The Road to Pre-Service Teachers' Conceptual Change

Abstract

This study involved a series of seminars which tested the hypothesis that learning to teach is improved through the application of a constructivist orientation. Self-questioning strategy training was conducted to help fifteen graduate students raise and reflect upon specific higher-order questions from the assigned reading materials. After each seminar session, students recorded their thoughts regarding topics discussed, issues raised, and questions unanswered Weekly journals were collected by the instructor for analysis. NUD*IST (Non-Numerical Unstructured Data Indexing, Search and Theory Building) software was usedfor initial theory building and analysis. Students' weekly journal entries indicated the conceptual transformations that these students went through. This study illustrated how a seminar structure was useful in helping preservice teachers' construct knowledge, engage in reflection, and effect conceptual change. A constructivist orientation to learning has become a main stream practice in early childhood education. Many teacher preparation programs have been designed to help pre-service teachers shift toward a more constructivist approach to teaching by creating opportunities for them to reflect upon their initial beliefs and practices about teaching and learning. Su (1992) claims that teacher education students have the potential for changing their views regarding reasons for schooling from basic skills education to broader perspectives about learning. Prawart (1990) advocates a constructivist approach to teacher education that looks for changes in the pre-service teachers' views about teaching and learning which influence their teaching practice. Since pre-service teachers have good potential for change, it may be possible to facilitate their learning to teach by examining preconceptions, allowing them to explore new awareness, and challenging their ideas through cognitive conflict (Feiman-- Nemser, McDiarmid, Melnick & Parker, 1989). When an external event challenges pre-service teachers' ideals about teaching and learning, efforts to resolve the conflict lead to professional growth. Some researchers have demonstrated that pre-service teachers' beliefs can be changed by uncovering and incontrovertibly confronting pre-service teachers' misconceptions before proceeding with instruction (e.g., Bennett, 1997; Posner, Strike, Hewson & Gertzog, 1982). Other researchers suggest that questioning, reflecting, and problem solving can be applied to achieve the goal of concept change (Clark, 1988; Crow, 1987; Feiman-Nemser, McDiarmid, Melnick & Parker, 1989; Gunstone & Northfield, 1992; Posner, Strike, Hewson & Gertzog, 1982). Under such circumstances, pre-service teachers may construct their own learning through an interaction among their beliefs, their prior knowledge and their experiences. This interactive process is required to assimilate new information and to accommodate old schemata in order to change prior beliefs about teaching and learning. To enable pre-service teachers to see the connections between their beliefs about how children learn and their own teaching, a graduate teacher at a southern university created a course to challenge students' assumptions, knowledge, and beliefs through their learning experiences. This study was conducted in that class in an effort to document the impact of a seminar course structure on students' beliefs. Such a study may lead to better understanding of knowledge construction in teacher education and the ways that a course of study challenges and shapes pre-service teachers' beliefs. Methodology Participants. Participants consisted of 15 female graduate students who enrolled in a graduate seminar in early childhood education during the Summer 1999 semester. Eleven out of fifteen were current practicing school teachers. This was an elective course for early childhood graduate students taken frequently toward the end of the masters degree program. …