Investigating Cambodian Chemistry Teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) on the Content of “Matter”: A Focus on Two Components of PCK

抄録

PCK is the teachers’ knowledge about teaching particular content in particular ways to enhance student understanding. This requires adequate knowledge of students’ understanding (KSU) and knowledge of instructional strategies (KIS) to shape the practice of PCK. This study aims to explore teachers’ PCK on the content of “Matter,” focusing on KSU and KIS. A PCK survey test grounded in seven classroom scenarios followed by open-ended questions was developed by adapting the model of Park et al. (2018) to challenge 31 experienced chemistry teachers from 25 lower secondary schools in Cambodia. A qualitative content analysis was applied to teachers’ responses to generate a rubric categorization for KSU and KIS. Four categories of responses were created: 1) correct response, 2) partially correct response, 3) insufficient response, and 4) no response. Each response described the extent of teachers’ knowledge of students’ understanding and knowledge of instructional strategies. The frequency of each response category was calculated, and any elaboration of typical instructional strategies was highlighted. The results showed that over half of the teachers could define students’ misconceptions. Still, their knowledge of instructional strategies seemed limited due to their typical strategies, mainly following the traditional approach. Teachers preferred two common ways to address remedial students’ misconceptions: 1) telling the scientific concept directly to the students and 2) acknowledging the constructivist approach, such as inquiry with no explanation of inquiry activities on the content to be taught. Therefore, derived from these findings and discussion, providing PCK-based courses during in-service training and analyzing the pre-service subject matter course should be considered for developing PCK.