Nested epistemologies : secondary school science teachers’ views of nature of science, teaching and learning and implications for practice

Abstract

The main aim of this dissertation was to acquire an understanding of secondary science teachers’ beliefs about science teaching, their views of nature of science and how these conceptions may influence classroom practices. Questionnaires were distributed among 219 teachers in State, Church and Independent secondary schools, teaching all areas of science. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten teachers, representative of all scientific disciplines and school sectors. Moreover, this study aimed to explore the link between a group of science teachers’ beliefs and their participation in a community of practice. The extent to which participation allowed teachers to implement reform-based strategies was investigated. A large majority of participating teachers held constructivist beliefs about teaching while more than half of the respondents also held concurrent process beliefs. Sophisticated epistemological beliefs about acquisition of knowledge were held by more than half of the participants. However, it appears that practices in science classrooms are still predominantly teacher-centered and are not closely aligned to teachers’ epistemologies or beliefs about teaching. Although more than half of the participants also held adequate NOS views, such understandings are not being presented to students and NOS aspects are not being embedded as a learning outcome. Moreover, the beliefs and NOS views of a group of science teachers participating in a community of practice (CoP) resembled closely those of other science teachers, however, it appears that participation in the CoP was crucial in linking beliefs to practice and in enhancing the implementation of reform-based strategies.