'I'd Need To Do A Lot Of Reading Myself before Teaching This.' How Do Primary Student Teachers Know What Science To Teach?

The subject knowledge primary teachers have as a basis for their teaching has become a major concern in preservice and inservice teacher education. This paper reports on a study that investigated the science and pedagogical content knowledge of a sample of 42 preservice primary teachers in England. Assignments and questionnaires were used to collect the data. Many students identified particular areas of science in which they felt confident, or more often where they lacked knowledge--most commonly they felt least confident in the physical sciences. Many of the responses to the questionnaires revealed a lack of specific subject knowledge and misconceptions. Many of the students were able to draft suitable plans for teaching significant scientific ideas and to summarize relevant subject knowledge at their own level. However, there were many assignments where the subject and pedagogical knowledge were not tightly linked, for instance some student teachers presented a collection of science facts and concepts about the topic to be taught but did not focus on the key ideas that would require explanation. The results also indicated specific curriculum knowledge and wide use of published teaching resources by the student teachers. Contains 22 references. (JRH)