Practical Tools for Supporting Shifts in Preservice Teachers' Noticing in an Elementary Science Methods Course

• In Event: 66.031 - New Understandings and New Directions: Innovative Practices to Support Shifts in Preservice Teacher Perspectives

Abstract

In this paper I examine elementary pre-service teachers’ (PST) appropriation of practical tools for noticing and using students’ science ideas to plan student-centered instruction in the context of an elementary science teaching methods course. Findings suggest shifts in PSTs’ noticing and use of student ideas in instructional planning toward more student-centered practices. These findings challenge the assumption that PSTs can only be successful given time and teaching experience. This suggests that given scaffolding in the form of practical tools, PSTs can attend to student reasoning earlier than originally thought.

Author

• Dawnmarie Rose Ezzo, Michigan State University