Much of what teachers need to know to be successful is invisible to lay observers, leading to the view that teaching requires little formal study and to frequent disdain for teacher education programs. The weakness of traditional program models that are collections of largely unrelated courses reinforce this low regard. This article argues that we have learned a great deal about how to create stronger, more effective teacher education programs. Three critical components of such programs include tight coherence and integration among courses and between course work and clinical work in schools, extensive and intensely supervised clinical work integrated with course work using pedagogies linking theory and practice, and closer, proactive relationships with schools that serve diverse learners effectively and develop and model good teaching. Also, schools of education should resist pressures to water down preparation, which ultimately undermine the preparation of entering teachers, the reputation of schools of education, and the strength of the profession.

CONSTRUCTING 21st-CENTURY TEACHER EDUCATION

This paper set emerged from an international symposium that aimed to shed light on issues associated with the enactment of inquiry both as means (i.e., inquiry as an in- structional approach) and as ends (i.e., inquiry as a learning outcome) in precollege science classrooms. The symposium contributors were charged with providing perspectives from

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/sce.10118

Inquiry in science education: International perspectives

Science education reform documents emphasize the importance of inquiry experiences for young learners. This means that teachers must be prepared with the knowledge, skills, and habits of thinking to mentor their students through authentic investigations. This study examines how preservice teachers' inquiry experiences, in a science methods course, influenced and were influenced by their conceptions of inquiry. The study also assesses how these experiences were associated with eventual classroom practice. Six preservice secondary teachers were observed during a 2-month inquiry project and then followed into the classroom as they began a 9-week teaching practicum. Data revealed that participants' preproject conceptions of the inquiry process were related to the conduct and interpretation of their own inquiry project, and that the project experience modified the inquiry conceptions of those participants who already had sophisticated understandings of scientific investigations. Perhaps most importantly, the participants who eventually used guided and open inquiry during their student teaching were not those who had more authentic views of inquiry or reflected most deeply about their own inquiry projects, but rather they were individuals who had significant undergraduate or professional experiences with authentic science research. Finally, this article advocates that independent science investigations be part of preservice education and that these experiences should be scaffolded to prompt reflection specifically about the nature of inquiry and conceptually linked to ways in which inquiry can be brought into the K-12 classroom. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Sci Ed87:112–143, 2003; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/sce.10044

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/sce.10044

Inquiry projects in science teacher education: What can investigative experiences reveal about teacher thinking and eventual classroom practice?

(1984). Attitudes to Science: an update. Studies in Science Education: Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 26-59.

Attitudes to Science: an update

Avoiding science in the elementary school

Assessing Inquiry Potential: A Tool For Curriculum Decision Makers

Effect of Field Experience during Elementary Methods Courses on Preservice Teacher Behavior.

The study investigated affective changes in elementary preservice teachers during a formative period and related these changes to the development of specific classroom science teaching behaviors. Thirty preservice teachers were randomly selected from a population involved in a field oriented methods course program. Analysis of pre and post affective measures and concurrent measures of perception and performance of teaching behaviors during this formative period found significant developmental relationships. The results suggest the effective use of instruments measuring certain affective changes during a formative period and moderate to strong predictive effects of the development and perception of classroom teaching behaviors. The affective changes which demonstrated relationship with teaching behavior included specific aspects of interests and attitudes toward teaching science and children learning science. No relationship was found with preservice attitudes toward nature.

Affective predictors of preservice science teaching behavior

A review of the literature suggests a relationship between life-long development of formal reasoning schema and performance in professional education careers. The study investigated implications of cognitive development of preservice teachers as it relates to their classroom teaching performance. Ninety-one seniors involved in a field-oriented teacher education program were given classroom responsibilities which included teaching a science unit. Formal thinking abilities were assessed using two types of developmental level tasks, performance on traditional type Piagetian tasks and recognition of formal thought approaches in solving educational tasks. Professional behaviors were assessed using observational ratings of classroom instructional and planning activities. Subjects assessed as formal operational, 30% of sample, using Piagetian performance tasks, had significantly higher facility in performing model classroom teaching behaviors than transitional or concrete subjects. Higher recognition ability of formal thought approaches to teaching was not related to facility in performing classroom teaching when compared to performance on Piagetian tasks. The relationship held up in seven of eight broad teaching behavior categories observed in classroom instruction. The results supported a general portrait of teaching behavior specifically related to teachers of differing cognitive functional levels. Implications for professional training programs are discussed.

Dennis W. Sunal

Papers

Assessing Inquiry Potential: A Tool For Curriculum Decision Makers

Effect of Field Experience during Elementary Methods Courses on Preservice Teacher Behavior.

Affective predictors of preservice science teaching behavior

Teacher cognitive functioning as a factor in observed variety and level of classroom teaching behavior

Relationship of affective measures and preservice teaching behavior