Preservice Biology Teachers’ Scientific Reasoning Skills and Beliefs about Nature of Science: How Do They Develop and Is There a Mutual Relationship during the Development?

Are We on the Way to Successfully Educating Future Citizens?-A Spotlight on Critical Thinking Skills and Beliefs about the Nature of Science among Pre-Service Biology Teachers in Germany

A rapidly changing world and constantly expanding knowledge requires education to no longer focus on teaching subject-matter knowledge but also to promote students' critical thinking (CT) and an accurate understanding of the nature of science (NOS). However, several studies have shown that these skills are still poorly acquired during formal education. Given the cause-effect sequence from teacher education to teacher action to student learning, it seems reasonable to consider individual factors on the part of (pre-service) teachers as possible contributors to such skill gaps. In our study, we therefore investigated how pre-service biology teachers perform on tasks assessing their CT skills and NOS beliefs. In addition, we addressed the questions of whether test performance and/or the relationships between CT skills and NOS beliefs differ as a function of the number of learning opportunities. Our results show that our participants' CT skills were only in the low-average range. Moreover, 86% of them did not have an informed understanding of NOS. Although participants in the master's program demonstrated clearly superior CT skills than those in the bachelor's program, no such difference was found in terms of NOS beliefs. However, there was a consistent advantage for pre-service teachers who were aspiring to a teaching qualification in two (as opposed to only one) scientific subjects. Our findings provide useful implications, particularly with respect to the influence of learning opportunities in university teacher education and the effectiveness of CT- and NOS-based instructional settings. On a more prospective note, our findings underscore that, given the grand global tasks of the 21st century, it seems more important than ever to ensure that pre-service science teachers have sufficient expertise in CT and NOS in order to increase the likelihood that these teachers will be able to successfully help their future students develop these skills.

Analysis of Data-Based Scientific Reasoning from a Product-Based and a Process-Based Perspective

In this study, we investigated participants’ reactions to supportive and anomalous data in the context of population dynamics. Based on previous findings on conceptions about ecosystems and responses to anomalous data, we assumed a tendency to confirm the initial prediction after dealing with contradicting data. Our aim was to integrate a product-based analysis, operationalized as prediction group changes with process-based analyses of individual data-based scientific reasoning processes to gain a deeper insight into the ongoing cognitive processes. Based on a theoretical framework describing a data-based scientific reasoning process, we developed an instrument assessing initial and subsequent predictions, confidence change toward these predictions, and the subprocesses data appraisal, data explanation, and data interpretation. We analyzed the data of twenty pre-service biology teachers applying a mixed-methods approach. Our results show that participants tend to maintain their initial prediction fully or change to predictions associated with a mix of different conceptions. Maintenance was observed even if most participants were able to use sophisticated conceptual knowledge during their processes of data-based scientific reasoning. Furthermore, our findings implicate the role of confidence changes and the influences of test wiseness.

Professional Knowledge and Self-Efficacy Expectations of Pre-Service Teachers Regarding Scientific Reasoning and Diagnostics

Understanding and knowledge of scientific reasoning skills is a key ability of pre-service teachers. In a written survey (open response format), biology and chemistry pre-service teachers (n = 51) from two German universities claimed central decisions or actions school students have to perform in scientific reasoning in the open inquiry instruction of an experiment. The participants’ answers were assessed in a quality content analysis using a rubric system generated from a theoretical background. Instruments in a closed response format were used to measure attitudes towards the importance of diagnostics in teacher training and the domain-specific expectations of self-efficacy. The pre-service teacher lacked pedagogical (didactics) content knowledge about potential student difficulties and also exhibited a low level of content methodological (procedural) knowledge. There was no correlation between the knowledge of student difficulties and the approach to experimenting with expectations of self-efficacy for diagnosing student abilities regarding scientific reasoning. Self-efficacy expectations concerning their own abilities to successfully cope with general and experimental diagnostic activities were significantly lower than the attitude towards the importance of diagnostics in teacher training. The results are discussed with regard to practical implications as they imply that scientific reasoning should be promoted in university courses, emphasising the importance of understanding the science-specific procedures (knowing how) and epistemic constructs in scientific reasoning (knowing why).