Prospective Teachers' Critical Perspectives of Science Teaching : A Case Study of Trial Teaching Critiques

Abstract

Trial teaching is thought to have an important role in the development of prospective teachers' competencies towards teaching practice. Many prior studies have focused on the competencies development of the prospective teacher who practiced trial teaching after they have become teachers. But he/she can experience trial teaching as a teacher much fewer times than as a student. This indicates that the prospective teacher, as a student in trial science teaching, has many opportunities to learn about methods of lesson planning and teaching practice. Therefore this study aimed to clarify what competencies he/she developed from the viewpoint of observation and critical perspectives of science teaching. As a result of analyzing the 'content' and 'depth' of comments in the 'good points' and 'improving points' sections of 'comment cards', the following three points were revealed. (1) When prospective teachers critiqued trial teaching, they tended to examine both 'good points' and 'improving points' focusing on individual teaching acts. In contrast, there were a small portion of them who examined both 'good points' and 'improving points' focusing on teaching materials, and there were a small portion of them who examined 'improving points' focusing on lesson structure. (2) In the case of 'good points', many prospective teachers commented at the level of 'general elementary school teaching'; on the other hand, a small portion of them commented at the level of 'unit specific'. (3) In the case of 'improving points', either more or a comparable number of prospective teachers commented at the level 'unit specific' than those who commented at the other levels.