
videotaped lessons confirmed that. For example, in the one lesson which included a

demonstration experiment, he asked questions of boys and girls equally (2 boys and 2

 

3 More information about Steve’s preservice education can be found in the previous section of
this chapter 3: Terry’s Case Study.

87

girls) and he treated them with the same respect.

Out of 110 students, Steve had 10 students with special needs; none of them had
English as a second language. Their needs were fulfilled by adapting assessment and
teaching styles. He also developed a good rapport with the students’ special education
teacher.

Like many new science teachers, Steve did not know the science budget (for
example, expendables, equipment, duplication, textbooks and other prints resources, and
media and software) for his school. This kind of information would be considered
essential for any science teacher, especially a new one, to figure out which resources are
available that would fit with their plans and help them to teach for conceptual
understanding.

In his classroom, Steve had no computers, but he had access to a computer lab
once a semester, and limited access to laser disc players, CD-ROMs, and a modem.

Like most other new teachers, besides teaching, Steve had other non-teaching

assignments. He was an athletic coach and class sponsor.

It is common that new teachers usually do not attend any professional conferences
or belong to any professional organizations. But in Steve's case, he attended and
presented at the state science teachers’ association conference. Moreover, Steve is a

member of NSTA and his state’s Science Teacher Association.

Steve's Knowledge and Beliefs

Steve's knowledge and beliefs were documented by using the Teachers'

Pedagogical Philosophy Interview (TPPI) developed by Salish. His interview was audio

88

taped, transcribed, coded, and analyzed. HyperRESEARCH software was used in the
process of coding and analysis in conjunction with codes and “supercodes” developed for
the Salish Project. Most of Steve's knowledge and beliefs were coded as conceptual,
early constructivist, and experienced constructivist teaching styles. He also holds some
aspects of didactic and transitional knowledge and beliefs about teaching. The summary
of the analysis results for Steve's knowledge and beliefs according to the TPPI
supercodes4 is included in Table 8.
T_eaLher's View of Content

The coded interview indicates that Steve's views of teaching science content are
mostly early constructivist with few aspects of transitional.

In his questionnaire (SIDESTEP, 1996), Steve listed the top three goals in order

of importance that he holds for his students:
0 “To become problem-solvers.”
0 “To learn how science can affect their lives, positively and negatively.”

0 “To become active members in today’s changing society.”

He wants his students to view science as fun and something that they can relate to
their lives. According to the TPPI super codes, these teaching beliefs would have
classified him as transitional teacher. However, a careful reading of Steve’s TPPI (1996)

transcript would raise questions about this conclusion, because he wants his students to

 

4 TPPI super codes matrix is in Salish Instrument Package & User’s Guide (1997, P. 64-
66).

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make connections between what they learned in side the classroom and the real world.
For example:

“Well a lot of what I do is to make science something that they can relate to, at

any rate, have a lot of ideas of science and things that are fun in the classroom,

and I try to bring it into my everyday life, like the digestive system or something.

You've all had digestive system failures, ha, ha. You know, what does that mean?

Or, I try to just make it so that it can relate. And sometimes I have to stretch it a

little bit, but, you know, I think if they can relate it to something that goes on in

everyday life.” [emphasis added]

So, for Steve one major goal of his teaching is to help students make connections
between science and everyday life activities (i.e., application of scientific ideas to the real
world).

Steve also believes that the most important science skill for his students to
understand by the end of the school year is problem solving. He believes that problem
solving is more important than content knowledge in either chemistry or biology. He
explained, “It's probably more important that they can solve a problem than... [have
certain] knowledge and skills.”

He believes that he can learn science best by teaching. Steve believes that
teaching helps him understand the content in depth, even the abstract concepts in
chemistry, as he says:

“I never have learned so much as when I had to teach something or talk to a group

of students or a whole class about it, you know. It's just the easiest way to really,

really get in depth. I mean, I never understood parts of chemistry before I

actually taught it, and it's starting to make sense” (TPPI, 1996).

He considers students' engagement in subject matter and his students’ ability to

make decisions to be the underlying principles of his science goals. All these teaching

beliefs provide evidence that he is an early constructivist teacher in terms of his

91

knowledge and beliefs about science content. These basic principles of science teaching
were mentioned in his TPPI (1996) transcript. He says:

“...engaging students in subject matter. Um, providing an atmosphere where the

students can, um, take a little responsibility upon themselves, learn how to be

responsible people, um, and letting them get to the point in their life where they
can make decisions for themselves which is one thing that I think a lot of students
need to work on, you know. They're not to the point where they can make
decisions on their own, and I think that's one of the main points that I like to strive
for, I don't profess to even be close to it..." [emphasis added]

Therefore, regarding content, Steve provides some evidence of beliefs that
represent transitional teaching (e. g., he wants his students to view science as fun) but the
major emphasis of his beliefs is early constructivist. Most of his beliefs in this domain
provide evidence that he holds an early constructivist teaching style (e.g., by connecting
science to real life applications, students are able to make their own decisions based on
their learning in science class; and to solve problems. By engaging students in subject
matter, Steve helps students to become active members in the society.

Self as a teacher

The coded interview indicates that Steve sees himself as an early constructivist
with some aspects of didactic teaching.

He wants to work more on his classroom management. Furthermore, he thinks
that most teachers can improve their classrooms and teaching by working on
management. According to the TPPI supercodes that concerned classroom management
and time management, his responses are coded as didactic. However, these are, in fact,
concerns of most teachers, and particularly of inexperienced teachers (Hall, 1979; Hall,

et. al, 1991).

His view of a well-organized classroom is one that is,

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“. . .running well, I'd say that most, I wouldn't say all, but most of the students are
engaged in an activity of some sort, um, you know. And I, I think sometimes
engagement can be them paying attention to what's going on, whether it be me or
another group presenting, but I think most of the time it's when they are actually
actively doing something in the classroom. And that doesn't mean that it's quiet
and it doesn't mean that it's um, there's not people running around doing things, it
means they're all actively engaged, or most of them are actively engaged” (TPPI,
1996)

Steve wants his classroom “running well” not for the sake of controlling the
classroom, but in fact, to have students actively engaged on their learning activities.
According to the above, Steve sees himself as a facilitator inside the classroom (i.e.,
organizing activities for students to gain experience that will lead to learning. This form
of teaching reflects “learning as a process” (Grunder, 1989), which would help students
develop conceptual understanding.

Steve believes that one of his main strengths as a teacher is his ability to
communicate with the students. Steve realizes that he has a positive effect on his
students through feedback from students and other people, as he says:

“. . .feedbackfiom students and, um, you know, um, feedback I get fiom other
people who say I’m doing a good job, that I've taught well, or if I've seen them in
my class that day, give them my token, or he said , uh, you know that was a great
lecture, it was a very interesting lecture” (TPPI, 1996). [emphasis added]

Teacher's Actions

The TPPI supercodes indicate that Steve's beliefs about teacher actions are diverse
including aspects of didactic, transitional, and early constructivist teaching.

When he was asked, “How do you decide what to teach and what not to teach?”

His response was with what he "felt comfortable with" in teaching the previous year (i.e.,

teaching biology during his internship). He says:

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“I really ended up gearing it towards things that I taught last year, because I was
more comfortable. Now, I did a lot of applications, and I switched things around,
but as far as biology goes, I um, went with what I felt comfortable with” (TPPI,

1996.) [emphasis added]

It is clear that Steve makes his decisions about what to teach based on his
confidence on specific subject mater that he taught last year, not on "students'-leaming".
These beliefs focus on "content-learning" as an orientation to make decisions about
teaching instead of on the integration between learning-content and students-leaming to
make these decisions (Anderson & et. al, 1998).

He believes that time is the only impediment that prevents him from
implementing his model of teaching and learning inside the classroom, “I think it's just
time. You can't talk to everyone, give everyone a one-on-one educational experience
without more time.” Again, these are concerns of many teachers, particularly
inexperienced teachers. Consider his response for how he can overcome this constraint.
He needs more time to know each individual in his classroom to give them individual
educational experience, as he says:

“Take as much time as I can to do that. I mean, I don't necessarily feel I do it

enough, because there's just other things I have get done, but you know, I usually

set aside a day during the marking period, you know, where I talk to each kid

individually about their grade, about their work, um, and then any other chance I

get in the lab or, you know, working on projects or something like that” (TPPI,

1996.). [emphasis added]

However, one could say, a didactic teacher needs more time to know his students.
But in Steve's case, he needs more time to, " give everyone [students] a one-on-one

educational experience." So he wants to use this time to assess students’ understanding

individually, in order to plan better and address students’ misconceptions in lessons.

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When he was asked, “In what ways do you manipulate the educational
environment to maximize student understanding?” He said,

“. . .change groups a lot.. I don't know...one day we've done a group activity, the

next day we, I try to say, OK, we'll go to an individual activity where they're

working on groups, too, something where they have a group project where they
have to present the group to other students, or something just to keep things
changed up so they don't get into ruts too much. So I try to do that as much as
possible” (TPPI, 1996). [emphasis added]

It is clear from this quote that Steve uses small groups as an instructional strategy
in his teaching. Thus, students have a chance to work on a project within their groups
and be able to present that project to their colleagues. His video taped lessons confirmed
that he used small group techniques often in his teaching (i.e., students were able to gain
knowledge through their own interaction, even though the nature of interaction was about
how to solve mathematical problems). Steve wants to change classroom format (e. g.,
group project and presentations) in order to maximize student learning.

In his questionnaire (SIDESTEP, 1996), Steve lists the following methods of
assessment of student understanding: group work, discussion, essay/short answer,

projects, homework, concept maps, student-developed protocols, quizzes from the

curriculum, and lab write-ups.

Therefore, regarding teaching actions, Steve provides some evidence of beliefs
that represent didactic (e.g., time is a constraint) and transitional teaching (i.e., make
teaching decisions based in what is comfortable to him). However, the major emphasis in
his beliefs about teacher actions is early constructivist (e.g., he needs more time to know

his students in order to offer individual educational experience).

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Smdents' Actions

The coded interview indicates that Steve's students’ actions are didactic,
conceptual, early constructivist, and experienced constructivist.

Steve believes that his students can learn best by giving them the right answer to
their questions, e.g., when student ask, "What's the answer to that question, Mr. Brook?"
Usually, he gave them the right answer from the beginning. But often he forced them to
think about it and come up with something. These teaching beliefs suggest that he holds
some didactic beliefs in terms of knowledge and beliefs about his students’ actions, but is
also trying out alternatives for encouraging them to generate ideas.

He accommodates students with special needs in his classroom by changing
expectations for students. Usually, Steve changes the testing format, e.g., “I do the best I
can to [accommodate students with special needs], on quizzes, tests, writing
assignments.” Also, he works with the special education teacher for these students.

Steve believes that his students, “understand a concept if they are able to ask
questions, explain, and connect concepts together.” Furthermore, he believes that his
students can understand a science concept through writing, as he says:

"If they can write about it, if they can, um, if they can go beyond just the rate

memorization of something and put a concept together with another concept or

put ideas together, and usually that comes out in writing” (TPPI, 1996). [emphasis
added]

Students are able to use different methods of representation (e.g., drawing,

concepts map, essay, etc.) to show their conceptual understanding. Indeed, Steve did that

three times in his videotaped lessons. He asked his students at the end of each lesson to

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write or draw a concept map for the most important chemical concepts that they learned
in that lesson.

He believes that learning is occurring in his classroom from students’ feedback,
such as, when his students say to him that he is, “doing a good job.” Also, he believes
that he can maximize students’ understanding by letting students work in groups. Steve
wants his students to view science as a discipline related to their everyday lives (i.e., the
real world).

Therefore, regarding students' actions, Steve holds few aspects of didactic (e.g., giving
students the right answer direct without giving them a wait time to think about the
answer) and experienced constructivist (i.e., using a variety of assessment methods).
Most of his beliefs about students' actions would be scattered between conceptual (e.g.,
students be able to connect concepts together) and early constructivist (e. g., students
work in groups, and students are able to make their own decisionss).

Environment

Steve believes his students like the class because of the knowledge they acquired
through their learning science, and the importance of science to their lives. According to
the TPPI supercodes these teaching beliefs would place him in the didactic domain. But
a careful reading of his TPPI (1996) transcript would suggest he is an early constructivist
teacher in terms of knowledge and beliefs about his classroom environment, as he says:

“We get to blow things up. That's all they want to do in chemistry. Um, well, I

had one student that said, you know, "Gosh, I've learned more in this class than I

did in all my other classes," and it was one student that I didn't, um, particularly

think was going to, ha, ha, succeed. I mean, she's doing well, but...l think if they
can take out of my classes some knowledge about themselves, especially in

 

5 For more explanation see teacher’s view of content domain for Steve.

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science, how is science important to their lives? Um, then that's an

accomplishment. . . " [emphasis added]

So, Steve believes it is important for his students to gain knowledge about themselves,
not just a pure content knowledge which might be isolated from themselves and the real
world out-side the school.

.C_ontex_t

The coded interview indicates that Steve's knowledge and beliefs about his
classroom context are mostly early constructivist with some aspects of didactic.

As noted in the Teacher’s Actions section above, he recognizes that time is the
only impediment to his teaching in the way he would like. Also, he believes that state
objectives influence his teaching (i.e., the level of flexibility of these objectives). He
thinks that, “they [the state objectives] are more flexible than some people make them out
to be.” He definitely believes that these objectives influence his teaching. In the state
where Steve taught, he used objectives which are based on the National Science
Education Standards (NRC, 1996). The state objectives that influence his teaching were
designed to integrate science content, the process of science and real world applications
of science.

Steve suggests overcoming his constraints in away that suggests early
constructivist teacher beliefs. He wants to offer extra time to meet with his students
individually in order to determine their learning needs. As noted above, he says, “So I
think it's just time. You can't talk to everyone, give everyone a one-on—one educational
experience without more time.” These teaching beliefs would suggest he is an early

constructivist teacher in terms of knowledge and beliefs about his classroom context,

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because he uses the state objectives. He believes he needs more time to assess students’
understanding in order to modify his plans and address students’ misconceptions in his
lessons.
Diversity
Steve believes that he can accommodate students with special needs in his
classroom by changing the testing format and collaborating in this with the special
education teacher in his school. These teaching beliefs would suggest he is a conceptual
teacher in terms of knowledge and beliefs about his classroom diversity. He tries to do
his best to accommodate their needs, as he says:
“I do the best... on quizzes, tests, writing assignments, you know, either go ahead
and ask them what they need, um. We have a great resource right here in the
school that, you know, you give her a test problem and she reads the question for

them and they feel real comfortable with it, so I do my best to ask them whether
they would prefer to take the test or an essay” (TPPI, 1996). [emphasis added]

Philosophy of Teaching

The coded interview indicates that Steve’s philosophy of teaching includes
aspects of didactic, conceptual, early constructivist, and experienced constructivist
teaching models.

Again, he believes that his students can learn science best if he provides them
with answers, but in some cases he forces them to think about ideas instead of just giving
them information. Giving students direct answers immediately without giving students
time to think about answers to their questions would reflect a didactic teaching style in
terms of his knowledge and beliefs about his philosophy of teaching. However, if he

“forces them to think about it, ” by using a conceptual understanding process, then as a

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conclusion, presents the current canonical scientific explanation (e.g., Roth, 1989), could
reflect a constructivist teaching style.

Steve believes that his students can understand science concepts when they are
able to, “ask questions above and beyond what has already been taught.” He thinks that,
“asking questions and designing something are valuable learning for them outside the
classroom environment.” These teaching beliefs suggest he is a conceptual teacher in
terms of his knowledge and beliefs about philosophy of teaching, because he is
encouraging students’ questions that are both procedural and conceptual.

He also believes that students' engagement in subject matter and their abilities to
make decisions are the primary goals of teaching. He says that learning is equal to
knowing, they are, “about the same.” Steve mentions his work with his mentor teacher in
the last year (his internship) as the best learning situation that he has ever experienced.
He learned many different things, as he says:

“It was last year working with a mentor teacher. I mean, not only was 1 learning

things to teach the class, I was learning fiom him about school, and about subject

matter, and about how to deal with kids and deal with parents and deal with
administrators and, um, so, it 's a one-on-one situation and I think when you have

a one-on-one situation, with someone and their expressed purpose is to help you,

then that's about the best situation” (TPPI, 1996). [emphasis added]

This learning experience influenced his way of demonstrating an effective
teaching/learning situation in his classroom. He wants to talk one-on-one with his
students in order to know more about their educational needs. All of these teaching
beliefs would place Steve's knowledge and beliefs about philosophy of teaching in the

early constructivist domain, because he values strategies to engage students with subject

matter.

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Steve believes that he can learn science best by teaching. He describes how the
activity of organizing science content so that he could teach it to his students caused him
to deepen his understandings and grasp connections that he had previously not
understood.

He thinks that writing skills are valuable learning for his students. He says:

“If they can go beyond just the rote memorization of something and put a concept

together with another concept or put ideas together, and usually that comes out in

writing” (TPPI, 1996).

These teaching beliefs would place him in the experienced constructivist domain
because he believes that writing can help students to develop conceptual understanding
by putting concepts or ideas in science together (i.e., analysis and synthesis process
skills).

Therefore, regarding philosophy of teaching, Steve provides evidence that
represent a wide range of beliefs. This includes didactic teaching. However, this is not a
major emphasis in his philosophy of teaching. His philosophy includes aspects of
conceptual teaching (e. g., students are able to ask procedural and conceptual questions,
and students are able to connect concepts together); early constructivist teaching (i.e.,
engaging students’ in subject matter); and experienced constructivist teaching (i.e., using
alternative forms of assessment to appraise students’ learning, using teaching to construct

learning).

hin rmanc
Steve’s video portfolio from his second year of teaching is of three consecutive

days when he taught “Gas Properties” in his chemistry class for 11th and 12th grade

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students at Kroger High School. The total number of students in his classroom was about
20. Most of them were Caucasian. Students were sitting individually in desks arranged
in rows. Some times they changed their seating while they were working in groups.

In the Salish Project, teachers chose which classes they wished to focus on.
Generally, researchers understood that teachers chose their “best” classes. This was not
the case for Steve. He chose his chemistry class because he wanted feedback on the class
he found most difficult to teach. This perceived difficulty stemmed primarily from a
feeling that his content knowledge was weaker in chemistry (his teaching minor) than in
biology (his teaching major).

In the first lesson, Steve began by collecting the homework and answering the
questions with the students. In the second half of the first lesson he asked the students to
work in groups in order to figure out a gas’s properties through relationships among
Pressure (P), Volume (V), Temperature (T), and the number of moles (n). In the second
lesson, he began by doing a chemical reaction as a demonstration to help students
discover some gas properties. He then asked them to explain what happened and why.
The last day was a review session to prepare his students for the quiz on the following
day. At the end of each session students were asked to write a journal about the most
important concepts that they learned in chemistry on that day. During the groups’ work,
Steve was moving from one group to another, answering students' questions and/or
explaining procedural and conceptual issues to them.

These three consecutive videotaped lessons were analyzed by using the Secondary
Teacher Analysis Matrix-Science Version (STAM). The analysis done using the STAM

video portfolio for Steve's teaching performance is reported under several subtitles:

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overview; teacher's content; teacher's actions; students' actions; resources; environment;
and other, (for more information about the categorization of Steve's teaching performance
see Table 9).
Overview

Steve's teaching performance is coded as transitional and conceptual, with some
aspect of didactic and few aspects of early constructivist. Most of the time he did not
reflect any deep understanding of the main concepts that related to the gas properties.
Instead, he spent the three consecutive classes (180 minutes) teaching how to use one
formula (PV = nRT), which he called it, “the magic formula.” One key element in his
teaching style is the degree of confidence with the subject matter, which he admits is low.
This was reflected by the fact that he did not use any type of molecular representations to
explain that gas pressure is a result of random collisions of moving particles of a gas with
the walls of the container. These collisions exert a force per unit area that we perceive as
gas pressure. This level of content knowledge in chemistry is considered basic
knowledge to promote conceptual understanding.

Teacher's Content

 

The structure of Steve's content is descriptive and explanatory with some aspect
of teacher and students negotiating understanding about teacher content.
He used only one equation (PV = nRT) during the three days of classes. One

might say this is good practice. It is consistent with TIMSS6 (1997) recommendations (i.

 

6 This stands for Third International Mathematics and Science Study (1997).

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104

(i. e., less but deeper content is better). But in fact, in Steve’s case he covered a lot of
concepts without clear connections among them from the scientific point of view. For
example, he covered gas pressure, volume, temperature, moles, collisions, fusion,
osmosis, ideal gas, molecules, and chemical reaction, during the three lessons.

The subject offers many everyday examples that could be connected to the
classroom work, but he stressed the mathematical (quantitative) aspect of the content (gas
law). In a few cases, he pointed to examples of the relationships among these physical
quantities. For example, he mentioned the reason for the cooling of an aerosol can after
using it. His explanation was, “when you use that container the gas pressure inside it will
decrease, so the temperature will decrease too.” According to his explanations for this
phenomenon, he did not make a clear connection among internal gas pressure, internal
gas temperature, and external temperature (atmosphere temperature) that interact to cause
the aerosol can to be cold. Also, he did not offer any explanation or ask his students for
reasons that cause the gas pressure inside the container to be less when you use the
container. So, Steve did not provide much evidence that he used any scientific models
. derived from the Kinetic-Molecular Theory of Gases to justify his explanation of this
phenomenon.

He did not present the limitation of the laws; the content is very specific for
“ideal” gases. He mentioned that all gases (i.e., ideal gases) under specific conditions
(P = 1 atrn, T= 273 °K, and n=1) have the same volume which equals 22.4L. However,
there is no such thing as an ideal gas that obeys the equation perfectly under all
circumstances; all real gases deviate slightly from the behavior predicted by the law

(McMurry & Fay, 1995). For example, the actual molar volume of a real gas ofien

105

differs slightly from the 22.414 L ideal volume (the actual volume of Argon is 22.09 L
under the same circumstances, for example.)

This topic presented opportunities for explaining the process of, and history of
ideas in science, but Steve did not integrate that in this class. Instead of explaining the
process and history of science, Steve wrote out the formula on the blackboard and
focused on the mathematical applications of that formula. Thus, he had the opportunity
to explain how these quantities are put together in one equation. In addition he could
have mentioned that this equation is derived from the Kinetic-Molecular Theory of
Gases, which combines Boyle's law (P will decrease as T increases, at constant 11 and T);
Charles’ law (V will increase as T increases, at constant 11 and P); Avogadro's law (V will
increase as n increases, at constant P and T); and Dalton's law (Pm, = P1 + P2 + ...).

At the end of each lesson, Steve asked his students to write a journal that reflected
their understanding of the main chemical concepts that they learned through that lesson.
Teacher's Actions

Steve used 3 or more methods that were teacher-centered. He demonstrated one
experiment, but it was not clearly related to the subject. The purpose of that experiment
was to prove how gas can effuse (effusion is the escape of a gas through a pinhole

without molecular collision). To produce a Carbon dioxide (C02) as a gas, he combined

baking soda (NaHCO3) with vinegar (CH3 COOH) according to this reaction:

NaHCO3 + CH3COOH => CH3COONa + C02 + H20

He used candles as indicators to show Graham's law (the rate of effusion of a gas
is inversely proportional to the square root of its molar mass). The demonstration was

exciting to the students but it was not connected to the ideal gas law. For Steve, the main

106

concern was to get the reaction done and form Carbon dioxide to put the candles out.
The students observed that demonstration, but they were not able to make connections
between the molar mass of a gas and rate of effusion from one side. Steve did not help
students understand how this demonstration is connected to the ideal gas law (e.g., the
relationship among the mass of a gas molecule, speed, pressure, and temperature) from
other side.

Steve interacted with students by showing them how to use the formula. His
questions were about the manipulation of the formula (e. g. uses of units). Questions were
about the how to apply the formula, and end of the chapter problems from the textbook.
Assessments were quizzes and homework. The uses of the assessments were for
checking knowledge (procedural skill for the manipulation of one formula).

His responses to students' ideas about subject matter were ofien not reported
through the use of the STAM, because Steve focused on the mathematical aspects of the
formula. Teaching in this way allowed students to be able to execute the mathematics
with or without understanding the underlying scientific concepts. Thus, most of the time
the nature of dialog between Steve and his students was about the correctness of the
mathematical procedure in order to get the right answer. In a few cases, he was seeking
to change students’ unscientific ideas (e.g., explain that the volume of the room is
constant while the amount of gas inside the room is variable.)

Students' Actions

Students represented their ideas in writing as reconfiguration of information

provided. Students engaged in procedural and conceptual questions, and they asked

questions about how to solve problems, i.e., how to apply the equation. Student-student

107

interactions about subject matter were rare; in a few cases, students interacted about the
correctness of their answers. Students rarely initiated any activity; sometimes they
offered some examples such as the application of carbon dioxide (e. g., fire extinguisher).
Students clearly accepted the teacher’s expectations about their learning content goals
(i.e., solve mathematical problems), activities (students participated in classroom
activities according to Steve’s instructions), and assessment (i.e., test performance;
students’ questions were about the exam content). Students’ understanding, in Steve’s
view, was demonstrated by solving mathematical problems based on the ideal gas law
formula and by getting the right answers.
Resources

Steve used multiple resources (i.e., textbook, blackboard, periodic table, and
laboratory materials) in his teaching. In general, the use of resources was related to the
content. Students looked at, but did not actively use resources. As an example, Steve did
the chemical reaction demonstration by himself without any help from students. Also, he
answered all the questions on the blackboard, and while he was writing, he asked students
about the right answer according to their homework. Usually he posted the right
answer’s numerical value and symbol for the questions that were assigned as a
homework. He controlled the access to these resources. He rarely involved students in
how and when to use these resources. For example, in the demonstration experiment,
students were not involved in lab work using equipment and materials.
Environment

Steve made all of the decisions about class activities (i.e., it was teacher-

dominated). However, the classroom had few attractive physical artifacts that related to

108

science such as pictures, displays, etc. There were some teaching aids displayed. Most
were not related to the content except the Periodic Table of the Elements. Students' work
displayed was similar for all students (i.e., worksheets or journals)

@121:

The videotapes did not provide significant information about group-interaction, or
to student-student interactions. The deeper conceptual knowledge for Steve in this topic
was low, the main indication for this impression comes from his teaching (he spent 180
minutes in doing applications to solve a one mathematical linear equation). The quality
of student-teacher interactions was cooperative, but mostly the focus of interaction was
about procedure and mathematical applications to the ideal gas law equation.

However, data provide only limited information about Steve’s conceptual
understanding or information on his lessons for teaching in this way. So, alternative
explanation could be that he believes this way of teaching was the most appropriate way
for his students to come to understand the relationships among pressure, volume,
temperature, and number of moles.

One could infer this from the low-level cognitive goals in the three lessons. Steve
did not emphasize a model of kinetic molecular motion, nor did he elicit or provide
explanations using such a model. Instead, the focus of the interaction was about
procedure and mathematical applications.

Student were always engaged and on-task, whether they were in small groups or
working individually. Facilities were flexible and he changed format or activities

frequently. Transitions were well organized and naturally smooth. His use of the time

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was well organized. However, he did not present the content in deeper conceptual terms

or include more real world applications (as he said he wanted to do).

Summag of Steve’s Case

Steve Brook is a second year secondary science teacher who graduated from
teacher preparation programs at North Global University. He taught tenth grade biology
and eleventh and twelfth grade chemistry at Kroger high school in a small town. Most of
his students were Caucasian.

Steve provides evidence that he had to some degree a consistency among his
knowledge, beliefs, and performance. His knowledge and beliefs turn out to be
conceptual and student-centered teaching styles with some aspects of teacher-centered.
While, his teaching performance through the videotaped lessons was scattered between
conceptual and teacher-centered with some aspects of student-centered. The summary of

the analysis results for Steve’s knowledge, beliefs, and performance is included in Table

10.

111

CHAPTER 4

Teaeher Preparation Programs at South filobel University and the Cases ef Den &
Kathy who Graduated from this Program

This chapter consists of three interrelated sections. The first section focuses on
the teacher preparation programs at South Global University. This section is divided into
two parts: Part (a) focuses on science content program which reported the analysis results
of the science content courses that new secondary science teachers completed in the
science disciplinary departments. Part (b) focuses on teacher education courses that new
secondary science teachers experienced in the college of education, including science
methods and general education courses.

The second section focuses on the knowledge, believes, and performance of Don,
a graduate from teacher education program at South Global University.

Finally, the third section focuses on Kathy’s knowledge, believes, and
performance who graduated from two different Universities. She graduated from teacher
education program at South Global University, but her degree in science was from

different university.

Section One: South Global University Teaeher Preparation Proggams

In this section I describe features of teacher preparation programs at South Global
University. Whenever teacher preparation programs are mentioned, it means both parts
of this program: Science content program which took place within the science discipline

departments; and teacher education program which is taught at the college of education,

112

this includes general courses, for example, educational psychology, and foundations of
education courses as well as courses in science methods.

The following sources were used to collect data: a) Data sheet for describing
formal program operated by institution; b) Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty
Form; c) Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form; (1) Syllabus
Analysis Form; and e) Preservice Program Interview-New Teacher Interview Form
(NTI). Data were transcribed, coded, and analyzed.

In order to gain a clear vision about teacher education program features at South
Global University I divide the analysis outcomes into two parts: 1) Science Content
Program, and 2) Teacher Education Program. The reasons for separation that is the two
components of teacher education program are different. After initial analysis to their
data, it was evident that it would be appropriate to treat them as two separate programs as

noted in Chapter 3.

P : cience ontent Pr ram t outh Gl bal niversi

Science content program features at South Global University were mainly
extracted from Don's responses on the Preservice Program Interview-New Teacher
Interview (N TI), Preservice Program Interview- Science Faculty Form (four faculty
interviews were analyzed, one for a general chemistry course instructor, college physics
instructor, astronomy instructor, and a general biology course instructor). Also, I used

science content course syllabi. A summary of science content program features is

included in Table 11.

113

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115

1. Semester Hour Requirement

New Secondary science teachers are required to complete at least 56 semester
hours of science including specific courses which provide certification in at least two
subjects and usually three. In Don’s case, who had a Biology major, and
Chemistry/physics as a minor took 8 semester hours in mathematics. He took 8 semester
hours in physics. Also, he took 29 semester hours in Biology, and 21 semester hours in
Chemistry.
2 o b’ 'v

Don as well as the science course’s instructors mentioned that the main objectives
of science courses were content oriented. Don says that, “it was pretty much , you know,
cram as much stuff in your brains as possible, I think a lot of memorization and, ah, facts
and formulas.” In addition to those objectives, the Modern Astronomy course instructor
added, “that simply to motivate them, that science is interesting.”

Furthermore, a chemistry instructor reported that one of the objectives of the

chemistry course was to focus on practical applications, as he says:

“So the next course is a more practical application which I think that students who
as they get through the beginning course, find that course to be somewhat a little
easier and then perhaps a little more interesting because it’s application oriented
and we ask people to understand what the solvating processes are, for example,
although the solvating process is no longer used, it still is a good example of
chemistry and have them understand what steel is, what alloys are, understand
what it means to have gold to a certain number of carats. It turns out to be
something that women students in this class usually wake up and say - I wonder
how many carats that gold is that I'm wearing on my finger. So the courses have
different functions and they have different messages” (Preservice Program
Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis added]

116

3. Instmctional Strategies

The most common instructional strategies in these science courses were lectures

and labs, as Don says:

“In the main content courses, not really that I can think of. I mean, it was pretty
much, you know, you went to your , ah, you went to your lecture and some of the
classes, you know, that if you were lucky you had some kind of a lab where you
went for may be a three or four lab or something, you can go and, ah, you know,
there was a lot of learning in there I think than probably, um, at the lectures”
(NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

In the astronomy class students were able to use the intemet connections to update

their information in astronomy discipline, as the instructor says:

“And the visuals in the last couple of years, we've upgraded so that we have direct
Internet connections so that the latest picture of Pluto, you know, released
yesterday, is actually incorporated seamlessly into the lecture tomorrow and I
think that gives not only dynamic pictures to look at but the sense that astronomy
is an ongoing thing. That some of the lectures, I could not tell you all about it at
the beginning of the semester because it had not been discovered yet” (Preservice
Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).
4. Instructional Resources
Textbooks, courses’ notes, toys, lab manuals, demonstrations, overhead visual
materials, software, CD ROM, and computer home work assignments were used as
resources for science instruction. Many of the science faculty members described the
textbooks that they used by, “quite excellent in what we are looking for in a textbook.”
However, the astronomy class instructor reported that, some instructors used the

textbooks without their test banks, because as one biology instructor mentioned, “ I do

not use their test banks. I think they are not very good.”

117

5. Methods of Assessment

Science courses largely used objective tests (multiple choice exams and short
essay). The using of these kind of tests as a tool to assess students understanding was
justified by many faculty members in the college of natural science. Most of them
referred to the big class size (the range between 350-1,100 students) in these introductory
classes.

This justification was reported by the biology course instructor as well as others.

She says:

“My problem with essay exams is when you read 400 essays, have you ever read
400 essays? When you get to the end you don't know whether your standards
have shifted or not. If I'd read this other one before I had coffee yesterday
morning would it be the same, you see. And I worry about that. I personally, and
then you add to that different people, then I feel the evaluation of those is so
uneven that it may be less fair to the student then a multiple choice which is well
crafted and I pride myself on being able to do that. I think some of the people
who think it's not as good a test aren't very good at it. That's all that's going on
there” (Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996). [emphasis
added]

Other evaluation methods were used in the science courses, but not common as
the objective tests. Instructors used homework, computer graded homework, projects,
and oral exam for make-up exams.

6. Cooperative Learning

In science classes cooperative learning techniques were often used in the
laboratories and recitations (review sections). Mostly students work in the lab with a
partner or small groups. Kathy reported that she used this technique in the advanced bio-

chem. lab.

118

Also, Don reported that he did not use cooperative learning in most of his science
classes except in the labs, as he says:
“In most classes not at all. Except for like in the labs, you know, when we had
classes that had labs. And really a lot of the science classes do have a lab that
goes along with it but, um, in the labs there would be quite a bit of cooperative
learning in a lab group or with a lab partner” (NTI, 1996).
7. Course Audience
Science courses were offered for all students and major students with only one
reporting a non-maj or course. As Don said, “I think for everybody...I think at SGU they

take all the same classes.” For example, college physics course which Don took was for

the pre-medical students.

8. Actual Research

All science instructors, except astronomy class instructor, reported that they did
not offer opportunities for their students to do research. There were many reasons for not
doing that. Some of them said the large number of students in each course. Another said,
“we do have formal courses students can sign for independent study.” While, some like
the chemistry instructor thinks that would not be happened unless your are a students in

the science program, as he says:

“If students are in the bachelors of science programs, then they have an
opportunity to do a research project. That would not be until their third or fourth
year normally” (Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).

So based on that, prospective science teachers through this program are not able

to experience actual research, because this opportunity is offer in the advance courses in

119

science and usually most of education major students do not take any of these courses

because they are not required in the program.

The modern astronomy class instructor believes that this is a suitable time for
them to start acting as researchers. His class was reported by Don as an exciting
experience for him. In this class the instructor offered his students three opportunities to
do actual research. When he was asked about the experiences outside of the lecture class,
“How often would you say students, whether it be through the labs or what not, have the
chance to work on actual research projects or in research facilities as part of their

experience in your course?” His response was:

“Three opportunities. One opportunity for all of the students is actually extra
credit. We have telescopes on the roof which you can look at with your own
eyeball and check up on what I've been saying and if you write a one page report
on it, you get extra credit points that are not insignificant kind of points. That, in
fact, used to be required and we've shifted it to extra credit just as far as the
attitude changed that this is a plus...Then within the labs we have two research
projects. The first half of the semester, one which is based on a visual
observations which is required of a wider variety of things and then the second
half of the semester, we're actually beginning it this week, the first lab is doing it
as we speak in fact, we're going to make use of a automated CCD camera we have
on the roof to present it, with what they are getting right now, with a live
demonstration. What's great is that with a CCD camera you can subtract out the
daytime sky and you can see stars right now in the middle of broad
daylight....Get some idea of how the whole system works in the first half of
today's lab and in the second half of today's lab they're going to be presented with
eight different options of types of research projects they could do as a class with it
which they then discuss, work together, and come to a class consensus lab-by-lab.
Each lab will make their own independent choice, what they want to do, then
design the project, how long will be expose it, the camera and so on, and put
together an observing file. Sometime over the next few weeks, pending on clear
weather, that observation will be made automatically in the evening when they're
not there and then towards the end of the semester they'll come back and look at
the data that have come from the project that they designed and analyze that using
the computers to get the rotation period of an asteroid or the motion of a comet or
whatever one they have chosen. So everyone gets to participate in that project”
(Preservice Program Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).

120

9. Important experience

Don mentioned that the college physics class was one of the two more favorite
science classes to him, because he liked the content, “There was a lot of math involved in
it and I like to figure out mathematical problems. Also, it had a lot of demonstrations.”
For the same reason he reported that he enjoyed the astronomy class. Don was helping
the instructor and the graduate teaching assistant in the astronomy class by setting up the
demonstrations, which the instructor had difficulty with. In addition to these two classes,
Don had an endocrinology class that combined between lecture and lab. He was doing
much better in the lab than the class because it, “was pretty interesting,” as he says:

“I enjoyed the lab a lot. We, um, dealt with rats every time and you would inject

rats with certain, um, hormone and then, you know, cut them open later to see

how it affected different things like the weights of tests or something like that.
that was pretty interesting, I liked that. It was kind of close to kind of research
kind of stufi' that was interesting” (N TI, 1996). [emphasis added]

Kathy on her science program liked cell biology, it was advanced biology. She
considered this class a the most interesting experience that she experienced in her science
program, because “it really linked together a lot of the principles of biology along with
the bio-chemistry and focused all on processes that take place inside body cells.”

10 tudent-F ul Rel tionshi

All faculty members and students agreed that the nature of student-faculty
relationships seemed to be informal. Yet, Don questioned this relationship by saying,
“they are cordial and they are nice... a lot of times you kind of wonder, you know, if they
really care whether someone's learning or not.” He explained his questioning by

claiming that science faculty invest most of their time in research first, then teaching. In

other words, they do not have time for their students.

121

11. Program Structure/ Cohort
Neither new secondary science teachers, nor faculty said that there was a cohort in
science classes. In those science classes most of the students were all majors, with
majority of audience from pre-medical students.
12, Purpose for Studying Science
Don started out as a science major because he liked math, but he was thinking
also about going into the medicine field. He took biology as a major, and got minors in
chemistry and physics. His major was intended to approach the medical field, “It would
be better on my resume as having a science major so I switched over to biology.” While,
he took his minors in chemistry and physics because he knows that these two science
disciplines need to have strong mathematics background in order to understand them,
which he loves. The excited story started, when he got married and had kids, as he says:
“By that time I started really looking at teaching. Teaching was something that
was in the back of my mind because 1 had enjoyed high school, I enjoyed teachers
and learning myself and so I thought it would be something that I would like to
share with other people. .. When it came down to the end I applied to the
graduate school for science education and I applied to medical school at the same
time and, ah, got accepted to graduate school and eventually after a couple of
rounds, I did not get into South Global Medical School and basically it was the
only one I applied to and I decided if I did not get into South Global Medical

School, and I decided I was not going to apply anywhere else. . . .I am happy with
that decision [being a teacher]” (NTI, 1996. [emphasis added]

Kathy also, had similar interests. She was, “mostly interested in a career of
medical technology.” She got a degree in biology as a good background that could fit
with teaching or medical technology so she would be able to switch between those to

fields.

122

13. Philosophy of Teaching Science

Science faculty either did not respond to or reported no philosophy of science
teaching. But the hidden philosophy was to focus on science content they can deliver that
to their students. Some of the science faculty believes in modeling connections between

science and society as part of the course content.

Part b: Teacher Education Program at South Global University

Teacher education program features at South Global University were mainly
extracted from Don and Kathy’s responses on the Preservice Program Interview-New
Teacher Interview (N TI), Preservice Program Interview- Teacher Education Faculty
Form. The following faculty interviews were analyzed: Director of science education
center, instructor of science teacher methods, instructor of foundations of education, and
instructor of the applied chemistry), and some of the Teacher education Courses Syllabi.

A summary of science education program features is included in Table 12.

Overview

Students, no more than 15 in a class, complete Methods 1, II, III and then student teaching
in sequence. They move through all four semesters as a cohort. Emphasis is on reading
of relevant research literature, discussion, and modeling by the instructor. Practicum
allow numerous opportunities to try out ideas, the majority of which are relating desired
student goals with research about the role of the teacher and the effect of Teacher
behavior on students. At the same time, teachers are considering how their classroom

climate reflects their understanding of the nature of science.

123

 

 

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126

Methods I: Meets for two and half hours a week plus four weeks in an elementary school.
Working with the elementary students forces prospective secondary teachers to expand
their repertoire of instructional strategies.

Methods 11: Meets for seven and half hours a week. In this seminar instructor and
students focus upon creating a rationale for teaching science. In this case a rationale is
defined as a statement of purpose, strategy, goals, and evaluation for the science teacher.
This rationale is developed during intensive seminar sessions. Students develop a set of
goals for science education, read a variety of research papers, and analyze their goals in
the light of what is known about the research on teaching, learning, and nature of science.
They examine discrepancies between goals and behavior by identifying problems and
cause-effect relationships. In this class, students have experience both in planning a
lesson and in teaching a complete secondary science class. To make it somewhat easier
on each student, students in teams of two or three prepare a lesson the will teach for three
days in a high school physical science class.

They then go to the school and teach for three days, being videotaped during the
lessons. After the teaching they return to the university where they critique their own
tapes, critique the tapes of all other students, and have their tape critiqued by the
instructor. Students spend about two weeks after this teaching revising their lessons and
prepare for another try. Then they return to the high school and teach the same lesson to
a different class. Again they are videotaped and critiqued.

The culminating moment in this second methods course occurs in a final
examination. When the student sits down individually with the instructor for an hour and

a half and defends a written rationale for teaching science at a particular level.

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Methods 111: Meets for four hours a week. This course emphasizes four aspect of teacher
education: One-to-one communication skills, techniques and materials for personalized
learning, adolescent cognitive psychology, and teacher self-evaluation. In the seminar,
students develop discrete one-to-one communication skills and ways of achieving
individual excellence. They examine materials, analyze teaching strategies, and practice
skills during a teaching internship. To insure that this seminar entails more than just
talking about education, a five-day-a-week, one-hour-per-day, clinical experience for 15
weeks is an integral part of this methods course.
1. Admission Requirements

Students can be admitted into this program by having minimum GPA of 2.5, at
least 30 semester hours of science completed and senior status.
2. Types of Certification Awarded

The scope of this program is to certify teachers in grade K-6 Basic Science,
General Science, Physical Science, Biology, Earth Science, Chemistry, And Physics.
This program granted degrees in the following majors: Undergraduates can major in
Science Education (a liberal arts degree), or complete a degree in any science department
as well as the state specified certification requirements. Graduates may earn a Masters of
Arts in Teaching degree while gaining certification. All programs require a minimum of
two full years of study, regardless of entering degrees or coursework.

st r ir nt

The requirements of this program are that all students should complete at least 56

semester hours of science including specific courses which provide certification in at

least two subjects and usually three. Coursework also includes two semesters of History

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and Philosophy of Science and two semesters of Applications of Science. General
Professional Education coursework includes; Issues in Education, Educational
Psychology, Human Relations for the Classroom Teacher, and Teaching the Exceptional
Learner. Science Education courses include: Methods I (elementary, 37 hours seminar,
60 hours Practicum), Methods 11 (K-12, 112 hours seminar, 6 days Practicum), Methods
111 (middle school, 60 hours seminar, 75 hours Practicum), and student teaching (30 hours
seminar, 16 weeks in both middle and high school with at least four teachers).
4, Program Purposes/Goals

The program goals are to develop analytical teachers who have a research-based
rationale for teaching, skills and competencies as a teacher, and experience with a broad
range of teachers, students, grade levels, and disciplines. Stress is placed on self-
evaluation, use of research in developing teaching strategies, and considering the entire
classroom climate.
5. Course Objectives

The objectives of general education courses were broad. Some of these objectives
were addressed on the “Foundations of Education” course, which was taught to all
education majors. This course was assigned for three semester credit hours. Course goals

and objectives according to the Syllabus Analysis were to:

0 provide an overview of educational theories and philosophies which reflects the
range of beliefs historically and established a foundation upon which students can
build their own philosophies.

0 encourage student to think about selected issues in education and develop their
own informed opinions about their impact on student as a teacher.

0 give students an opportunity to ask questions and offer opinions on variety of
educational topics.

0 share their experiences including the instructor as teachers.

0 discuss content relevant to student’s needs as an educator, and

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0 model a variety of teaching methods and strategies.

In science education courses, especially in methods (I, II, & 111), both instructors
and new secondary science teachers agreed that the objectives of these courses were to
have a research-based rationale for teaching, and the skills that need to implement that
rationale. In other words, the objectives for these courses were to present research-based
knowledge in science education and put things in practice (i.e., teaching). Kathy
mentioned some of these objectives in her NTI (1996), as she says:

“most of it was presenting, um, research-based knowledge of science education
and then, urn, putting that into practical "how to do" or "what to do" type of
information, how it applied to a classroom.”

For the applied chemistry instructor, one of the objectives was to change his
students' ideas about the nature of a chemistry lab. So, be aimed to change the concept of
chemistry lab from traditional lab that has been pretty much verification to a lab that
helps students link things together in order to build a concept. As he says:

“Chemistry lab has traditionally not allowed kids to try three more drops if two
are recommended or try a little stronger or a little weaker solution that really
stick, everybody since they're very nervously wringing their hands and my
solution is to pick labs where you can alter solutions or alter the strengths or
whatever or try with other things where there isn't really a hazard... instead of
doing pre-lab write-ups, they do a journal which focuses on what they're doing
right then and there, what happened, and why they think it happened to make this
transition between what they do, what they see, and explaining it which is, again,
even if you're doing a verification lab you still have to tie it back to what you
know. Or if you're developing a concept, you want to tie it to what you think is
happening so that you're building a concept” (Preservice Program Interview-
Science Faculty Form, 1996).

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6. Instructionfl Strategies

In general education courses, lecture was commonly used as an instructional
strategy, although small group, discussion, and cooperative learning were used. Science
education instructors used lots of discussion using readings and articles from journals,
actual teaching, cooperative and small groups, videotaping, projects, labs, and hands-on

activities.
7. Instructional Resources

In general education courses, textbooks, readings, and handouts were used by
instructors. In science education, many instructional resources were used such as
readings, lab manuals, lab activities, textbooks, audio-visual, computer sofiware, course

packs, SS & C assessment handbook, and written notes.
8. Methods of Assessment

A wider variety of assessment were used by science education faculty than
general education faculty. Science education faculty used authentic assessment such as
personal interview, portfolios, journals, projects, self evaluation, peer evaluation,
presentations, field trip, resource notebooks, and work plans. Actual
teaching/performance was also used. In the applied chemistry course, in addition to a

project paper, the instructor used multiple choice and short answer tests.

Don reported that in methods courses, students were involved in the evaluation
process. He valued this strategy because it helps him make a reflection on his
performance. For him being immersed in the evaluation it is a, “teaching tool,” as he

says:

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“It is good.... it forces you to reflect I guess, you know, and reflection is kind of an
important part in teaching and I think that is probably something they were
looking at when they did that kind of thing because you have to do it in and you
have to reflect back on what you have done and see if you have really met the
objectives you were supposed to and really are kind of forced to be real honest
with your self on what you have done and what you have met. In that way I think
that is probably, you know, a good teaching tool, you know, it is an evaluation
process but it is kind of a teaching tool in the same way” (N TI, 1996). [emphasis
added]

9. Cooperative Learning

Science education faculty and students agreed that cooperative learning and small
group work were more common instructional strategies in science education courses than

general education courses, especially in science education seminars. As Kathy says:

“Oftentimes we were assigned to do lesson plans that could be done with other
students. Um, some Practicum work- I remember in Methods III we went to (City

name) and taught for a few days and doing some group work with other science
education students” (NTI, 1996).

The director of science education center confirmed that all the science education seminars

have some sort of cooperative learning. He says:
“Maybe it is not exactly cooperative learning but it certainly is not like- here are
the rules and you take them out and make sure they are going on in the school.
But what is going on in the school is then brought in and sort of analyzed and

discussed” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form,
1996). [emphasis added]

10. Research Experience
Neither new secondary teachers nor faculty at science education program

mentioned that the used actual research in science education classes.

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11. The Internship

The internship in science education program was 150 hours during three
semesters prior to student teaching, all with supervision and seminars. Student teaching
was a full-time, 16 week program with at least 13 visits by Science Education Center
staff during the semester.

Prospective secondary science teachers were required to have teaching
experiences in different grade levels: elementary, ninth, and middle school/ junior high.
The elementary experiences were most frequently in kindergarten. The rationale of
asking those teachers to have teaching experience in the kindergarten level was to put
them in a situation that required them to think about the most appropriate instructional
strategies that fit with this level of students. For sure, lecturing in kindergarten will not
work. This rationale was explained by one of the methods courses instructor, who says:

“The real reason, however, is that if I took most of our students, who are pretty
well educated in the sciences, put them in a high school class here, they could
contentedly lecture about whatever they wanted and the good students in the
district would take notes placidly and not complain, by and large. If I put them in
a kindergarten class, nobody says, well, I want to go out and lecture. Instead they
say, "My God, what am I going to do?" And we say, "Well, what are your goals
for these students?" They say, "Well, gee, kindergarten, it's not going to be
astrophysics, they ought to think it's fun, interesting, exciting and they should say,
I can do science." "What do you know about how kindergarten learn?" "Well, it's
not by lecture, it's not by movies. They can't follow directions, they can't read.
Guess I'll do a lab activity. But the lab can't be anything very serious because
they can't follow directions. So I guess we'll do a lot of messing about. Give
them test tubes and they'll pour things and they'll think it's fun and neat." "And
how does that match up with what you know about how kids learn and how
teachers teach?" And they discover that it's compatible” (Preservice Program
Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form, 1996).

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12. Field Experiences

Neither Kathy nor Don had field experience in any general education courses.
However, their field experience in science education was at different grade levels and
schools, was informative, and included full range of activities from observing to planning
to teaching and assessing.

Don reported that his field experience in science education, “was actual field
experiences... that is why I got hired at my job because they felt I had lots of experiences
and I had not even been a teacher yet.”

Kathy's field experiences ranged from, “it was a real difficult semester,” to “it was
a good experience.” Kathy in her field experience observed a few hands-on activities and

she taught in middle school.

13. Supervision

Prospective secondary science teachers were supervised by science education
faculty and mentor teachers. For example, in student teaching there were at least 13
visits by Science Education Center staff during the semester. Some aspect of the
supervision nature was explained by the methods instructor, as he says:

“I get 50 hours from looking at the final interviews plus the time out in schools.

About 36 hours out in schools and about 14 hours in the interviews when the class

is small. When the class is full size you can add another 15 hours to that. In fact,

the final interview alone adds 1 1/2 hours a week, on average, to the instructional
load and I think it's fully worth it” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher

Education Faculty Form, 1996).

The goal of supervision in science education program was to support new

secondary science teachers with a feedback about their students teaching. As Kathy

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mentioned, “well, these are your good behaviors, these are behaviors you need to work
on, instead of doing this maybe you should try this.”
14. Important Experiences

Don and Kathy recognized their science education seminars as important
experiences. They believe that these courses were designed to teach them how to teach
the material they intended to teach. For Kathy it was student teaching. However, her
experience in methods III was not real growth for her because she was not assigned to a

good model teacher.

Don reported that, “methods were by far the most valuable of any of them.”
These courses gave him the chance to experience teaching in the real world (a school
setting). Also, he appreciated videotaping his own teaching because this would allow

him to make reflection on his teaching, for him it was a, “big learning style.”

15. Student-Faculty Relationships

New secondary science teachers and their faculty agreed that they have informal
relationships (i.e., personal & close). Don had a very close relationships with most of his
science education instructors, even “it was better I guess than maybe the science content
relationship.” Also, Kathy had personal relationships with her instructors in the general
education courses and science education courses, “I think both of them, um, I felt that,
um, the instructors knew me fairly well.”
1Q, Prefessienal Linkages

In science education program professional linkages are required in the methods
courses. New secondary science teachers were asked to have a membership in NSTA.

Kathy and Don have a membership in NSTA. In addition to that, Don is a member of

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several professional groups including: State-SEA, State-STA, NBA, and the local

education association.
17. Fromm Structure/ Teacher edugtion Cohort

Cohorts do formally exist in science education program. New secondary science
teachers recognized that were a cohort in their methods courses, as Don said, “we got to
work in small groups within our 15 and, you know, and I worked with all of them fairly
close.”

But from the faculty point of view, this cohort was not so strong, especially with
the professional courses, as the applied chemistry instructor says:

“I suppose there is some... .probably the most trouble I see with our program with

a lack of coherence is with the professional courses the kids have to take, the four

outside of the college... there is about 12 hours of coursework that really could be

making an impact if it were more clearly focused” (Preservice Program Interview-
Teacher Education Faculty Form, 1996).

From an administrative point of view, the science education director rated the
program coherence (science content, college of education, and science education) as, “I

would probably give it an overall of C+.”

18. Program Relationships

Both faculty groups from TE department and College of Natural Science admitted
that the nature of the relationships between the faculty members in those two programs
(science education program and science content program) were informal and not so
strong. As the director of science education program mentioned that this relationship, “It

could be stronger.”

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On the other side, the applied chemistry instructor still see this relationship as
informal and it is varies from year to year. Yet, even if it is informal, he thinks that this
relationship with physics department, “right now is pretty good,” the same with the

biology. He thinks chemistry is, “the hardest one.”

19, Prior Career Inflaences

Kathy had a prior career before being a teacher. She worked five years as a
medical technologist. Then she worked eight years in health care data processing doing a
lot of customer interactions and some very simple programming through customized
software for health care users. After that she returned to school and entered the science
education program at South Global University. Her prior career experience helped her to
deal with students and take care of them. She was able to benefit from this experience by
making connections between her background in (health care, human health, and diseases)

and teaching biology. She described this experience as helpful, as she says:

“... those years of experience indicated to me the importance of training
employees and in the, you know, education within the work place and also what
types of behaviors and skills make you a good employee. During the medical
technology years, I just got a lot of good background on the human anatomy of
physiology, you know, put into use. Um, I do not know, I learned a lot about
health care, and human health, and diseases the background in that... a lot of
times, when you teach biology, kids really like to hear about actual case studies.
They love that” (NTI, 1996).

29, Philesephy of Teaching

The philosophy of general education courses were to focus on different learning
styles and customer satisfaction (i.e., Total Quality Management). Both, science
education faculty and prospective secondary science teachers agreed that students should

understand science (i.e., nature of science) and how students understand it.

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The science education faculty reported largely that their philosophy was
constructivist and promoting reflective teaching. This phiIOSOphy was expressed
implicitly by the science education directors, as he says:

“I sometimes argue that the rationale for those application courses is that it is an

experience with STS, organized around problems and questions and if you are

teaching from the students’ perspective, if it is student-centered and that they're
using their prior knowledge and experience and whatever else, not only to identify
questions but to point out where they're going to find answers, what resources
they're going to use and what they're going to do about it, seems to me that those
aspects of teaching that use student constructions already there and hopefully are
designed in a way to change their constructions, their interpretation of meaning,
that those are the two things. Taking advantage about what we know about
learning, which you have to change your teaching of that if you want to use the

word constructivist teaching. Although, the constructivists never really talk about
teaching” (Preservice Program Interview-Teacher Education Faculty Form, 1996).

Section two: Don’s Case Study

Don Miller (a pseudonym) is a second year secondary science teacher in his mid-
twenties. In 1994, he graduated from South Global University with a biology major and
chemistry/ physics as a minor. He is certified to teach in all science disciplines. He had
more than 100 hours of field experience before he began student teaching. His student
teaching assignment was 2 Life science, 2 Earth science, and 2 General science for the
middle school level (6-8). Also, he taught one Physical science courses to high school
level students (9-12).

Background

During his preservice teacher education course work, Don took introductory

courses in biology and chemistry, and the associated labs. In addition to that, he took

courses in organic chemistry (1 & II), and organic chemistry lab. In biology, he took

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fundamental genetics, biochemical molecular biology, fundamental genetics lab, cell
physiology, evolution, and honors lab research in biology.

Don's background in physics and mathematics was 8 semester hours in
mathematics (calculus I & II), and 8 semester hours in physics (college physics I & II).

His pedagogical training in teacher education was through the MAT program at
South Global University. He took science methods courses (I, II, and III). In addition to
that, he took courses in applied physical sciences, applied biology sciences, science
history perspectives, meaning of science, elementary special subject student teaching,
general laboratory, general astronomy, and lab Practicum for secondary science teachers
(I & II).

Don’s pedagogical background in education was from College of Education
courses that he took through his teacher education program. Don took courses in child
development, educational psychology, human relations, and issues in education.
Teaching context

Don began teaching at Olan Mills High School (also a pseudonym) in 1994 after
graduating from the teacher education program. He taught 9th grade physical science at a
small school in a rural, mid-western community of 2,500 people. Approximately, 95% of
all local community residents in Olan Mills High School earned incomes of less than
$40,000/year. The entire Olan Mills High School system consists of about 1500 students
in grade K-12.

Don's teaching load consisted of six periods of 9th grade physical science each
day. As is the case with most new teachers, he was assigned to several non-teaching

duties including: coaching, faculty committee work, class advisorship, club sponsorship,

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study hall duty, lunchroom duty, hall duty, detention monitor on a rotating basis, and
homeroom supervising.

Most of his students are Caucasian. He had 60 male students and 68 female
students. Don had about 20-30 students in his classes who were classified as having
special needs. He usually addressed their needs by using sign-up schedules for before
and after school and during planning periods for tutoring sessions. He used mandatory
once a week meeting for students with grades of D & F, and points were given for
students’ desire to improve. Sometimes, he sent his students with special needs to the
Resource Center.

Don had no computer in his classroom, but he had access to the computer lab
once a month. Usually, he used this lab for writing inputs and papers. In addition, he had
access to the laser disc players, CD-ROMs, and a modem.

Don used Physical Science, first edition, (1993) as a textbook in his class. This
textbook comes with tests, worksheets, quizzes, activities, reviews, and other
supplementary resources. He usually spent 15-20 hours per week preparing to teach
science.

In his questionnaire (SIDESTEP, 1996), Don lists the following methods of
assessment to assess his students' understanding in science including: group work,
worksheets, discussion with students, essay/short answer, projects, oral reports,
homework, lab write-ups, and performance exams (students were asked to do
demonstrations in front of him).

Don is a member of several professional groups, including: NSTA, NEA, the state

science teachers' association, and the state and local teachers' union. In the past year, he

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attended one national science teacher conference, but he did not present there. Moreover,

Don assisted his wife with advising pep club and cheerleading.

Don's Knowledge and Beliefs

Don's knowledge and beliefs are documented by using Teachers' Pedagogical
Philosophy Interview (TPPI, second and third year teacher, 1996). His interview was
audiotaped, transcribed, coded, and analyzed. HyperRESEARCH software was used on
the process of coding and analysis. Most of his knowledge and beliefs can be described
as early constructivist teaching style in most of the TPPI categories, except in teacher’s
knowledge and beliefs about view of science content. In this category, he holds a
conceptual teaching style as dominant. Also, Don holds some aspects of didactic,
transitional, conceptual, and experienced constructivist knowledge and beliefs about
teaching. The summary of the analysis results is included in Table 13.
Dan’s Views of Content

The coded interview indicates that Don's views of teaching science content are
mostly conceptual with some aspects of transitional.
He is a physical science teacher for 9th grade. He believes that the most important
science concepts for his students to understand by the end of the school year are sound,
light, fluids, forces, and Newton's Laws. In the first semester he taught general chemistry
concepts, his student did a big project and they built a gigantic periodic table. In his class
he tried to cover the most important basic general background in science because he

wants to give his students the opportunity, “to choose what area they like the most.”

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In his questionnaire (SIDESTEP, 1996), Don listed the top three goals in order of

importance that he holds for his students:

“To realize how science influence nearly every aspect of their lives and that it is an
ever changing field with “truth” being the best explanation at the time.

“To be able to begin to think logically and work problems out step by step. I also
would like my students to be able express themselves or explain their thoughts better
on paper.
“To have a working knowledge of concepts not to just recall but to apply.”
He wants his students to think that science applies to their life,

“But it is important for me. I want them to be able at the end of the year to say,

0k, this concept explained why this happened, this explained why this happened.
um, and I see how science applies to my life” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis

added]

According to the TPPI supercodes this suggests that he holds some aspects of
transitional teaching beliefs, because he mentioned that, “science applies to my life.”
However, he believes that his students are able to make sense to the world around them
by using the scientific knowledge. As a result of using this knowledge, students are able
to make that connection between main ideas in science and the real world. Don wants his
students to understand what the main concepts of science are and to be able to use this
knowledge to explain things. Moreover, he wants them, “to have a working knowledge
of concepts not to just recall but to apply.”

Self as a teacher

TPPI supercodes indicate that Don's self as a teacher is both transitional and early

constructivist, but his early constructivist knowledge and beliefs about himself as a

teacher were dominant.

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Don would like to organize his classroom to let the students move around,
because he wants to change his classroom physical environment to facilitate learning.

Don describes a well-organized classroom as:

“I like it so that students feel they can move around, you know, when I guess they

are supposed to be but, um, if you walk in it will be kind of, ah, it will not be the

quietest room. It is kind of loud but hopefully not to the point where it is being

distracting from the learning and being able to talk and share their ideas” (TPPI
Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

Don believes that his main strength is his ability to relate to his students. For
example, he cares about his students, has good relationships with his students, and has a
sense of humor. In the TPPI transcript (1996) when he was asked about his main

strengths as a science teacher, he said:

“I care about whether they learn and I do not want any student to ever say that I
do not whether they got an A or whatever. I mean, I want them to know foremost
that I definitely care about what they do, you know, if they succeed or fail, I care
about that and I guess having sense of humor is my other one. And so I usually
have a pretty good rapport with the students where I can, you know keep them
interested through humor.” [emphasis added]
It is clear from this quote that Don cares a lot about his students' learning and he
is willing to build strong relationships with them.
Teacher's Actions
The coded interview shows that Don's actions are mostly early constructivist with
some aspect of experienced constructivist.
He believes that time is one of the constraints. The big problem in his situation
was to monitor students while they were working in their “Roller Coaster” projects. He

wants to give more time for his students to work independently.

Also, he thinks that one of the biggest problems:

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“. . .is having parents understanding exactly what my objectives are when I am
teaching. I think a lot of that might be my fault... .When I talk about the roller
coaster project, I wrote objectives and everything out for students that I did not
require them to take them home and next year that is on the agenda where they
take them home and have them signed” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

So, Don is willing to get parents involved in the process of teaching, learning, and
assessment.

Don decides to move from one concept to another, when 90% of his students
understand the concepts that were covered. He used projects in his teaching as an
assessment tool. This reflects him being experienced constructivist, because he uses
students' understanding as criteria in his teaching (i.e., he makes his teaching decisions
based on students' understanding). Moreover, he uses group wok (i.e., projects) as a
technique to assess students' understanding.

Students' Actions

TPPI supercodes indicate that Don’s Students' actions in the classroom are
transitional, early constructivist, and experienced constructivist.

Don believes that you have to change the classroom setting to accommodate
students with special needs. For example, he sits students with hearing problem
somewhere closer to the front.

Don believes that most of his students can learn science best by the same way he
learned science, he says:

“I assume most of the students learn [science] the same way... trying, getting the

problem, trying to attack the problem, and see what happens and what worked and

what did not work and knowing how to use that the next time we do it” (TPPI,
1996). [emphasis added]

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So, he thinks that all students can learn science in the same way (i.e., there is no diversity
in students' learning).

However, Don is willing to use different strategies to help students understand the
activities. Thus, he changes students' perceptions about the necessities of knowing. He
wants his students to experience different instructional strategies and different methods of
assessment to assess their understanding of the scientific concepts, more than traditional
ways of assessing students' understanding (i.e., tests and quizzes). Yet, the nature of
those tests is factual recall, “memorization of a text.” These teaching beliefs were

included in the his story when he describes his best teaching experience, as he says:

“This girl that I have in my class this year, she is really a neat person and, um, at
the beginning of the year when we did... these roller coaster projects and that was
just a huge, um, production... but it was this gigantic project and it was all
surrounding was velocity, acceleration, and measuring time and distance and
they had to build this big roller coaster.. . .She started in on the project and at
first it was kind of exciting and then after a while, um, people kind of got scared
thinking it was going to be an impossible project and then I think we kind of
came full circle and by the end we were excited about it again. But she, this
project just killed her and we talked about it with the principal and talked about
with her parents and everything and this is a straight A student. She never got
anything other than A and ah, she came to the point where she actually and asked
me, “can you just give me some notes and give me a test on anything. ” She
asked me, you know, it was unbelievable to me why anybody one would want to
just take notes and take a test. But I was trying to convince her that there were
other styles of learning that she needed to show me that she could handle and
this was one that shows her creativity and, ah, her skills of tackling a problem
and meeting the requirements. . ..So anyway, I think we got past that and she
ended up coming up with a pretty good results, it was not the greatest but it was
alright. So we moved on. Then we came to another project. It was basically the
same kind of thing but this time it had even less requirements and I said how I
want a project an electromagnetic spectrum and you do anything you can to
present that information as creatively as you can... .She jumped right into it and
she ended up being a 25 minute video on the electromagnetic spectrum and it
was just incredible” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

146

Moreover, he believes that teacher needs to make some changes in the assessment
process to fulfill students’ needs. Don has a student who can not read at all, he would not
even be able to tell what the test said! He overcomes this problem by sending this
student sometimes to the resource center, or he asks him the test questions verbally. So,
Don made changes in his teaching strategies, assessment methods, and expectations to fit
with this student’s needs. These teaching beliefs were mentioned in his story when he

describes his strategies to deal with students who have special needs, he says:

“But if I said, okay, give me an example of how, Newton’s First Law in like when
you are driving down the road or something? And he can give me, if that was his
question on the test, if he had read it he would not be able to give me an
intelligent answer but if I ask the question he can give you 1,000 answers. He is
very bright when the thing is read to him, but, you know, if he reads to himself,
there is not a chance” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis added]

Environment
Don wants to see his class as the most attractive class for his students, he says:
“If they are going to be in school, then, you know, they want to be in your class.
Um, that is kind of what I want them to see the kids acting like rather then just
dreading that if they have go to the class it is going to be terrible and they do not
have to learn anything that way I do not think” (TPPI Interview, 1996). [emphasis
added]

Also, he thinks that his students will like the class because of social aspects (i.e., science

was fun and applicable). These beliefs would place him in the early constructivist

category in terms of his knowledge and beliefs about the classroom environment, because

he wants his classroom to be a student-centered.

147

Context

When Don was asked about, “what are some of the tactics you use to overcome
these constraints,”2 he did not identify much that he has done, but there were indications
about what he would like to do in future years, such as better communication of
objectives with parents. His attention to his students with the severe reading difficulties
was a way of dealing with a constraint.

These teaching beliefs suggest that Don's context in terms of his knowledge and
beliefs is an early constructivist, because he admits that there are some constraints that he
needs to work on. For example, make better communication with parents to involve them
in students’ learning, and pay more attention to students with special to help all students
develop understanding.

Diversig

Again, Don recognizes that teacher should accommodate students with special
needs by changing classroom management (e.g., hearing impaired sit near front of the
room).

He also reports meeting special needs by changing expectations such as
employing different assessment methods.

Philosophy of Teaching
The coded interview indicates that Don's philosophy of teaching are scattered

among didactic, transitional, early constructivist, and experienced constructivist.

 

2 These constraints were explained in Teacher’s actions domain.

148

Don describes a good learner as someone with basic skills (i.e., listens well). He
learns best by doing things, trying things out, and seeing what happens. He believes that
his students can learn in the same way.

Don thinks that the founding principles of teaching are having students be
interested in what they are learning, and having experiences to try to apply that
information or to present that information in creative ways.

Therefore, regarding philosophy of teaching, Don provides some evidence of
beliefs that represent didactic, transitional, and experienced constructivist teaching styles
but the major emphasis on the beliefs about philosophy of teaching is on early

constructivist.

Don’s and His Students’ Beliefs about the Learning Environment inside the
Classroom

These beliefs about the learning environment for Don and his students were
measured by using CLES through the Salish Project. Students’ scores were measured for
five different classes. The number of students who responded to the survey was 45.
Mean scores were calculated. Don and his students’ results on CLES are summarized in

Table 14.

Don perceives that what he teaches in his science class is more relevant to the
lives of students out-of-school, than his students according to the Personal Relevance

Scale (PR). Don’s score on this sub scale was 28 and his students was 24.4

149

Table 14: Don's and His Students' Scores on the Constructivist Learning

 

 

 

 

 

 

Environment Survey (CLES).
CLES Sub Scales Don's Don's Students National National
Score Mean Score from Sample: Sample:
Five Classes Science Students Mean
(n=45) Teachers Mean Score
Score3 n> 5,000
n= 69
Personal Relevance 28 24.4 24.8 23.3
(PR)
Scientific 26 22.7 22.6 22.6
Uncertainty (SU)
Critical Voice (CV) 32 24.6 Not available 24.3
Shared Control (SC) 17 15.2 20.8 17.2
Student Negotiation 30 21.6 Not available 22.6
(SN)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Also, Don sees science as more uncertain than his students do. He sees science as
an evolving activity embedded in a cultural context and embodying human values and
interests, while his students perceive that less. He scored on Scientific Uncertainty Scale

(SU) 26, while his students scored 22.7.

He strongly believes that his students are able to legitimately exercise a critical
voice about the quality of their learning activities, while his students perceive that much
lower. He scored on Critical Voice Scale (CV) 32, but his students scored 24.6. This
means that, in comparison to this teacher (Don), students believe they have little input
about the nature of their learning environment.

Don and his students have a small difference on their perceptions over the control

of classroom learning environment but both scores are low. He and his students believe

 

3 Not all data for CLES scales were available for new secondary science teachers.

150

that the students are involved in the management of classroom learning. He scored 17 on
Shared Control Scale (SC) and his students scored 15.2.

Don scored himself notably higher than his students in Student Negotiation Scale.
He thinks that his students have input about their learning inside the classroom (i.e.,
students have a positive role inside the classroom). For example, he believes that
student-student interactions for the purpose of building their scientific knowledge within
the consensual domain of the classroom is important for students' learning. His students

mean score on the Student Negotiation Scale (SN) was 21.6, while he scored 30.

Don's Teaching Performance

Overview

Don is an early constructivist with some aspect of conceptual and experienced
constructivist (see Table 15). He taught the Electromagnetic Spectrum and its
applications in every day life through four consecutive days.
During three of the four sessions, he did many demonstrations to help his students
understand these ideas. On the second session he and his students constructed a table that
includes criteria to grade students’ assignments. Don is an optimistic teacher, he tried
hard to help students understand the main concepts in one of the most abstract topics in
science, the “Electromagnetic Spectrum”.

Teacher’s Content

The structure of the content for Don is mainly explanatory with students and
teacher negotiating some understanding. He used many demonstrations to explain the

components of

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152

Electromagnetic Spectrum. He explained the differences among these components
according to the wavelength and frequency. Examples and connections led by Don.

Don did not present the limitations, exceptions, or multiple interpretation to this
topic. Moreover he did not pay any attention to the laser safety in his class. As an
example, he shot laser beam onto the forehead of one student while showing his students
some applications of laser light. Nothing was mentioned about the history of science.
The processes of science were integrated by the teacher (for example the students and the
teacher used the laser beam to derive the laws of reflection and refraction).

Teacher Actions

He used many teacher-centered methods with some student-centered methods.
He used many demonstrations that were conceptually focused (for example, UV, laser,
microwave, x-rays, and etc.). Teacher-student interaction was focused on the
clarification and usefulness of students’ ideas. Both teacher and students had input (i.e.
Constructing the scoring rubric table). Don’s questions focused on concepts and
connections with some questions emerging from students’ ideas and instructional
objectives.

Don used multiple forms of assessment (for example, he asked his students to
design a poster, pamphlet, page of a book, or a transparency that reflected their scientific
understanding to a magnetic spectrum topic). He and his students used the assessment in
addition to grading to adjust activities. His responses to students’ ideas about subject
matter were seeking to change the students’ unscientific ideas. Table 16 shows an
example of a scoring rubric he created with his students to evaluate their work on a poster

project.

153

 

Table 16: Grading Rubric Table Constructed by Don & His Students

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Criteria/ 1 2 3 4 5
Grade
Information Visible/ Examples Diagrams, extra
& content invisible information
Uniqueness No color little colors poster
No diagram very colorful
Creativity Photocopy of Pictures, “Wow factor”, eye
original some words catching
Effort minimum average complete, well done,
comparison to the class

 

Students Actions

Frequently, students used writing and other representations of ideas to construct
their understanding of the main concepts. This was clear when the teacher helped the
students to set criteria to judge their assignments (see Table 16). Most of the students’
questions were conceptual in nature, while some were procedural in nature. Student-
student interactions about subject matter were not observed on these four consecutive
lessons. Most of the time students contributed examples and analysis, most of these
examples were pertinent. Students’ understanding of teacher’s expectations included
some frustrations with role, and sometimes roles and procedures were negotiated with
students.
Resources

Don used multiple resources (for example, visual aids, videos, manipulative,
laboratory materials, technology). Uses of resources were to aid many understanding and

applications. He controlled the access to these resources.

154

Environment

Many decisions in this class were joint decisions made by Don and his students.
Many teaching aids displayed were related to content. There was no direct evidence for
students’ work displayed, but from the statements he shared with the class there will be
more displayed in the future.
thsr

The accuracy of content for Don was high through the video taped lessons. The
student-teacher interactions were cooperative. Most of the time students appeared to be
engaged and on-task. Transitions were well organized and naturally smooth. Use of the
time was well organized. Facilities were flexible and changed frequently.

Don did so many demonstrations that he left little time for each activity. He spent
much time in constructing the Rubric Table, but if it is to be used for the whole semester
this will be fine. Four students participated in the demonstrations; three of them were
male. Male students asked more questions than female students. Female students

seemed more excited by the demonstrations.

Summary ef Den’s Case

Don Miller is a second year secondary science teacher in his mid-twenties. In
1994, he graduated from South Global University with a Biology major and
chemistry/physics minor. He is certified to teach all science disciplines.

He began teaching at Olan Mills High School in 1994 after graduating from the

teacher education program. He taught 9th grade physical science at a small school in a.

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rural, mid-western community of 2,500 people. The majority of his students were
Caucasian. He had 60 male students and 68 female students. Don had about 20-30
students in his classes who were classified as having special needs. He had good rapport
with his students. The student-teacher interactions in his classroom were cooperative.
Most of the time his students appeared to be engaged and on-task.

Don showed a high degree of consistency among his knowledge, beliefs, and
performance. His knowledge and beliefs turn out to be student-centered teaching style in
most of the TPPI categories, except in teacher’s knowledge and beliefs about view of
science content, where he holds a conceptual teaching style as dominant. Also, Don
holds some aspects of teacher-centered knowledge and beliefs about his teaching.

Don displayed student-centered teaching performance throughout his four
videotaped lessons with some aspects of conceptual teaching. The summary of the

analysis results for Don’s knowledge, beliefs, and performance is included in Table 17.

Section Three: Kathy's Case study

Kathy Brown (a pseudonym) is a second year secondary science teacher in her
upper-thirties. She was a biology major and chemistry minor. She graduated with a
science degree in 1978 from a large mid-western university different than her teacher
preparation university. Kathy worked as a medical technologist for a while and then she
worked in health care using computers. Her areas of teaching certification are general

science, biology, chemistry, and physical science.

157

Background

During her preservice teacher certification course work, Kathy took general
chemistry and biology courses in college. Her chemistry training and experience
includes five years as a medical technologist before going into science education, plus her
courses in organic chemistry, qualitative analysis and lab, biochemistry, and biochemistry
lab.

Kathy’s background in math and physics included math through college calculus,
and a full year of physics (one semester for physics majors; the second semester for
health science majors).

Her pedagogical training in teacher education was in the MAT Program in South
Global University.

Kathy could not remember if she had any field experience before she began
student teaching in her general education courses. Her student teaching assignment
included four life science sections for middle school level (6-8) and one biology section
for high school level (9-12).

Teaching context

Kathy began teaching at Mejier High School (also a pseudonym) in 1995. It is a
small school in a small city with a population under 25,000. Approximately, 40% of all
local community residents in this town earned incomes of less than $40,000/year, and
another 40% earned less than $70,000. The Mejier School system includes about 800

students in grade 9-12.

158

Kathy's teaching load consisted of five periods of 9th grade physical science each
day plus one period college credit-biology. Kathy was assigned to several non-teaching
duties including hall, bus, and cafeteria duties.

Most of her students were Caucasian. She had 75 male students and 71 female
students. Kathy had 13 students in her classes who were classified as having special
needs. She usually addressed their needs by working with the special education teachers
who were supposed to help in mainstreaming. All of her students spoke English as their
primary language.

Kathy had no computer in her classroom, and she used the computer lab less than
twice per semester. Mostly, the computer lab was used for math and English remediation
with some word processing. She had access to laser disc players, CD-ROMs, and a
modem.

Kathy used a Physical Science text by Prentice Hall, (First Edition, 1988) in her
classroom. She also, used supplementary materials, such as NSTA Mechanics, GEMS (it
is a large set of science activities), and Cabbage Chemistry. USually, Kathy spent 12
hours per week preparing to teach science.

Kathy used many methods of assessment to assess her students' understanding in
science including group work, worksheets, discussion with students, essay/short answer,
projects, oral reports, multiple choice tests, true/false tests, fill-in the-blank questions,
homework, and lab write-ups.

Kathy is a member of National Science Teacher Association (NSTA). In the past

year, she attended one national science teacher conference, but she did not present there.

159

She attended one workshop after school session on using a camera for a microscope for

biology and biotechnology.

thhy'flnowledge and Beliefs

Kathy's knowledge and beliefs were documented by using the Teachers'
Pedagogical Philosophy Interview (TPPI). Her interview was audio taped, transcribed,
coded, and analyzed. HyperRESEARCH software and coding protocol developed for the
Salish Project were used in the process of coding and analysis. Most of her knowledge
and beliefs turn out to be early constructivist and conceptual, with some aspects of
didactic and transitional. The summary of the analysis of Kathy's knowledge and beliefs
according to the TPPI supercodes is included in Table 18.
Teacher’s View of Content

The coded interview indicates that Kathy's views of science content are both early
constructivist and conceptual.

In her SIDESTEP questionnaire, Kathy listed the top three goals in order of

importance that she holds for her students:

0 “Students are honest and self evaluate themselves honestly about their effort in class
and out of school.

0 “Students view science as meaningful and important.

0 “Students think critically about issues relating to the science and application of
science that they have learned about.”

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She believes that students should see science as dynamic, not absolute truth, and
as relevant to life. These teaching beliefs were part of her response to how she would

like her students view science by the end of the year, she says:

“Um, it is really important to me that they [students] do not view science as
absolute truth. You know, it is just, I think, again, it is important to illustrate that
science is changing and, um, it is self correcting and all that. I hate for them to
think that it is everything. That it is absolute truth. Um, I really think they need
to see that science is involved in a lot of um, issues and, um, that is the key to
them seeing it as meaningful ” (TPPI Interview, 1995). [emphasis added]

Kathy thinks that content knowledge is important for students to learn, especially,
the main concepts in each subject area. For example, she believes that the concepts of the
cell, DNA, and chromosomes are the most important concepts in biology that her
students need to understand. Also, she believes that her students can, “construct these
ideas (concepts) in their mind through a learning process.” So, Kathy believes that her
students should understand these concepts and deal with a, “minimal amount of content
they are going to use again and retain.”

Self as a teacher

When Kathy was asked about what areas she would like to improve as a teacher,
she said, she wants to learn more about teaching and learning with technology, because
there are many computers in her school. Also, she wants to use this technology to
demonstrate more hands-on activities that fit with her lessons and units. According to the
TPPI super codes, this description would be coded under other. So, labeling these
teaching beliefs with any of the primary teaching styles referred to in this study will not

fit with her response. She believes that, “with technology ...we had some classes on

Internet, we have Internet at school. So, there is really a lot, oh, there is just all kinds of

162

things to be learned.” So, for her the aim of learning how to use technology (i.e.,
intemet) is to help her students interact with other students in or outside the school.

She believes that her main strengths are self attributes. For example, she sees
herself as approachable, enthusiastic, and somebody the students can talk to. In the TPPI
transcript (1995) when she was asked about her main strengths as a science teacher, she
says:

“I think they find me approachable. That is so important. If they really view you

as somebody they can talk to, you know, that they can approach. That is really,

really critical. Um, and to make yourself available to the students, um, because
the classroom time is just never enough.”

Teacher's Actions

The analysis suggests that Kathy's actions are didactic, transitional, conceptual,
and early constructivist, in different areas of her teaching.

Kathy feels that what to teach is based on forces beyond the classroom, including
following what has been taught in the past and what is in the textbook. She moves onto
other concepts based on the required curriculum and the schedule, not because students
understood the concepts.

Also, she decides what to teach based on student reactions and directions, current
concerns in the society, or current areas of research. So, Kathy makes her decisions
about teaching based on student’ ideas, shares science examples with the students (i.e.,
real world connections), and benefits from research results. These teaching beliefs were
clear in her response to how do you decide what to teach and what not to teach, as she
says:

“So a lot of it I really, um, go by what is, urn, current concern, a current concern
in society or some order in a current area of research. In biology, advanced

163

biology this year, we hit DNA really, really hard because of the OJ. Simpson

trial. And um, so I think any time that is there is something outside the classroom

that might help interest the students and show the relevance of it, I think it is

important to seize that opportunity” (TPPI Interview, 1995). [emphasis added]

Kathy maximizes students' understanding by using a variety of instructional
activities in the classroom. In her videotaped lessons, she used lecture, demonstrations,
hands-on, and lab stations4.

She focuses on organization and classroom management in describing the well-
organized classroom. Kathy wants to put more emphasis on classroom discipline than

any thing else. So, she wants to form her model of a well organized classroom based on

classroom management criteria rather than focus on students’ learning, as she says:

“Students should know what is expected of their behavior. That should be clear.
There should be a fairly straight-forward routine as far as assigned work and due
dates and late work. All that should not be a big deal every day and a hindrance.
All that should be established pretty much at the beginning of the semester or
year” (TPPI Interview, 1995).

Students' Actions

The coded interview indicates that Kathy's students’ actions are transitional,
conceptual, and early constructivist.

Kathy states that she knows that her students understand a concept through her
use of written tests or students’ display of skills through hand-on demonstration. She
believes that learning is occurring in her classroom when students apply what they have
learned, explain something, or discuss something. So, Kathy believes that her students

are able to use their knowledge of scientific concepts and make connections and

 

4 Kathy mentioned that she used lab stations in her videotaped lessons, but were not
observed by the writer.

164

applications as an indication that they understood these concepts.

Kathy accommodates students with special needs in her classroom by sending
those students sometimes to the special education teacher who assigned for each student,
or she makes more than one form of information for them to use. For example, she uses
written, verbal, and representations/displays as different ways of reaching students.

Kathy believes that her students learn in different ways. She says, in response to
a question asking how do you think students learn best:

“I think it is a combination...l think by us having a combination of, um, ways to

present the material or see the content or concept in the classroom. Again, I think

a lot of students are either visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learners. You know, I

think each of them, and then there are, of course, students with learning problems-

we have dyslexic students” (TPPI, 1995). [emphasis added]

Her understanding that students would learn in different ways and her attention to
meeting those learning needs by varying her instruction would place her in the early
constructivist domain. Therefore, regarding students’ actions, Kathy provides some
evidence of beliefs that represent transitional and conceptual teaching styles but the major
emphasis on the beliefs about students’ actions is early constructivist.

Environment

She wants her class to be challenging in order to help her students gain self
confidence. As she mentioned in her TPPI (1995) interview,

“The most important thing would be because she challenged me. You know, I

think that is really important. You know, if they had one project or one assigned

or anything that they looked at and said, 'Oh, I just can not do that,’ and if they
really tried and they were able, you know, to progress in their learning,

understanding, and then as a result they gained a lot of confidence in their
learning, I think that would be pretty important.” [emphasis added]

165

Kathy reports that she manipulates the physical environment inside her classroom
to maximize students’ understanding. So, she is changing the environment of the
classroom and not focusing on students’ learning (i.e., emphasis cooperative learning or
use students’ ideas) to maximize students’ understanding.

QM!

When Kathy was asked about, “What are some impediments that are you have
faced in trying to implement the kind of teaching that you want in your classroom,” she
said she thinks that the lack of resources in her school is the most important impediment
that she faced in trying to implement the kind of teaching she wants. For example, she
said that she went through a huge battle just to try to get some microscopes. Also, she
mentioned the lack of textbooks, especially advanced biology textbooks. However, her
response was about school resources, and not to deal with her classroom learning context.
According to the TPPI super codes, these teaching beliefs could place her in the didactic
domain. Such a label is obviously a simplification.

Diversity

Again, Kathy recognizes that teachers should accommodate students with special
needs by changing the instruction. She thinks that,

“The best thing you can do is to have more than one form of information. You

know, do not write everything on the chalkboard or the overhead. You know, do

not just say everything. You know, a lot of times, you know when reading
through summarizing something, asking questions, and then as well having
iggtseging on the overhead to try to get different ways of reaching them” (TPPI,

It is interesting to note that her response to a question about diversity is about diversity of

learning styles, not ethnicity or gender. Kathy’s teaching beliefs would place her in the

166

conceptual teacher domain in terms of her knowledge and beliefs about diversity in her
classroom.
Philosophy of Teaching

The coded interview shows that Kathy's philosophy of teaching contains aspects
of didactic, conceptual, and early constructivist views.

She sees herself as, “definitely a visual learner.” She knows that she learned
something when she can remember that thing. Kathy differentiates between learning and
knowing in terms of memory. She refers to learning as a short term memory event, while
knowing results in long term memory. She believes that a good learner can listen to a
lecture and see things (i.e., see transparencies). All these teaching beliefs would place
her in the didactic domain, because she used the term “memory” to distinguish between
knowing and leaning. She distinguishes based on the amount of scientific knowledge that
has been accomplished and how long can learners save this knowledge, instead of saying
that learning and knowing are similar and each one will lead to the other. Also, she
focuses on listening and seeing as criteria for a good learner, instead of focusing on
learners’ personality traits (i.e., curiosity, creative, or being a risk taker), or on
development of understanding scientific ideas and learning.

Kathy believes she knows something when she can use that content knowledge
and be able to solve problems in the real world. She thinks that she can learn very well
by doing such as making a concept map. Also, Kathy believes that her students
understand a phenomenon when they are able to explain it.

Kathy's underlying principles of teaching are revealed in the TPPI (1995)

interview, as she says:

167

“I think, the first thing that comes to mind is the attitude of the student or learner.
Actually, I have met up with students, you know, that really do not want to learn.
One of our administrators said during our orientation, there is nothing stronger
than a made up mind, and I believe that. I think their attitude has so much to do
with it.. . .And another principle, again I feel so strongly that you have to take into
account individual learning styles and, um, cater to those different learning styles
as much as you can within the time frame you have...1 think responsibility, you
know, beyond your subject matter, moral responsibility. I am trying to challenge
these young people into becoming people that can hold jobs and be responsible."
[emphasis added]

She also believes that learners have different learning styles and attitudes. These
teaching beliefs reflect her being an early constructivist teacher in terms of her
knowledge and beliefs about philosophy of teaching, because her teaching is focused on

students, especially development of self esteem, students having different learning styles,

and students having different attitudes toward learning science.

Kathy’s 8;: Her Students’ Beliefs about the Learning Environment inside the

 

 

Classroom

Kathy and her students’ beliefs about the learning environment inside the
classroom were measured using the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey
(CLES). The maximum score for each sub scale is 35 and the minimum is 7. Kathy and

her students’ results on CLES survey are summarized in Table 19.

Contrary to beliefs of most teachers, Kathy’s students see more relevance to her
teaching than she does. Kathy’s score on this sub scale was 22 and her students’ was

26.8.

Kathy’s score on the Scientific Uncertainty scale also is lower than her students’

scores. This shows that she has a more absolute view of scientific knowledge than her

168

Table 19: Kathy's and Her Students' Scores on the Constructivist Learning

Environment Survey (CLES)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CLES Sub Scales Kathy's National Sample: Kathy's Students National Sample:
Score Science Teachers Mean Score from Students Mean
Mean Score One Class (n=26) Score
T1: 69 n > 5,000

Personal 22 24.8 26.8 23.3
Relevance (PR)
Scientific 20 22.6 23.9 22.6
Uncertainty (SU)
Critical Voice 23 No data available 24.7 24.3
(CV)
Shared Control 16 20.8 15.9 17.2
(SC)
Student 24 No data available 23.4 22.6
Negotiation (SN)

 

 

 

 

 

 

students. The students tend to view science as involving activity embedded in a cultural

context and embodying human values and interests while she believed that her teaching

rarely or sometimes communicated science in this way. She scored on Scientific

Uncertainty Scale (SU) 20, while her students scored 23.9.

Kathy and her students hold nearly the same beliefs about students’ ability to
exercise legitimately a critical voice about the quality of their learning activities. She
scored 23 on Critical Voice Scale (CV) and her students scored 24.7. In other words,
both Kathy and her students believed that students were able to exercise critical voice
sometimes or ofien.

Kathy and her students also have nearly the same view on their perceptions about
the control of classroom learning environment. They believe that students are seldom
involved in the management of classroom learning. She scored 16 on Shared Control

Scale (SC) and her students scored 15.9. This means that Kathy practiced teacher-

169

centered method in her teaching, so the students did not have much input about the nature
of their learning or make significant decisions about it.

Finally, both of them hold almost the same beliefs about the nature of student
negotiation inside the classroom (i.e., the role of students inside the classroom). For
example, Kathy and her students believe that student-student interactions for the purpose
of building their scientific knowledge within the consensual domain of the classroom is
sometimes or often important for students’ learning. Her students’ mean score on the

Student Negotiation Scale (SN) was 23.4, while she scored 24.

Kathy's Teaching Performance

In the three consecutive days of teaching recorded in her video portfolio, Kathy
taught "Fluid Pressure" for 9th grade students at Mejier High School. Before these three
videotaped lessons, Kathy mentioned that she designed six different demonstrations to
help her students understand the idea of fluid pressure.

On the first day, she asked her students to explain the demonstrations that they
did the previous day on fluid pressure. For example, she asked them to explain why the
Pepsi can [with water in it] collapses when it is cooled after heating? Why when you
heat a glass bottle, will the egg fall down into the bottle when the heat source is removed?
She listened to students’ responses. There was no evidence that Kathy used students’
responses (i.e., students’ ideas or misconceptions) to guide her teaching. Kathy did not
explain how these demonstrations are related to the fluid pressure. However, these
demonstrations could not help students understand the main ideas in this topic, because

each demonstration needs to connect few concepts to be understood. To understand these

170

two demonstrations, students need to connect the following concepts together: force,
area, internal pressure, atmospheric pressure, dynamic fluids, statics fluids, and pressure
difference.

In another task, she was looking for an explanation of real world events. For
example, she asked her students to explain how the pneumatic tube in a bank drive-
through system works? To facilitate students’ understanding, she asked them to work in
small groups and report back to the class.

On the second day, she asked her students to work in small groups to design a
boat to float in water. The idea of this activity as Kathy reported in her videotaped lesson
was to figure out the relationships between mass, volume, and density of modeling clay
in order to design a clay boat that will float in the water. So, the students need to change
the shape of the clay so that it will float. However, the introductory part of this activity
was not connected effectively to the main topic, fluid pressure, or to the “Archimedes’
Principle.” Kathy wrote, “Archimedes’ Principle” on the blackboard without any
explanation to this principle or discussion with students. No more analysis could be done
on the second day lesson because the sound of the tape was disconnected for about 30
minutes (the researcher could not hear anything from the tape after the first sixteen
minutes). However, the overt action of Kathy on her class suggests that she displays a

student-centered style of student-teacher interaction.

In the last day, she reviewed the test questions with her students. The text of the

test was about “Force and Momentum.”

171

Overview

These three consecutive videotaped lessons were analyzed using the Secondary
Teacher Analysis Matrix-Science Version. The STAM analysis of the video portfolio for
Kathy's teaching performance is reported under several categories: overview; teacher's
content; teacher's actions; students' actions; resources; environment; and other.

In her teaching the STAM analysis suggests that Kathy displayed teacher-centered
teaching with of some aspects of student-centered and conceptual teaching. For more
information, see Table 20.

Teacher's Content

The way that Kathy structured the content in lessons is mainly factoids with some
aspects of explanatory mode. She ofien asked her students to recall information from
previous lessons. Kathy spent some of the time (30%) on definitions of concepts. She
asked her students to copy the definition of each concept from the transparency. In some
cases she asked them not to do that because they could find the definitions in the reading
package.

The connections among these concepts were not observed in Kathy's video portfolio. In a
few cases, such as pumping water , hydraulic machines, pneumatic system examples and
connections were made by the teacher, and sometimes were mentioned by students and
the teacher. Students offered some examples for the applications of fluid pressure in their
every day life. Kathy did not present the limitations, exceptions, or multiple
interpretations of this topic. For example, in her lessons, it is essential to mention that
fluids behave differently when they are at rest than when they are in motion. Fluid statics

concentrates on the properties of fluids at rest, while fluid dynamics focuses on

172

 

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fluids at motion (Cutnell & Johnson, 1995). Neither the history of science nor the process
of science was mentioned.
ficher's Actions

Kathy used some teacher-centered methods in her teaching, as well as some
hands-on methods. These activities were either overly directed in which students
followed the procedure in order to confirm the results, which students might already
know or undirected such as exploration without specific follow up. For example, she
asked her students to follow the instructions in the lab procedures exactly without
changing anything to do one of the fluid pressure application experiments. There were
few teacher-students interactions about subject matter in these lessons. The focus of
interactions most of the time was on clarification of procedural issues. Kathy’s questions
focused on factual recall. For example, she asked her students to define some concepts
like force and pressure.

She used tests and quizzes in her assessment. For example, she asked them to
differentiate between force and momentum, mass and weight, define some concepts, and
solve some mathematical problems in her test review. Her assessment process did not
appear to go beyond grading. She focused on the grades and the right answer. The test
appeared to be an end in itself to give grade, not a method to assess students’
understanding and to guide her teaching.

Kathy accepted all students’ ideas about subject matter. For example, one student
said “at higher altitude air pressure increases.” The student’s prediction was wrong, in

fact, the pressure decreases. Instead of helping the students rethink about his prediction,

174

she asked another student to give the right answer without asking him for an explanation.
By doing so, she stressed the factual nature of science.
Students' Actions

Many activities in the class often were done in small groups. In Kathy‘s teaching,
writing and other representations of ideas were not used. She was looking for short
answers. The nature of students’ questions tended to be more procedural than
conceptual. Student-student interactions about subject matter also tended to be more
often about procedure than clarification. Students rarely volunteered examples or
analysis, and when they did so, examples were weakly connected to the class activities.
Students’ showed confusion over procedure, particularly, when they were asked to follow
procedure.
Resources

Kathy used a reading package and small number of other resources, including
some hands-on activities. These resources appeared to have limited relation to the
content being taught. Most of the time, Kathy controlled the access to these resources.
Environment

Many decisions in this class were made by Kathy. A few teaching aids were
displayed which were not related to content (e. g. periodic table of the elements, skeleton).
There was no evidence of students’ work being displayed.
Other

The accuracy of content for Kathy was not a problem, because she was confident
when she transferred the content to her students. In her videotaped lessons she provided

evidence that she knows a lot of scientific facts that related with fluid pressure topic. The

175

quality of student-teacher interactions was c00perative, but the focus of interaction was
mostly about procedure. Usually, student were engaged and on-task, even though some
students were playing basketball through the activities time. Transitions were well
organized and naturally smooth. Use of the time was well organized. Facilities were

flexible and changed frequently.

Summag of Kathy’s Case

Kathy Brown is a second year secondary science teacher in her upper-thirties.
She was a biology major and chemistry minor. She graduated with a science degree in
1978 from a different large mid-western university than her teacher preparation
university. Kathy worked as a medical technologist for a while and then she worked in
health care using computers. Her areas of teaching certification are general science,
biology, chemistry, and physical science.

Kathy began teaching at Mejier High School in 1995. Kathy taught 9th grade
physical science and college credit-biology at a small school in a small city. Most of her
students are Caucasian. She had 75 male students and 71 female students. Kathy had 13
students in her classes who were classified as having special needs; none of them had
English as a second language.

Kathy who graduated from SGU’s teacher education program reflects
inconsistency among her knowledge, beliefs, and teaching performance. Kathy’s
knowledge and beliefs turn out cover the gamete from teacher centered to conceptual to
student-centered with emphasis on student-centered. Moreover, she displayed teacher-

centered teaching performance with small degree of conceptual and student-centered

176

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teaching. The summary of the analysis results for Kathy’s knowledge, beliefs, and

performance is included in Table 21.

178

mated

THE LINKAGES AMONG TEACHERS’ PERFORMANCE, ESQWLEDGE,
BELIEFS, TEACHER PREPARATION PROGRAM FEATURES,

AND TEACHERS’ CHARACTERISTICS

This chapter describes linkagesl among teaching performance of these four new
high school chemistry teachers, their knowledge and beliefs, features of the teacher
preparation programs they experienced, and their personal characteristics. This chapter
begins with a brief summary of the most important findings followed by a more detailed
delineation of those findings for the four teachers who are the subjects of the case studies
presented in chapters three and four.

Again, in this chapter I used categories of teacher-centered, conceptual, and
student-centered to describe high school chemistry teachers’ knowledge, beliefs, and
teaching performance as they are defined in the methodology chapter, chapter two.

After deep analysis of the four new high school chemistry teacher cases, it turned
out that these teachers displayed teaching performance that differed in important ways.
While all four teachers had student-centered aspects of their teaching, two of them had
more teacher-centered aspects than others. One of them turned out to be a mix of
teacher-centered and conceptual in his teaching performance. While, the fourth showed a
mixture of conceptual and student-centered teaching.

The aim of this chapter is to answer the following questions which came out in

the first phase of analysis:

 

1 “Linkages, “relationship,” and “association” are used interchangeably in this chapter.
The data were primarily qualitative. There is no claim or assertion of causality, nor
should any be constructed, (Salish, 1997).

179

1) What kind of teaching performance was displayed by these four new teachers, and
what knowledge and beliefs did they hold related to teaching?
2) Why did they teach the way they taught?

In order to gain better understanding, it is appropriate to answer question one by
looking to the linkages for each teacher among their teaching performance, knowledge,
and beliefs and then comparing the four cases to explain some of the investigated
relationships. I can hypothesize about the answer to question two by looking to the
linkages among the findings from question one, teacher preparation program features,

and teachers’ characteristics.

mm f M ' r F'n in
0 The course objectives in the teacher education programs at both institutions
were diverse and more comprehensive than science disciplinary program course
objectives. The course objectives in science courses were almost entirely content-
oriented in both institutions. These objectives were coupled with vast amounts of
scientific information to be learned. However, the course objectives in the teacher
education programs at both institutions were structured to help prospective teachers

learn about constructivist teaching.

0 All four of the teachers and most of the faculty interviewed confirmed that the
connections between prospective science teachers’ learning and real world
applications were not clearly addressed as a major goal in science courses at
either institution. This point was widely agreed upon. In addition, the prospective

science teachers and the faculty members said that the connections between science

180

labs and lectures were weak and that the lab is primarily used to verify previously
known facts or laws. Moreover, the prospective science teachers agreed that the
connection between the lab and the lecture is essential to understand science
concepts. Only one teacher took three or four of the applied courses available
through his teacher education program (at SGU), and the other program (N GU) did
not have such courses available. Steve and Terry took an elective course in their
teacher preparation program (at NGU) that focused on teaching using laboratories in

secondary science classrooms. They both identified this class as beneficial.

Prospective science teachers did not experience cooperative learning in their
science classes. They sometimes did work in groups in their labs, but these would
not generally be described as cooperative groups. Otherwise, this experience with
cooperative learning was limited to their courses in teacher education. All of the
prospective science teachers reported that the primary method of instruction was
cooperative learning in their science methods courses. However, in describing the
nature of group work in the science education seminars, the director of education

center at SGU said, “may be it is not exactly cooperative learning.”

All new secondary science teachers reported that they used a variety of
assessment methods in their science education courses. The common assessment
methods that they experienced were papers, interviews, presentations, projects, and
student teaching. All of them practiced teaching in their science education courses
before they became interns. Assessment in science courses was almost exclusively in

the forms of mid-term and semester end objective tests that were machine scored.

181

All four of the teachers identified that learning from on-the-job experience or
field experience in their teacher preparation programs was a crucial factor in
developing their teaching approaches. The teacher with the most consistency
among knowledge, beliefs and performance rated his on the job experience as
providing 80 percent of his teaching model. The graduates of NGU completed a year
long student-teaching internship. All four teachers gave a very low rating (between
five and 20 percent) to their undergraduate programs as contributors to their teaching
models. One teacher who had thirteen years in a prior career did not identify any
contribution from that career to her teaching model. The year long internship in the
teacher education program at NGU was valued by Steve and Terry. This internship
was both part of separate courses and integrated into existing courses. At SGU Don
and Kathy had student teaching for one semester. During their student teaching, new
secondary science teachers were required to teach in different levels through their
science method courses. Steve and Terry found that having a professional secondary
science teacher within the team of course instructors helped them to gain first hand
experience that was closer to a real classroom setting. The benefit from this
experience was influenced by several factors like school context and collaborating
teachers. Terry and Kathy had their student teaching experiences in very difficult

school contexts.

While all four of the secondary science teachers hold student-centered beliefs
about teaching, only one effectively demonstrated student-centered teaching. All
four agreed that science should be taught in way that connects to students’ lives.

However, only one demonstrated teaching practice that reflected this belief. The

182

structure of the content of all four teachers is mostly descriptive and explanatory in
the courses they taught. None of the teachers mentioned anything about the history of
scientific ideas in their video portfolios, even though two of them took courses about
history and philosophy of science as part of their teacher preparation programs. All
of four of the teachers expressed that they use science as a way to solve problems.
Three of the four identified students’ understanding of applications of science as a
major goal for the classes they taught, even though only two of the teachers took
courses in applied science as part of their teacher education program. All of their
beliefs reflect that they made their teaching decisions based on students’
understanding of scientific concepts. Thus, there is not a clear pattern of relationship
between new teachers’ preparation programs and their actions as teachers. In the
students’ actions domain, the beliefs of the four teachers’ were more consistent with
their actions than in any other domain. All four of the teachers believe that teachers
need to use a variety of teaching strategies to fulfill students’ needs. They
acknowledge that learners are diverse. All of them use group work in their teaching.
In two of the cases from two different institutions, the teachers structured activities
where students presented their work. Most questions asked by students were
procedural in nature. Unfortunately, in most of the videotapes, students’ comments
were not clearly audible.

The new secondary science teachers did not reflect a deep conceptual
understanding of the scientific concepts that they taught in their video portfolios.
This related to the nature of the science disciplinary courses they took as teacher

candidates. College science courses did not result in deep conceptual teaching for

183

these new teachers. All of the teachers experienced lectures in their college science
classes. None of these classes were designed for teacher candidates, but included a
wide range of future scientists, medical personnel, engineers, teachers, and students
preparing for other fields. The new science teachers experienced a dichotomy
between science process and science content. In most science classes, the lab was
taught in a way that was poorly connected to the lecture. The size of the classes was
large — some as large as 800 students. The objectives of the science courses were

generally content-oriented.

Linkages among Teachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs

The linkages among teachers’ performance, knowledge, and beliefs for these new
high school chemistry teachers are illustrated in Figure 1. Terry, Steve, and Kathy
frequently displayed student-centered beliefs and knowledge yet their performance
leaned heavily toward teacher-centered teaching performance. They also infrequently
demonstrated some aspects of student-centered teaching. Steve sometimes displayed
conceptual teaching, while, Kathy infrequently demonstrated some aspects of conceptual
teaching. However, Don turned out to be the only teacher who frequently demonstrated
student-centered beliefs and teaching performance with less frequent demonstrations of
aspects of teacher-centered teaching performance. Sometimes, he displayed a conceptual
approach to teaching.

In contrast to the variation in teaching performance, as Figure 1 shows, all of

them expressed primarily student-centered teaching knowledge and beliefs with some

184

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aspects of conceptual and teacher-centered beliefs. This is indicated by the dark bars in
the figure. According to the TPPI supercodes, Kathy and Steve turn out to share a very
similar distribution of classifications of knowledge and beliefs. Don expressed primarily
student-centered beliefs, and he infrequently expressed some aspects of conceptual and
teacher-centered beliefs. Terry sometimes expressed some aspects of teacher-centered

teaching beliefs, and she infrequently expressed conceptual teaching beliefs.

Teachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs about Science Content

 

The linkages among these four new science teachers’ knowledge, beliefs and
performance in the science content domain are summarized in Table 22.

According to the STAM analysis of their videotaped lessons, the structure of the
content for all of them is mostly descriptive and explanatory. However, Don and Steve
provided evidence in their teaching that they structured the content in their science
lessons around key ideas. In addition, Don and his students negotiated understanding of
these key ideas with the teacher’s content emphasized. Kathy stressed the factual notion
of scientific knowledge.

In general, Kathy, Terry, and Steve offered a few examples in their teaching that
integrated the subject matter. Their students offered some examples, too. However,
these examples did not focus on students’ understanding of the big picture of how these

concepts connect to each other and how students can use this knowledge in their lives. In

186

 

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187

fact, these examples and connections that were represented on their videotaped lessons
reflected the superficial relationships among these concepts and real world applications.
For example, the relationships Steve discussed in teaching about the ideal gas law were
only mathematical. He did not connect the gas law to real world examples in the lives of
his students.

In contrast, all of them believe that the connections between science and students’
lives are essential in teaching science. When they were asked, “How do you want your
students to view science by the end of the school year?” Don said he wants his students
to, “see how science applies to my [the student’s] life.” Kathy wants her students, “to see
that science is involved in a lot of, um, issues and, um, that is the key to them seeing it as
meaningful.” Steve answered this question by saying, “they can relate it to something
that goes on in everyday life.” Terry, in her SIDESTEP questionnaire, reported that the
second, in order of importance, of her top three goals that she holds for her students is,
“to see science as a way of thinking applicable to every day.”

It is noticeable that all of them agreed in their beliefs that science should be taught
as a discipline related to students’ lives (e.g., external applications of the science content
knowledge, Cajas, 1998). However, in their practice, Don was the only one who made
significant connections among the science concepts that he taught and real world
applications. For example, he and his students diagnosed some of the X-ray films for
different actual cases that showed bones broken in different positions.

None of the four teachers, through their videotaped lessons, provided any
evidence that the limitations and exceptions of science content were addressed. In other

words, no one mentioned when, how, or where we can or can not apply specific kinds of

188

scientific knowledge (i.e., ideas, laws, and theories). For example, Kathy did not mention
in her fluid pressure lesson where and when we can use these physical pressure laws (i.e.,
she did not differentiate between two kind of fluids: statics and dynamic). Also, Steve
failed to mention that in reality there is no such thing as an ideal gas that obeys the
equation perfectly under all circumstances. However, a fundamental fact is that all real
gases deviate slightly from the behavior predicted by the law.

None of the four teachers mentioned anything about the history of scientific ideas
in their teaching. Furthermore, the process of science was absent from Kathy’s, Terry’s,
and Steve’s teaching. Don integrated science process into his teaching. For example,
Don and his students used the laser beam to derive the laws of reflection and refraction).
By doing so, Don lead his students to reconstruct how evidence has been used to
formulate scientific ideas and to use this process to formulate and evaluate ideas.
However, it is important to note that Don ignored important issues dealing with laser
safety in this lesson.

Steve’s, Terry’s, and Kathy’s beliefs suggest that they value problem solving in
science (i.e., science process) but it is not represented to any great degree in their
teaching. For example, Steve thinks that one thing he needs, “to concentrate more on is
getting them to problem solve instead of me taking the responsibility of problem
solving.” For, Terry science is, “basically inquiry ...to figure out the world around you
through a defined method.” Kathy also states that while students are involved in problem
solving, she would like to have her students do more work, “where they have to solve

problems.”

189

However, while Don did not mention that quite so explicitly in his interviews, he
reported in his SIDESTEP questionnaire that the second of his top three goals in order of
importance that he holds for his students is, “to be able to begin to think logically and
work problems out step by step.”

According to their beliefs, all four of the teachers expressed that they used science
as a way to solve problems (i.e., problem solving techniques), not as a process to
understand the scientific ideas through problem solving (i.e., science is inquiry oriented).
However, Terry mentioned that science is inquiry in her TPPI interview, but when she
explained that she refers to it as a “defined method.” So, following the scientific method
does not necessarily lead to solving complex problems or to fostering students’
understanding.

Therefore, in general, the matching between what they believed and what they
displayed about science (i.e., science content and process) was not strong, because all of
them except Don demonstrated the descriptive notion of science. In other words, they
(Steve, Terry and Kathy) demonstrated science as two separate components, “science
content” and “science process.” Their comprehension of science process was limited or
poorly integrated. It was evident through the videotaped lessons that Don sometimes

integrated science content and science process.

T hr’Perform anl nBlif Tah’Ain

The linkages among these four new science teachers’ knowledge, beliefs and

performance in the teacher’s actions domain are summarized in Table 23.

190

 

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191

According to the video portfolio analysis, Terry and Kathy displayed very similar
teaching performance in terms of their actions inside the classroom. Their approach was
teacher-centered with some aspect of student-centered teaching styles. Steve’s teaching
performance, in terms of his actions, was divided between teacher-centered and
conceptual with some aspects of student-centered teaching styles. Don displayed student-
centered and conceptual teaching styles in terms of his actions inside the classroom.

However according to their beliefs, all of them expressed student-centered
teaching beliefs about their actions inside the classroom. In addition to that, Steve, Terry,
and Kathy expressed some aspects of teacher-centered teaching beliefs. Also, Kathy’s
beliefs suggest that she holds some aspects of conceptual teaching beliefs about her
actions inside the classroom.

On the STAM-Science version, the teacher’s actions domain consists of the
following categories: methods; labs, demonstrations, and hands-on; teacher-student
interactions; teacher’s questions; kind of assessment; assessment use beyond grading, and
teacher’s responses to students’ ideas.

All of them used teaching teacher-centered method with some aspect of student-
centered. Small groups were used as an instructional strategy in their teaching.

However, the quality of group work did not match with the actual meaning of
“cooperative learning.”

Don used many demonstrations that were conceptually focused (for example, UV,
laser, microwave, x-rays, and etc.), e.g., he used the laser beam to demonstrate the laws
of reflection and refraction. Kathy’s activities were “cookbook,” i.e., students went

through procedures in order to confirm the results. Labs, demonstrations, or hands-on

192

activities were absent from Terry’s teaching on these three video taped lessons. Steve
focused on solving mathematical problems. The experiment demonstration that he did
was not clearly connected to the main topic of his three videotaped lessons (ideal gas).

The nature of teacher-students interactions varied. In Don’s case, the focus of
teacher-student interactions was on the clarification and usefulness of students’ ideas.
Both teacher and students had input (e. g., constructing the scoring rubric table). In
Kathy’s teaching the focus of interactions most of the time was on clarification of
procedural issues. Steve interacted with students by showing them how to use the
formula. Terry’s teaching through the videotaped lessons indicated that there were few
interactions between her and her students about subject matter.

The focus of the teachers’ questions also varied. Don’s questions focused on
concepts and connections with some questions emerging fi'om students’ ideas and some
from instructional objectives. Kathy’s questions focused on factual recall. For example,
she asked her students to define some concepts like force and pressure. Steve’s questions
were about the recognition of how to apply the formula, and end of the chapter problems
from the textbook. Terry’s questions were not directed toward either scientific
knowledge, or factual information. Most of the time questions were used for classroom
management.

Terry, Steve, and Kathy used tests, quizzes, and homework in their assessment as
common assessment methods. In addition to that, Steve and Terry used journals. For
example, Steve asked his students to draw a “concept map” for the chemical concepts
that they learned at the end of each lesson. Also, Terry asked her students to design a

commercial about ‘energy transformations and applications.” However, Don used

193

multiple forms of assessment. For example, he asked his students to design a poster,
pamphlet, page of a book, or a transparency that reflected their scientific understanding
of the magnetic spectrum topic. Both the activity in Don’s class where students
developed materials and the activity in Terry’s class where students developed
commercials allowed the students some freedom in designing their classroom activities.
However, Don used this activity as a tool to focus on students’ misconceptions and
students’ learning. There was no evidence that Terry did that in her videotaped lessons.
For all of them except Don, the use of assessment was mostly on grading and
checking on students’ knowledge. For example, Kathy asked her students to differentiate
between force and momentum, mass and weight, to define some concepts, and to solve
some mathematical problems. However, Don and his students used the assessment in
addition to grading to adjust activities (e. g., constructing the scoring rubric table).
The coded interviews of all four teachers suggest that they hold primarily students-
centered teaching beliefs in term of their actions inside the classroom. Don, Terry, and
Steve decide to move from one concept to another in teaching science, when they believe
their students understand the concepts that have been covered. For example Steve could
move to other concepts when most of his students, “have a mastery of [most of] the
concepts.” Kathy tries, “to have a lab for each main concepts in a unit and, um, then
some discussion and review.” It is clear from their expressed beliefs, that all of them
believe they made their teaching decisions about when to move from one concept to

another based on, “students’ understanding,” which suggest student-centered teaching

beliefs.

194

When these prospective science teachers were asked, “How do you decide what to
teach and what not to teach?” Steve and Terry decide what to teach based on the state
objectives that influence their teaching. Kathy’s teaching is sensitive to the students’
reactions and directions, current concerns in the society, and current areas of research.
Don tries to, “teach things that are, not only interesting to our students, but interesting to

99

me.

Table 24: Assessment Methods Listed by Prospective Secondary Science Teachers in
Their SIDESTEP Questionnaires

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teacher/Assessment method Terry Steve Don Kathy
Group work \/2 \l x/ x]
Worksheet \/ \I «1
discussions \I x] \l «1
Essay/ short answer x] \I \l \I
Project \I x] x/ «1
Oral report \I \j x]
Homework x] \j x] x]
Lab write-up \/ x] x] \/
Performance exam \/

Concept map \I x]

Student developed protocol \/

Participation «I

Fill-in-the blank questions \/
Quizzes from the curriculum \j x]

True/false test «I
Multiple choice test \I \I

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 \/ Means that teacher lists this assessment method in his/her SIDESTEP questionnaire.
Absence of a mark means the teacher does not use that kind of assessment in her/his
teaching.

195

Table 24, derived from their SIDESTEP questionnaires, indicates that all of them
share the following methods of assessment to assess their students' understanding in
science: group work, discussion with students, essay/short answer, projects, oral reports,
homework, and lab write-ups.

In contrast, their teaching performance through the videotaped lessons did not
indicate that variety of different assessment methods to appraise students’ understanding.
For example the use of tests and quizzes was common in their videotaped lessons, but

other kinds of assessment were uncommon.

'_I‘_eachers’ Performance, Knowledge, and Beliefs about Students’ Actions

 

The linkages among these four new science teachers’ knowledge, beliefs and
performance in the students’ actions domain are summarized in Table 25.

In the students’ actions domain, the beliefs of the four teachers’ were more
consistent with their actions than in any other domain. Terry, Kathy, and Don expressed
student-centered teaching knowledge and beliefs, and displayed student-centered
teaching performance, too. However, Terry and Kathy displayed some aspects of
teacher-centered teaching. Steve displayed conceptual teaching, while, he expressed
conceptual and student-centered teaching beliefs.

In Don’s class, students frequently used writing and other representations of ideas to
construct meaning to their understanding of the main concepts. This was clear when Don
and his students set criteria to judge students’ assignments. In Steve’s and Terry’s
classes students represented their ideas in writing as reconfigurations of textbook

information or information provided. For example, Terry’s students used their textbook

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197

as a main source from which to extract information to design their commercials. In
Kathy’s teaching, writing and other representations of ideas were rare, and she was
looking for short answers.

In contrast, Kathy believes that her students can understand concepts, “where they
have to write something, an explanation.” Also, Steve believes that students can
demonstrate understanding of the science concepts by using writing, “If they can write
about it.” However, while Steve used writing in his teaching, the focus mainly was on
mathematical problem solving.

The nature of students’ questions in Terry’s class was procedural. Kathy and
Don’s students’ questions were occasionally procedural and mainly conceptual. Steve’s
students engaged mainly in procedural and some conceptual questions, and they asked
questions about how to solve problems, (i.e., how to apply the equation).

General speaking, the student-student interactions were not easy to hear because
most of the time the camera was not moving and focused on teacher. So, there were not
many interactions among students that you can hear very well. For example, in Don’s
class, student-student interactions about subject matter were not observed on these four
consecutive lessons. In the other classes, student-student interactions were rare. The
nature of these interactions was about procedure and clarification in Kathy and Terry’s
classes, while in Steve’s class the focus was more ofien on the correctness of their
answers. However, I made a speculation about Terry’s class based on the students’ group
presentations that there was some student-student interactions about procedure and some

about understanding.

198

In Steve’s, Terry’s, and Kathy’s classes, students rarely initiated activities, they
contributed few examples, and connections of these examples to class activities were
weak. Don’s students contributed examples and analysis, and most of these examples
were appropriate.

All four of the teachers believe that the teacher needs to use different teaching
strategies to fulfill students’ needs. They acknowledged that learners are diverse. They
recognize that there are students with special needs in their classes. They expressed
different ways of dealing with those students’ needs. Some of them want to change the
physical environment in their classrooms (Don and Kathy). Others want to make changes
in expectations (Don and Steve want to make changes in the assessment process; Kathy
and Terry use different ways to reach them), and cooperate with the special education
teacher or resource center in the school (Kathy, Steve, Don).

When the prospective secondary science teachers were asked, “how do you know
when learning is occurring or has occurred in your classroom?” Steve and Terry made
this determination from students’ feedback. Don and Kathy were more specific as to the

kind of student feedback (through project or small group discussion).

Linkages among Findings from Question Qne, Teacher Preparation Program

F_eatures. afnd Teachers’ Characteristics

In this section the study is designed to investigate the linkages among the findings
from question one, teacher preparation program features, and teachers’ characteristics.
The main features of science program and teacher education program in the three

domains: content, teacher’s actions, and students’ actions are summarized in Table 26

199

Table 26: The Program Features in Science Content Courses & Teacher Education

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Courses
Science Content Courses I Teacher Education Courses
Content

0 Large body of content 0 Less is better

0 Very limited process knowledge 0 Focus on process knowledge

0 Poor integration within &across fields 0 Integration is not clear

0 Limited applications and not related to 0 Applications are important and related
students’ world to students’ world

0 Lab frequently is not connected to the o Hands-on activities are connected to the
lecture lecture

0 Course objectives are content oriented. 0 Course objectives are diverse.

0 Textbook, lab, recitation 0 Multiple instructional resources

Teacher’s Actions

0 Teacher-centered approach 0 Student-centered approach

0 Lecture 0 Interactive

0 Limited assessment strategies 0 Variety of assessment strategies

0 Test and checking on students’ 0 Assessment to guide learning
knowledge

0 Not part of faculty interest 0 Encourage professional linkages

0 Cooperative learning is missing, except 0 Cooperative learning is common,
in the labs especially in science methods courses

Students’ Actions

0 Student passive 0 Student active

0 For all science majors & pre-mid 0 For prospective teachers

0 Students construct meaning 0 Memorizing

0 Large classes 0 Small classes

- Informal but not strong with faculty 0

 

members
No field experience
No cohort

 

Informal personal relationship with
faculty members

Actual field experience (i.e., teaching)
Informal & formal cohorts

 

When prospective secondary science teachers were asked, “in reference to the

teaching model or teaching package that you have developed. . .if you had to divide that

up into pie chart, how much of that chart would come from undergraduate training,

200

 

graduate training, your on-the-job experience, or anything else that you can think of?”
Their responses are represented in pie charts shown in Figures 2-5.

Don believes that most of the contribution (80%) to his teaching approach comes
from on-the-job experience’. Terry credits on-the-job experience with 45%, Steve with
35%, and Kathy with 30%. The second most recognized contribution factor was the
graduate training programs that include the internship year. Both Don and Kathy were
graduates of the MAT program at SGU. Both Kathy and Steve believe that graduate
work contributes 40% to their teaching models. Terry thinks that her graduate training
contributes 20% to her teaching model, and Don 15%.

All of them believe that their undergraduate training did not contribute that much
into their teaching approaches; this factor contributes between 5%—20%. Terry thinks that
life contributes to her teaching approach 25%. Steve believes that science conferences,
reading, and journals (professional events) contribute to his teaching package about 5%.
Kathy believes, “workshops you’ve attended. Things that you’ve done outside of any
classroom. Um, places you’ve gone. Reading you do at home. . .educational, things you
watch on TV,” contribute to her teaching approach approximately 10%. She referred to
these contributions as “miscellaneous.”

However, Kathy (who had 13 years prior career as medical technologist and
health care data processing consultant) does not mention any contribution of that
experience in her teaching approach. But in her NTI she reported that she used some of

real world examples from her prior career experience in teaching biology.

 

3 When we read this we need to remember as I mentioned in the methodology chapter
that the 2nd year of teaching for NGU graduates who participated in Salish Study was a
first year of teaching that they got paid for. For SGU it was a 2nd year of paid teaching.

201

 

 

l On-the-Job experience"
I Graduate

El Undergraduate

 

E3 Life
* Terry mentioned on-the-job experience twice in answering this
question, keeping track of her total as she answered. She first
stated that on-the job experience, "would be like 25%" As she
finished her image of the pie, she said, 'And then on-the-job stuff
would be, like, the other twenty." It seems unlikely that she
intended to count the job experience twice.

 

Figure 2: Factors Identifiedbyi Terry that
Contribute to Her Teaching Approach
(NGU)

 

 

I On-the-job experience
I Graduate

D Undergraduate

 

 

Professional events

 

 

 

 

Figure 3: Factors ldentifieid by Steve
that Contribute to His Teaching
Approach (NGU)

202

 

I On-the-Job experience
I Graduate (MAT)

El Undergraduate

 

 

 

 

Figure 4: Factors Identified by Don that
Contribute to His Teaching Approach
(SGU)

l¥gm ,. __ ,__, ,

 

 

 

 

I On-the-Job experience
I Graduate (MAT)

El Undergraduate

 

Miscellaneous

 

 

 

 

Figure 5: Factors Identified by Kathy
that Contribute to Her Teaching
Approach (SGU)

 

 

 

203

To address some of these linkages in depth, I divided this section into two parts.
The first one, focuses on linkages among findings from question one, science content
program features and teachers’ characteristics. The second part focuses on linkages
among findings from question one, teacher education program features and teachers’

characteristics.

Linkages among Findings from Question One, Scignce Content Course Features,
and Teachers’ Characteristics

The study found that the match between Steve and Kathy’s knowledge and
beliefs, and their teaching performance about science was not so strong. Steve mostly
displayed teacher-centered teaching performance with some aspects of conceptual
teaching style, while his knowledge and beliefs turned out to be student-centered with
some aspects of teacher-centered. Kathy displayed teacher-centered teaching style and
expressed conceptual and students-centered teaching beliefs about science content.
However, Terry and Don showed more consistency between their knowledge and beliefs,
and their teaching performance. Terry displayed and expressed teacher-centered teaching
styles. Don displayed conceptual and student-centered teaching performance, while he
expressed conceptual teaching beliefs. However, he did infrequently display and express
some aspects of teacher-centered approaches.

All of the teachers were taught science in large university classes. Mostly, the
audience of these classes were all science majors (i.e., pre-medical majors). Steve and
Terry had one class that was designed to help prospective secondary science teachers to

reflect on their learning of some science content. The science lab (ASC 409) covered

204

topics in physics, chemistry, and biology. Don took some classes that were designed for
teachers and taught within teacher education program at SGU. This program offers
classes in applied sciences. For example, within this program they teach applied courses
like chemistry, biology, physics, earth science, and STS (Science, Technology, and
Society).

All of the four new science teachers agreed that the objectives of the science
courses that they experienced in the science disciplinary departments were content-
oriented. Instructors delivered most science content to their students by using “lecture”
as the most common instructional strategy in their teaching. As Jean4reported in her
interview, the introductory chemistry course at NGU, “is designed to teach the traditional
objectives of general chemistry.”

The new teachers believe that these science classes taught at both institutions
(N GU & SGU) covered too many topics, ideas, and concepts. For example, Steve
described a typical science course that he experienced at NGU by saying, “It was pretty
content-intensive. ..[they were] trying to cover as much material as possible.” Don
reported almost the same thing when he described his typical science class that he
experienced at SGU by saying, “It was pretty much. . .cram as much stuff in your brain as
possible.” Terry added more to that by saying, “It was to get science content into your
head, or science skills, or um, an attitude about science.”

Kathy who graduated in 1978 with a biology major and chemistry minor, reported

that the objectives of science classes were, “basic background knowledge.” She also felt

 

4 Jean is a faculty member with a dual appointment between the colleges of education
and science who studied the introductory chemistry course.

205

that it was unnecessary to attend some of the science classes because she, “could pretty
much use the book and teach [her] self kind of out of the books.”

This view toward science course objectives was confirmed by some of the science
faculty at SGU. One of them said that the objective of his college physics course, “is to
give the students an overall picture of physics from Newton down to the most modern
development of what physics is all about or what it has been all about.” Another biology
instructor who taught a two semester course (plants and animals) said that the primary
objective of this course is, “to give students foundation in all aspects of biology.”
However, the general chemistry course instructor, reported that the primary objective for
his course was focusing on, “the basis for a physical model for understanding how
molecules work.”

Delivery of that much information within a certain period of time (e.g., one
semester or two) influenced the way by which these courses taught. To cover as much
content, science instructors were perceived as teaching these concepts as separate from
each other. The complexity of the existing relationships among these concepts was
perceived as absent from their teaching. However, the focus was on the superficial
relationships among these concepts. Usually, in these science classes the connections
among relationships were represented in mathematical formulas. This is especially true
in chemistry and physics courses where instructors focus their teaching on these
mathematical formulas and how to solve problems from a mathematical point of view,
instead of teaching for conceptual understanding. While these are powerful ways to show
connections, in the minds of professors, their meaning did not carry over to the new

teachers.

206

Moreover, the connections between prospective science teachers’ learning in the
science disciplinary departments and real world applications were not strongly addressed
as a major goal of teaching science at either institution. Only one chemistry instructor at
SGU reported that the objectives of a course [chemistry XIX] were more “practical
applications”, as he says:

“[The Chemistry XIX] course is more oriented toward the technical features, what

chemistry does for us, what chemistry does for society, how chemistry help us to

provide energy sources, provides material that are useful for building buildings,
for cement for example, ceramics, semi-conductors” (Preservice Program

Interview-Science Faculty Form, 1996).

Science in these science courses was taught as two separate components; science
content and science process. The integration between these two parts of science was not
addressed strongly in these courses. More importantly science process was not a well
developed component of science courses, and it is remote from new teachers’
comprehension (Gallagher, 1991). Students were rarely offered chances to explain,
predict, and interpret data in order to construct their own understanding in these typical
science classes, because instructors were concerned about class size, time, amount of
content, and etc.

To make this kind of integration it is important to connect between the lab and the
lecture. Furthermore, the lab should be designed as an inquiry to precede the lecture
(Drwin & Pestel, 1992). However, labs and lecture were not well integrated at either
institution. However, there were some exceptions. When new secondary science
teachers were asked, “What science courses or experiences stand out in your mind as

particularly important to you and why?” Steve response’s was, “it seemed like the lab

tied into lecture part of class instead of being completely separate.” Terry liked her

207

physical chemistry class and Don liked his astronomy class, because the instructors
covered a lot of demonstrations in these two classes. In addition, Don liked his
endocrinology lab more than lecture because he did some experiments on rats. For
example, he did work, “kind of close to kind of research,” to test the effect of hormone
injection on rats.

All four teachers agreed that the association between the lab and lecture is
essential for them to understand main ideas, concepts, and the relationships among them
in any science discipline. In Don’s science program, he experienced three or four of
these courses and felt that he learned a lot from them. He said, “. . .there was a lot of
learning in there [labs] I think than probably... lectures.” However, Steve and Terry,
who graduated from NGU, did not experience many courses that fulfilled their scientific
needs. For example, Steve reported that he did not experience the tie between the lab and
the lecture, “. . .in most science classes [he] had,” in order to help him, “link ideas
between the two.” Also, Terry says:

“The labs I took at [NGU] were also important. I learned techniques to use the

lab and learned some concepts as well [in the lecture] (unfortunately) the lab

didn’t always correspond with the courses” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

When new secondary science teachers were asked, “How often were cooperative
learning techniques used in your science content courses?” Terry, Steve, and Don
reported that they experienced cooperative learning techniques in their science programs
only in science labs. For example Don said, “in most [science] classes not at all. Except
for like in the labs.” Terry said, “. . .in the labs, most of the time. . .in the lecture halls,
never.” Steve, said, “I guess in the lab sections. . .there was some sort of cooperative

learning. . .l’d say forty percent of the time.”

208

However, they did not experience the real nature of the cooperative learning
process (i.e., not all group members were involved in the process of constructing their
understanding as a group). In fact, they mostly experienced working with a lab partner
and/or within small groups. The nature of the group work was mostly collaborative,
instead of cooperative. Usually students divided the work among thems.

For example, one of them would be responsible for running the experiment and
collecting data; another would prepare solutions; a third one would do the calculations. If
there is a write-up on the lab, it is most common that students will divide the work among
them in the same way. It appears that the reason for the collaboration among students in
labs is to reduce the time and effort, rather than to enrich the quality of the learning that
comes from interaction over ideas.

Again as mentioned before, Don mostly displayed conceptual and student-
centered teaching performance, while he expressed conceptual teaching beliefs. This
study found other factors that related to Don’s background that could contribute to his
knowledge, beliefs, and performance about his science content teaching style. In his
interview (NTI, 1996), Don reported that he likes physics because,

“ ...there was a lot of math involved in it and [he likes] figuring out mathematical

problems. . .physics had a lot of good, um, demonstrations,...[he] always enjoyed

helping [in the demonstrations].”

This quote reflects additional aspects relate to Don as a person, not with the

science program content courses that he experienced. First of all, Don has a positive

 

5 These notes are reported by my own observations as a chemistry lab instructor and
coordinator for two introductory chemistry lab courses in one of the residential science
department at NGU.

209

attitude toward physics which most of the new non-physics major teachers do not have.
Don had a biology major and chemistry/physics minor. As we know, science educators
and scientists agreed that it is essential to have positive attitude toward the subjects that
you teach. Second, Don loves to do mathematical problems this might facilitate his
understanding of the physics content. I am not arguing here that would help him to
transfer this knowledge to his students, but it is an important prerequisite to have a good
background in mathematics in order to understand physics, based on the way physics has
been taught in the university courses. Finally, Don is a curious person who is willing to
help, ask, and do actions.

So, when Don had the freedom to videotape any three consecutive lessons, his
choice was a physics topic. However, Terry and Steve chose to videotape classes in
which they did not have a strong background in the science content. For example, Steve
had less confidence in his chemistry background and he taught ideal gas law; and Terry
had less confidence in physics and chemistry and she taught energy transformations and

applications.

Link 7e‘ mon' Fin oin'sfrim O sr’on On T 2 hr . 2': c- m“
anfleachers’ chmteristics

Generally speaking, the study found that the objectives in the teacher education
courses at both institutions (N GU & SGU) were diverse and more comprehensive than
science disciplinary course objectives. For example, the course objectives of general

education courses at SGU were broad. These courses were designed to provide

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prospective teachers with an overview of educational theories and philosophy, discuss
students’ needs, and model a variety of teaching methods and strategies.

Kathy and Don confirmed the broadness of these course objectives. For example
Kathy said, “it may serve a purpose in kind of, kind of briefing you to what education as
a broad field is all about.” However, Don reported that these courses did not help him
that much in his teaching. For Don these courses, “were pretty boring to me. I didn’t
look forward to them much.”

At NGU the objectives of general education courses were broad, too, but the
focus was mainly on teaching and learning to diverse learners in diverse context. For
example, the course goals and objectives for [TE250] were the,

“. . .examination of American diversity and it social consequences. . .look at the

variety of effects that diversity has on schools, and that schools have on the

diverse array of students attending them. . .examine the link between equality and
number of social characteristics. . .look. . .ways in which educators and citizens can
reshape schools” (TE250 Course syllabus).

The objectives of science education courses in both institutions were more
specific toward teaching and learning science. The faculty members, Don, and Kathy
agreed that the primary goal of science method courses at SGU was to provide
prospective science teachers with knowledge based on research. In other words, the
primary goals for these courses were to reduce the gap between theory and practice, or to
transfer theory into practice. In addition to these objectives, the faculty members
mentioned constructivist teaching and STS.

Steve and Terry agreed that the common objectives for science education courses

at NGU were based in developing attitudes regarding education as a profession and

science for all. As Steve said, “they [faculty] tried to instill in us that it [education] was a

211

profession.” In addition to these objectives, the faculty members described a wide range
of teaching objectives reflecting a constructivist orientation.

The study found that the teachers’ performance, and their knowledge and beliefs
about their actions inside the classroom were not a close match, except for Don. All of
them expressed mostly student-centered knowledge and beliefs about their actions inside
the classroom, while their teaching performance ranged from teacher-centered to student-
centered. Terry and Kathy mostly displayed teacher-centered teaching performance
styles in terms of their actions. Steve demonstrated both teacher-centered and
conceptual; Don displayed both conceptual and student—centered teaching performance
styles. This may be the result of greater emphasis in science education courses on
developing the contemporary vision of science teaching contained in National Standards
and insufficient emphasis on developing the skills to implement this vision.

All four prospective science teachers reported that they used a variety of
assessment methods in their science education courses. For example, the common
assessment methods that they experienced in their science education courses were papers,
interviews, presentations, projects, and student teaching. In addition to that, Terry and
Steve reported that they wrote journals often in their science education courses.

All of them practiced teaching in their science education courses before they
became interns. Terry and Steve had about 90 hours of classroom experience at the high
school levels before they became interns. Terry and Steve had such experiences that in
TE301, TE401, and TE402. Steve to some degree admitted that these courses were

helpful for acquiring teaching experience.

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Don and Kathy had more than 130 hours of field experience through science
methods courses (I, II, III). However, Kathy could not remember if she had any field
experience in her general pedagogical classes (as an undergraduate in the 19705) before
she began student teaching. Don also reported that he had a little teaching experience in
his general pedagogical courses.

Don and Kathy had different views about their teaching experience in these
science methods courses. For Don this experience was “actual teaching” more than
observing others teaching. For Kathy, the methods III course experience was not so good
because the teacher she was assigned to, was not a good model teacher. For her, the
Methods 111 course did not, “seem like it was a period of real growth.” Yet, in this course
students are supposed to accumulate 75 hours of teaching experience.

The internship in teacher education at NGU was one year long. During this year
prospective science teachers were assigned to a school for nearly full-time teaching.
Throughout the internship, prospective science teachers stay in one placement working
under the supervision of collaborating teachers and university staff. The internship was
both part of separate courses to address management issues and integrated into existing
courses to continue development of effective models and techniques of teaching.

For example, the structure of the TB 802 course was feedback from interns and
in-class discussions, meeting interns with field instructors, demonstrations and
discussions, topic/activity of the day (this was conducted in small groups), and needs
assessment, (TB 802 Syllabus, Fall 1994). The instructors of TE 802 and TB 804

organized their courses around collections of issues (e.g., classroom management,

213

portfolio, unit planning, and assessment) that prospective secondary science teachers
would face during the internship year.

Student teaching in the teacher education program at SGU was 16 weeks long.
Prospective secondary science teachers were assigned to teach in middle and high school
for one semester. It was part of a course that consists of 30 hours seminar and 16 weeks
of student teaching. Prospective secondary science teachers were required to have
teaching experience in different grade levels through their science methods courses:
elementary, ninth, and middle school/junior high. The elementary teaching experience
was most frequently in kindergarten. During their student teaching, prospective
secondary science teachers were able to reflect on their own teaching on the seminar part
of this course.

Even though it is a program requirement to teach for one semester or one year, it
turned out that each one of the four teachers had different experiences. Terry and Steve
valued their student teaching experience because they had a chance to talk to and work
closely with “another science teacher.” Having a professional secondary science
teacher(s) within the course instructors team could help narrow down the course
objectives and course instructional strategies to be closer to the real classroom setting.
For example, interns and instructors would discus issues, ideas, and share information
that sounded valuable to interns to know and practice. This kind of interactions could be
a useful strategy that might help interns construct their pedagogical content knowledge.

Another factor that shape their teaching experience is the school context. For
example, Steve did his student teaching in an innovative high school where the field

instructor was his collaborative teacher, too. She watched his teaching, “maybe six

214

times,” and gave him direct and written feedback, “right after the class.” The science
department at the high school has a long history of deep involvement in NGU’s teacher
education program and Steve’s collaborating teacher is perhaps the most involved of the
teachers. Furthermore, she has won several awards for her outstanding teaching.

At this school, Steve felt that the, “staff and faculty at [school name] was real
helpful.” So, Steve felt that he was a “contributing member.” This feeling, especially
during student teaching, is essential to help prospective teachers to gain self-confidence.
Also, it would ease and open communications between interns and inservice teachers.

For Kathy student teaching, “was a real good experience.” But in the school in
which she did her student teaching there were a lot of, “discipline problems,” because the
school principal was new and he had a lot of personal problems and he was not there,
“even half of the time by the end of the semester.” Kathy mentioned that some teachers
tried to keep the discipline under control. It is clear that doing student teaching within
such a school context could minimize the benefit from this experience. However, Kathy
reported that regular classroom activities “were really no problem,” but any out of school
activities such as field trips were difficult to organize.

Another factor that could influence teachers’ knowledge, beliefs, and performance
is a teacher’s characteristics. Don, who experienced almost the same science education
programs as Kathy at the same time in SGU, ended up by having an “excellent” field
experience for the science education part. It appears that there is something more
important than program influences to his teaching and performance. It is self-attributes
that Don has. For example, Don is a self—motivated person. Whenever, Don was asked

to observe teaching or visit schools he was asking to teach, and he did that in any field

215

experience that he had. He said, “the first day I ever went into any of the experiences...
[I] asked that I’d like to have some teaching experience whether I screw up or not.” He
taught in all of his field experiences. Furthermore, he taught at “every level,”
kindergarten, junior high, and high school.

Don was an “initiative person.” In the high school to which he was assigned, the
cooperating teacher’s son had a heart attack and died. He took initiative when this
happened and took over her class. He says:

“. . .when I went to the high school and junior high, I taught them and we took an

organized big field trip and took all the seventh and eighth grades out to the

[River name]. High school, urn, student teaching, I did some extra stufir out there

and got to teach them kind of my own initiative about the student teaching, I got

to, I started out teaching several classes and in my situation, when my
cooperative teacher’s son had that heart attack and died, she left and I just took
over her class. They had a substitute come in but I just had it worked out with the

school that I just take over her class until she came back. ..I ended up having a

pretty good teaching experience for me because I was kind of thrown into being a

full-time teacher even though I was still in school. But that was really a unique

experience so I felt like I’d had a, I’d been kind of tested on the battle ground for
my first review” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

It is clear that Don took the first step to substitute for that teacher because he
realized that being involved in teaching is one of the most important tools to grasp the
craft of teaching (Holmes Group, 1990; American Association for the Advancement of
Science, 1998).

Also, Don mentioned in his videotaped lessons that he went to an X-ray center to
get some X-ray films to share the real world applications of magnetic spectrum with his
students. Don reported that he had a thoughtful conversation with the radiologist

physician about how to interpret these X-rays films and how to make use of that

professional knowledge in his teaching. This kind of action indicated that Don is a

216

curious person who is willing to ask and learn from different resources, especially,
professional people.

It is common that new secondary science teachers, especially in their first or
second year of teaching, are not ready to have this level of communication with
professional people in different disciplines. However, Don makes his teaching more
realistic and to some extent makes his students’ learning connected with the real world
applications by contacting professionals. These kinds of applications that Don made in
his teaching between content knowledge and outside school applications (i.e., real world
applications) could be interpreted as teaching for external applications (Cajas, 1998),
which be good because students are able to use school science in their out-of-school
experiences.

In the students’ actions domain, the study found that the beliefs of the four
teachers’ were more consistent with their actions than in any other domain. Terry, Kathy,
and Don expressed student-centered knowledge and beliefs, and displayed student-
centered teaching performance, too. However, Terry and Kathy displayed some aspects
of teacher-centered teaching. Steve displayed conceptual teaching, while, he expressed
conceptual and student-centered teaching beliefs.

The study found that there is a relationship between these outcomes and some of
their experiences when they were prospective teachers in the science methods courses.
Prospective secondary science teachers were asked, “How often were cooperative
learning techniques used in your teacher education courses?” According to their

responses to this question, all of them reported that they mostly experienced “cooperative

217

learning” in their teacher education courses, especially in the methods courses. Steve had
this experience, “seventy five percent of the time,” Terry had this experience,

“More often in my methods classes than my general classes. Every methods class

had at least part of the time in groups to model group work. We also discussed

ways to use groups in the classroom” (NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

Kathy’s experience in cooperative learning was in methods courses that she took
at SGU. During her methods 11 course, she worked with two other students in designing
and teaching a unit (e.g., food and nutrition) for a few days out in schools. She referred
to this experience as teaching in an, ”artificial setting.” The nature of her group work
that she was in was not always positive because, “the other two student teachers and I
weren’t always in agreement over what we should do.” However, Don, who graduated
from the same program, used the term “family” to describe his cooperative learning
experience in his methods courses. Within this program there were about 15 prospective
secondary science teachers who went through a two year program. So, according to
Don, within this group of prospective teachers,

“..there was a lot of cooperative learning there just by the fact that we were with

each other for so long that we got comfortable sharing things with each other and

whether that was the objectives of the program or not, that’s something that’s like
cooperative learning that kind of came out on it’s own maybe rather than going to
class and having them actually doing a cooperative learning activity. But the way

the program is set up, I think cooperative learning is just natural " (N TI, 1996).

[emphasis added]

So this experience helped Don to share with other prospective secondary science

teachers ideas, articles, and other resources helpful to teach specific science topics. This

kind of interaction within groups could help them to acquire what Grossman, (1990); and

Magnusson, et. al (1994) called topic specific teaching strategies.

218

However, the experience of cooperative learning that the four prospective
secondary science teachers practiced in their teacher education programs did influence
their knowledge and beliefs about their student’ actions more than their teaching
performance.

One reason, could be that the instructors of teacher education programs structured
activities for their students to work in small groups, but they may not have demonstrated
good models of “cooperative learning techniques.” So, the prospective teachers went out
from these classes with ideas of using cooperative learning and small groups in their own
teaching without acquiring the skills that allowed them to use this teaching strategy
effectively to promote students’ understanding. This argument fits with what the director
of education center at SGU believes about the nature of cooperative learning in the

science education seminars, “may be it is not exactly cooperative learning.”

Lim' in Te Th In 11 i

o Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is an essential component in any teacher
education program that structured to prepare prospective teachers to teach for
understanding. However, this study was not able to find any significant outcomes
which related to PCK for each new secondary science teacher. The two major
instruments that were used in this study: TPPI and STAM-Science Version were not
able to support the study with enough data to draw any conclusion about their PCK.
To report finding about PCK, either these instruments need to be modified according
to one of the PCK models that are well known in teacher education (for, example,

Grossman, 1990; or Magnusson, et. a1, 1994), or new instruments need to be

219

developed to be used in conjunction with STAM, TPPI and the other interview

protocols.

The using of supercodes to describe teacher’s knowledge and beliefs was
problematic in coding teachers’ beliefs. For example, in the environment domain
there is only one question in the TPPI interview used to code teacher’s knowledge
and beliefs into two categories teacher-centered or student-centered. This question
was, “ What are some of the thing you believe your students value most about their
educational experience in your classroom?” The same problem exists in the diversity
domain where there was only one question that coded into three categories; didactic;
transitional; or conceptual to describe teacher’s knowledge and beliefs. The
prospective secondary science teachers where asked, “How do you accommodate
students with special needs in your classroom?” In the context domain there were
three questions were coded into two categories teacher-centered or student-centered.
A related problem with the supercodes was responses that were did not fit the
conceptual frameworks of teacher-centered, conceptual, or student-centered teaching
were force fitted into those categories. For example, teachers who identified time as a
constraint were coded as didactic teachers in the supercodes. This is a gross

oversimplification introduced into the process of data analysis.

Using the video portfolio to describe teaching performance limited the researcher
ability to analyze teacher’s teaching performance. In the videotaped lessons the focus
was mostly on teacher. So, in the classes where students work in groups it was
difficult to hear much from student-student interactions or the interaction between

teacher and students while they were working in groups. So, to overcome this

220

problem for future research, I recommend either direct classroom observations or
careful attention to videotape quality which may necessitate providing better

equipment to teachers for recording their classes.

This study found that Steve and Terry taught in the areas in which they lack a strong
background, which differed the other two cases who related areas of strength for
videotaping. However, none of the four new secondary science teachers taught from

their majors (i.e., biology) in their videotaped classes.

Terry taught in a very difficult school context where virtually all of her students were
classified as at risk and many were also classified as special education students. She
taught in an urban setting and had no classroom of her own. As a result whatever
materials she used in teaching had to be hauled from room to room on a cart. The
teaching context for Terry was very different from that of the other three new
teachers. As a result comparisons among the four new teachers have diminished

efficacy.

Information about Steve’s background was not accessible because he is Japan
teaching English as a second language. So, no current e-mail interview was done

with him.

Data from CLES was not available for all teachers and their students. This

diminished the utility of this data source.

SGU and NGU graduates were at different experience levels because of the way
experience was counted. SGU graduates had a semester of supervised student

teaching plus a full year of paid contract work prior to the year studied. NGU

221

graduates had their internship year behind them prior to the year studied. NGU

graduates were in their first contract year during the period studied.

222

 

CHAPTER 6

RE EW F THE T DY DI SSION F THE EAR H TION
IMPLICATIONS OF THE FINDINGS, AND RECOMMENDATIONS

F QR FURTHER RESEARCH

Review of The Study

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of teachers'
characteristics and secondary science teacher preparation programs on new high school
chemistry teachers' knowledge, beliefs, and performance. Reviewing the literature
indicated that little research has been done to explore the influences of teachers’
characteristics and science teacher preparation programs on their knowledge, beliefs, and
teaching performance. Salish was the only study that addressed these issues on a national
level, but it was an exploratory study that was broadly focused on the relationships
among students’ outcomes, teachers’ knowledge and beliefs, teachers’ performance, and
teacher education program features. Another study that was done in conjunction with
Salish (Tillotson, 1997) explored the connection between the important features of the
Iowa-UPSTEP program and performance characteristics of new teachers (N Ts). These
NTs were graduates of the program in the early stages of their teaching career (first 1-3
years).

However, my study is the only study that aimed to explore in-depth the
connections among four domains: teachers’ characteristics; science teacher preparation
programs; teacher’s knowledge and beliefs, and teachers’ performance. To explore these

connections, a cross-case analysis was done between the high school chemistry teachers

223

 

who graduated from the two teacher preparation programs. Further cross-case analysis
was done among the four cases to compare the two different programs.

The findings presented in chapters three, four, and five suggest that the teacher
preparation programs in the two institutions have a number of key features which were
found to be linked to different teaching styles (i.e., teacher centered, conceptual, and
student-centered) that was displayed through the new high school chemistry teachers’
performance or expressed in their knowledge and beliefs. These findings are:

0 The course objectives in the teacher education programs at both institutions were
diverse and more comprehensive than science disciplinary program course objectives.

0 All four of the teachers and most of the faculty interviewed confirmed that the
connections between prospective science teachers’ learning and real world
applications were not clearly addressed as a major goal in science courses at either
institution.

0 Prospective science teachers did not experience cooperative learning in their science
classes.

0 All new secondary science teachers reported that they used a variety of assessment
methods in their science education courses.

0 All four of the teachers identified that learning from on-the-job experience or field
experience in their teacher preparation programs was a crucial factor in developing
their teaching models. The year long internship in the teacher education program at

NGU was valued by Steve and Terry.

224

 

0 While all four of the secondary science teachers hold student-centered beliefs about
teaching, only one effectively demonstrated student-centered teaching.

0 The new secondary science teachers did not reflect a deep conceptual understanding
of the scientific concepts that they taught in their video portfolios.

Also, the study found that there was a relationship among these teachers’
characteristics and their knowledge, beliefs, and teaching performance. These findings add
an important contribution to the existing research base in science teacher education
because it highlighted the features of science teacher preparation programs that
contributed to different teaching styles.

In this chapter, the implications for several groups of individuals will be
discussed. Specifically, implications for teacher education programs, science teachers,
professional education faculty, and school administrators were made. The implications
are drawn from the most significant findings which represent a limited group of those that
were presented through chapters three, four, and five. The opportunity for making
generalizations does not exist (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Stake, 1995; Yin, 1984) because the
case study design does not represent a sample from which we can generalize into
populations. The implications of the findings from this study may very well transcend
the two teacher preparation programs that were studied. The findings should be
evaluated by faculty and administrators to determine their applicability to their local

institutional setting.

225

Discussien ef The Researeh Questions

This study sought to investigate the following research questions:
1) What is the training of new high school chemistry teachers? In order to answer this
question, the following sub questions need to be answered:

a) What is the variety of subject matter background they experience during their

pre-service education?

b) What kind of courses did they take?

c) What kind of chemistry training and experience did they have?

d) What is their background in mathematics and physics?

e) What is their pedagogical training in teacher education?

2) What are the features of the teacher preparation programs these teachers experienced?

3) What are their beliefs about the nature of science and teaching science?

4) What are the key features of the classroom performance of these new high school
chemistry teachers?

5) What kind of preparation experience and knowledge contributes to a teacher-centered,
conceptual, or a student-centered teacher?

All science teacher preparation programs are intended to prepare new high school
chemistry teachers, as well as science teachers more generally, to be effective teachers in
the classroom. The reality is that this fails to occur in many cases. The reason for that
failure has been attributed to a number of factors within programs that are not adequate to

make changes in the minds of prospective teachers (Hewson, et. al, 1992) and to the

226

socializing influences operating within school cultures (Zeichner & Gore, 1990; Zeichner
& Tabchnick, 1981; Anderson & Smith, 1987).

In the case of Terry and Steve, the NGU program influenced their teaching
performance, knowledge, and beliefs differently. The same is true of the two cases from
SGU (Don and Kathy). Terry, Steve, Don, and Kathy shared some similarities in how
the important factors of their teacher preparation programs shaped their teaching
philosophy and behaviors. Terry faced conditions in her school environment which

influenced her teaching in ways more pronounced than the other teachers.

esti 1°W ' h riin n ih ei r?
This study found that the four NTs had biology as a major and chemistry as a
minor. Don had physics as a second minor. The training in chemistry for these four
teachersl was through general chemistry courses and labs, organic chemistry (1 & II) and
their labs. Kathy also took courses in qualitative analysis and lab, and biochemistry and
lab. Terry took two courses inorganic chemistry with labs, and one course physical
chemistry. Don through his teacher education program took two courses in applied

physics, and applied biology, and general astronomy.

 

' As I mentioned before, data about Steve’s background was not accessible because he is
in Japan teaching English as a second language. He was with Terry in many of the same
teacher education classes, and it is quite likely the shared many of their science content
courses (they have the same major and minor and both graduated from NGU in the same
year).

227

While the four teachers were biology majors, none of these teachers submitted
video portfolios of biology teaching. Steve is the only one who taught chemistry in his
three videotaped lessons. However he admitted that his background in chemistry was not
strong. Also, Terry taught a physics topic while she admitted that her background in
physics was not strong. As an undergraduate, she took one year of introductory physics
with lab.

Among the four cases, Don, who taught electromagnetic spectrum to his students
took 8 semester hours in physics plus he took the applied physics course that was
offered through science teacher education program at SGU.

The nature of the science courses that they experienced in their science component
of their programs was content-oriented. Teaching in these courses reflected an “anti—
model” of constructivist teaching. Generally speaking, science faculty in the two
programs used lecture as a common teaching strategy in their teaching. Moreover, they
were perceived by these NTs at teaching science concepts in a superficial way, without
focusing on representation of the complex relationships that connect concepts together.
Moreover, the concepts generally were not applied to the “real world” of students’
experience. Connections between prospective secondary teachers’ learning in the science
disciplinary content courses and real world applications were not strongly addressed as a
major goal of teaching science in either of the institutions. This lack of connection helps
entrench these prospective teachers’ beliefs about the isolation between teaching or

learning science and students’ lives.

228

 

Furthermore, the separation between the lab and the lecture influenced these
teachers’ perceptions about the nature of the lab. They perceived the science lab as a
vehicle to confirm scientific facts, laws, and theories, not as a teaching strategy that would
help them to construct their understanding (i.e., lab was not seen as an inquiry-oriented)

(Erwin & Pestel, 1992; Vieira & Oliveira, 1997).

u ti n2: Wh rethefeaturesof h t r r r i
these tegehers experienced?

The outcomes of the programs’ analysis showed that the new secondary science
teachers experienced more diverse and comprehensive course objectives in their teacher
education courses than in science disciplinary program courses. The common goal of
science methods courses at SGU was to provide prospective science teachers with
knowledge based on educational research. Using research-based knowledge in teaching
science method courses would reduce the gap between theory and practice. At NGU, the
common goals for the science education courses were to teach science for all students and
to teach that teaching is a profession. Teaching science for all students is a requirement to
promote scientific literacy (AAAS, Science for All Americans, 1990). Furthermore, to
teach all students successfully, teachers need to be aware of students’ unique needs related
to their learning.

All four of the prospective science teachers reported that they used a variety of
assessment methods in their science education classes. For example, the most common

assessment methods that they experienced in their science education courses were papers,

229

interviews, presentations, project, and student teaching. However, NGU graduates used
to write journals more often in their science education courses in addition to the methods
employed at SGU. Using different methods to assess students’ understanding is one of
the most common outcomes in science education research that would help focus on
students’ misconceptions and students’ learning.

A very important feature in the teacher education program at NGU is the one year
internship program. Through this program prospective teachers practice their own
teaching for a year under supervision of field instructors and collaborating teachers. At
SGU prospective teacher had the chance to experience teaching for only one semester. In
addition to that, the four science teachers had some teaching experience in their science
method courses prior to student teaching or the internship.

The reform agenda in science education asked to increase prospective science
teachers’ practice in schools (AAAS: Blueprints for reform, 1998), in order to help them
gain first hand experience in teaching science. This teaching experience through their
internship would help prospective teachers to integrate between content of science and
students’ learning (Anderson, et. al, 1998). However, some factors would minimize the
benefit from this teaching experience like school context, collaborating teachers, teaching
loads, teaching out of their majors, and students’ attitudes toward learning science.

In both institutions, the coherence between science disciplinary departments and
teacher education programs seemed weak. It was described by faculty members and

prospective teachers as informal and not strong.

230

 

However, at NGU there is growing communication between faculty from both
sides. Recent initiatives have strengthened this considerably since Steve and Terry
graduated. There are structures in place to facilitate communication and collaboration
between the faculties of the College of Education and the College of Arts and Science.
There has been a major grant recently awarded that stems in part from this improved
communication between the two colleges.

It was clear that prospective science teachers experienced a wider variety of
instructional strategies in teacher education courses, specially in science methods courses
when contrasted with science courses. They experienced small group discussion, teaching,
group projects, group work, and cooperative learning. In science courses lecture was the

dominant teaching method.

Water?

In general, the study found that all of the new high school chemistry teachers hold
student-centered teaching beliefs as dominant, but they also hold some aspects of
conceptual and teacher-centered beliefs. This provides evidence that these prospective
teachers had consistent knowledge and beliefs about their teaching. However, their
knowledge and beliefs about how they perceive their science content were shifted away
from student-centered teaching beliefs. For example, in their knowledge and beliefs about
how they view science content, Steve, Terry, and Kathy reflect that they see science as

two separate entities: content and process (AAAS, 1990; American Chemical Society,

231

 

1990; Kirk & Layman, 1996). Their image of science may have been acquired from the
long experiences of learning science K-20 (Ben-Peretz, 1995; Lortie, 1975).

On the other hand, the new high school chemistry teachers in the other domains
(e.g., students’ actions) mostly expressed student-centered teaching beliefs. For example,
they believe that students can learn in different ways, and they acknowledge that learners
are diverse. They recognized that there were students with special needs in their classes.

They expressed different ways of dealing with those students’ needs.

 

 

Question 4: What are the key features of the aw
of s n w ' s h ' ?

The outcomes of the video portfolio analysis for Terry, Steve, and Kathy suggest
that they have not have achieved a degree of success in implementing student-centered
teaching practices. They displayed teacher-centered teaching performance. However, Don
achieved a degree of conceptual and student-centered teaching practices. Steve sometimes
displayed a conceptual teaching style. Terry was plagued by students’ disruptions and
off-task behaviors while attempting to teach in a student-centered manner.

This discrepancy in these prospective teachers teaching practices could be
influence by school contextual factors. For example, Terry taught in a school where most
of her students could be considered as students with special needs. She taught in an urban
setting in classes consisting almost entirely of at-risk students. However, Terry in her
first year of teaching (in the internship year) displayed conceptual and student-centered

teaching style. While she secured a job in the same school as where she completed her

232

 

internship, the nature of the classes she taught in the two years was quite different. In
here internship year, she taught primarily biology to students in the college track. In her
first year as a professional, her student population was almost entirely non-college bound.
After completing her first year as a professional in this setting, she moved to a suburban
district well known for its innovative teaching practices and she is thriving in the new
environment.

Kathy taught in school that lacks resources. For example, she could not find
enough textbooks for students to do their homework. She did not even have an overhead
projector to present some transparencies in her biology class.

Other factors could contribute to the teachers’ performance is teachers’ subject
matter background which is essential for the purpose of teaching (Hashweh, 1985; Latz &
Lederrnan, 1996; Wilson, et. al, 1987). Terry and Steve reported that they chose to teach
topics in their videotaped lessons that they have difficulty with in order to get feedback
from Salish staff to improve their teaching in these areas.

Another factor that might influence science teachers’ teaching is the amount of
content that they are supposed to cover during the school year. TIMSS (1997) study
indicated that in The United States science teachers in the 8th grade covered many concepts
within one year (about 60), while in the other countries like Japan teachers covered about
5 big ideas during the school year. In summary, TIMSS study as well as National
Research Council (i.e., National Science Education Standards) (1996) recommended that
science teachers cover less science content in order to teach it in depth. Furthermore,

many scholars recommended that more emphasis must be placed on science as a method,

233

not a collection of facts, and on the processes of investigation (Lloyed, 1994; Lloyed &

Spencer, 1994; Rickard, 1992; Spencer, 1994)

I s 'on ° Wh 'nu f , -ar io ‘X! Hrin e ano .-uwl-dw n ri- -~ 1:
teaeher—eentered, eeneeptual, er a student-eentered teaeher?

The study found that there were key features of the teacher preparation programs
or teachers’ characteristics that contribute to teacher-centered, conceptual, and student-
centered teaching styles. In general, the findings indicate that new high school chemistry
teachers have inconsistency between their knowledge, and beliefs, and their teaching
practice. Terry, Kathy, and Steve mostly hold student-centered teaching beliefs, while
they demonstrated an array of teaching styles that tended toward teacher-centered style.
However Steve sometimes displayed conceptual teaching. Don was the only one who
displayed and expressed student-centered teaching knowledge, beliefs, and performance.

All four of the teachers were taught science as undergraduates in large classes (i.e.,
800 students) with science majors. However, Steve and Terry attended one science
laboratory course for secondary science teacher candidates. In science classes,
prospective teachers were passive most of the time. The teaching environment in these
classes was teacher-centered. Instructors focused on delivering content to their students.
The connection between science content and science process was not strong. Real world
applications in prospective teachers’ learning were not often implemented in their college

science classes. The lab only occasionally connected to the lecture.

234

 

This way of learning science influenced new high school chemistry teachers’
knowledge, beliefs, and performance. Terry, Steve, and Kathy view science as two
separate components. Also, in their teaching they focused over the factual and
descriptive nature of scientific knowledge. However, Steve sometimes displayed some
conceptual teaching in his teaching. Don had some extra background in physics. He took
an applied physics class and an astronomy class, In these two classes Don had the

opportunity to experience the connection between science process and content to a grater

In :...-_ _...

extent than was the case in other science courses. In general his experience in science

- I“ Md: "F"

classes was almost the same as that of the other three cases.

 

All four of the teachers most commonly experienced small group and cooperative
learning in their science education courses. This experience influenced their teaching
knowledge and beliefs in terms of their students’ actions inside the classroom. All of
them in their videotaped lesson used small groups in their teaching, but they did not
always use it effectively. One interpretation of that is that as prospective teachers they
were not taught how to use these techniques to teach for students’ understanding. In
other words, the science education faculty might not model cooperative learning
effectively in their teaching, so, how can we expect that from prospective teachers?
Other possibility might be related to the time concerns, because using this method of
teaching needs more time and science teachers usually concerned about covering much
content (NCR, 1996; Rodriguez, 1998; TIMMS, 1997). Rodriguez (1998) confirmed that
high school science teachers face everyday the dilemma of managing the demands of a,

“content-laden curriculum.”

235

Another factor that seems to be crucial to prepare prospective science teachers
was the teaching experience that they had through their science education program. Don
believes that that experience contributed to his teaching model at an about 80%level,
whereas the other three NTs see it matching a smaller contributions. Whenever, he was
assigned to a field placement Don would ask to practice actual teaching and not to simply
observe teaching. Learning from experience was common among these four teachers.
However, Steve reported that it is important to have experience in education as well as
learning from experience. He used the metaphor, “Riding a tricycle before you ride a
bicycle.” This metaphor of a prospective teacher’s view indicates that the teacher
education courses are essential for prospective teachers to cultivate more from their
teaching practice to become professional science teachers.

On a quite different not, Don and Kathy did not show enough evidence that the
courses they took in the history and philosophy of science had an effect on their teaching

practice or in their knowledge and beliefs.

Im lication f The Fin in

The focus of this study was on the teacher preparation programs in two
institutions: NGU & SGU, its faculty, and new high school chemistry teachers who were
graduates from these programs. The case study design prohibits making sweeping
statements of implications for all science teacher preparation programs (Stake, 1995; Yin,
1984). This design would help researchers to generalize findings of the study to some

broader theories in the field of teacher preparation programs. The findings in chapters

236

three, four, and five were based on the researcher’s analysis of each participant’s data,
and those chapters attempted to describe their perspectives with respect to the research
questions. This must be taken into account when considering the implications of this
study.

One of the major implications drawn from this study is that the orientation of
science content classes needs to be changed in order to fulfill the needs of prospective
science teachers. Steve suggests in his TPPI interview that we should, “reassess
undergraduate college,” because science teaching in college is, “so geared towards the pre-
med type.” So, it is essential to restructure some science courses to focus more on
content knowledge for the purpose of teaching. To acquire this, science teachers need to
learn science in a classroom setting that encourages them to construct their understanding.
The matching between the lab and lecture is a helpful tool that integrates between science
content and science process. Also, making real world application could help break down
the abstract level of science concepts.

Another key implication which emerged from this study is that the faculty in
teacher education courses need to model constructivist teaching and give their students
essentail experience in practicing it . So, you cannot effectively teach constructivist
learning by lecturing about it. Shymansky (1992) asked that all facets of preservice
education programs should model constructivist teaching if we want new secondary
science teachers to implement that in their teaching. My study has shown the

inconsistency between new teachers’ beliefs and performance when they used

237

constructivist approaches in their teaching. For example, Steve wanted to experience

more hands-on instruction in all his college courses. He says:
“Well, it’s kind of like you get in the education classes and they tell you how much
of hands-on learning and then, you know,, then conceptualizing is so good and
then I think: If it ’s college professors teaching this why are no college courses like
that, or very rarely, you have college courses like that? So,. . .it would be great if
they could do that, if there were more hands-on type instruction. . .they say,
chemistry lab. . .you follow the recipe. . . .You mix what was supposed to be mixed
and you know, I don’t know if that ’s any diflerent than sitting in a lecture hall ”
(NTI, 1996). [emphasis added]

One important implication of this research is that learning from experience was
crucial learning tool addressed by all four teachers in this study. So, having teacher
education program with one full year of student teaching is a key feature in the program
that allow prospective teachers to test their own theories about teaching. All four of the
new teachers agreed on the need to expand the practice teaching time, especially in the
methods courses. This would provide great support for new teachers as they learn to use
more effective approaches to teaching. However, the level of accomplishment from this
experience is influenced by several factors; collaborating teachers, administrators; school
context; prospective teaches’ personal characteristics; and students’ behaviors. So, in
placing prospective science teachers in school these factors should be taken in account.

Finally, increasing the communication and collaboration between science
disciplinary departments and teacher education is important. One way is through small

group discussion that might lead to design courses that better combine content and

pedagogy, such as applied science courses for prospective teachers and collaborative

238

 

research projects to serve teachers’ needs. Don’s background who enhanced as a result of

applied science courses, and he exhibited more student-centered teaching styles.

Reeemmendatien fer Ferther Research

This study identified several important linkages among teacher preparation

program features in the two institutions (N GU & SGU), teachers’ characteristics,

teachers’ knowledge and beliefs, and teachers’ performance. But still there are several

areas which are in need for further investigation. The following list of recommendations

for further studies related to the preparation of prospective secondary science teachers:

Giving the fact that this study focused on new high school chemistry teachers,
further research is needed to cover other science disciplines like physics and biology.
The four teachers in this study had biology majors and chemistry or physics as a
minor and only one of them taught chemistry topic for their video portfolios.
Therefore, further research is needed to follow teachers who are teaching topics in
their major field of study to see the influences of content background on their
teaching performance.

Further research is needed to explore the influences of teacher preparation program
feature on prospective science teachers’ performance in more than one year of
teaching. This kind of research would widen science teacher educators and scientist’
understanding about the changes in these teachers practice according to interaction

between their graduate/undergraduate training and their teaching experience.

239

0 Given the fact that this study focused on two teacher preparation programs, further
research is needed to cover some of the other seven institutions who were part of

Salish study.

240

APPENDIX A

PERSONAL BACKGROUND

241

APPENDIX A

PERSONAL BACKGROUND

In this study I focused on new high school chemistry teachers because my
academic and professional experiences in chemistry allow me to do that. I had a bachelor’s
degree in chemistry (B. Sc.) from Yarmouk University in Jordan. This four year program
in the college of natural science helped provide me with knowledge and laboratory skills in
chemistry as well as in other science disciplines, mathematics, physics, and statistics. In
chemistry, I took courses in general chemistry, organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry,
analytical chemistry, physical chemistry, instrumental analysis, qualitative analysis,
forensic chemistry, and techniques of separation.

Beside chemistry courses, I took courses in mathematics: calculus I & 11,
intermediate analysis, and ordinary differential equations. In physics, I took general
physics I & II with labs, and electricity & magnetism. With this academic background in
chemistry and other science disciplines, I felt more confident to analyze the new teachers
knowledge and beliefs, and their performance in chemistry than in other science
disciplines.

Having a Master of Arts degree in science education from the University of Jordan
improved my ability to integrate between my background in chemistry (content) and
pedagogy through science methods and general pedagogical courses that I had experienced
in the Master’s program. At the Ph.D. level I gained more academic and professional

experiences in science education through the course work that I have clone.

242

My working in Salish I Project from 1994 until the project completion in 1997,
helped me to gain a first hand experience in conducting research, collecting, coding,
analyzing, interpreting, and reporting data. In addition to my research experience, I taught
chemistry for high school students (grade 9 - grade 12) for 10 years in Jordan. I was
working in the Model School that connects to the College of Educational Sciences in The
University of Jordan. Moreover, I was teaching in The Department of Curriculum &
Instruction in the University of Jordan as a full-time Lecturer. I taught science methods
courses for science majors who were prospective science teachers.

In the United States, I was science graduate assistant for TE 402 science methods
course at Michigan State University. As a chemistry lab coordinator for three years to
the two introductory chemistry lab courses in a residential science department in the
college of Natural Science at Michigan State University, I taught these two courses, also I
supervised the undergraduate chemistry teaching assistants. In addition to that, I
supervised operations related with these two labs.

Through The Salish Project, plus the academic and professional backgrounds that I

have, I was able to construct my own framework for my dissertation.

243

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