The pedagogical content knowledge of pollution held by secondary chemistry teachers in Lebanon -

Abstract

In teacher education, it is vital to evaluate the conceptions held by pre-service teachers. If they have misconceptions, it is likely they will pass the inaccurate content on to their future students. The result of persistent wrong conceptions about scientific phenomena is an ill-informed citizenry and a reduced probability of suitable preventive actions by these citizens against future environmental issues such as pollution, the greenhouse effect in specific. Consequently, it is important to investigate teachers’ preparedness to help students develop correct conceptions about environmental issues. One of the best measures to gauge this preparedness is to investigate teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (Shulman, 1986). Consequently, the purpose of this study is to examine the pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of in-service experienced and not-experienced Grade 9 Chemistry teachers on the topic of pollution. The study also aims to relate the teachers’ PCK to their level of education and years of teaching experience. The qualitative research approach used in this study allowed for the generation of rich descriptions of six chemistry teachers' PCK. Half of these teachers have six or more years of experience and the second half have less than six years of experience in teaching pollution. Three instruments were used for data generation: (1) a unit plan followed by a semi-structured interview, (2) a videotaped teaching lesson followed by a guided case analysis and a semi-structured interview and (3) a CoRe matrix followed by a semi-structured interview. A framework for defining PCK that consists of six dimensions and research findings were used to build a rubric, specific to teaching the PCK of greenhouse effect and global warming, and a coding scheme derived from it that contains descriptors for each dimension was used in data analysis. Data were coded based on a rubric described above. A frequency count was calculated for every form of knowledge (PCK in planning, PCK in action and PCK in re