How do pre-service chemistry teachers rate the importance of content in organic chemistry during their chemistry studies at university?

Abstract

In this article a cross-sectional study on the students’ rating with regard to the contents in organic chemistry will be discussed. Pre-service teachers rated the contents with a questionnaire during their bachelor or master studies. It was shown that the pre-service chemistry teachers during their master studies rated the content as more important than the bachelor students. One possible explanation can be that the master students have teaching experience due to their internships at school whereas the bachelor students can only rely on their experience from their own school days. Overall, content belonging to the school curriculum in the federal state “Brandenburg” where the pre-service teachers’ university is located was rated better than content that was not a part of this curriculum. Concepts were not rated significantly better than the content. Because of the importance of conceptual knowledge for the future profession as a teacher, the courses in organic chemistry will be redesigned with a clear focus on concepts.

How Do Preservice Chemistry Teachers Rate Tasks Following the Construct of School-Related Content Knowledge in a Concept-Orientated Course on Organic Chemistry?

“…Although the rating of the masters' preservice chemistry teachers showed that they also rate other content (than from their own school days) as important, the fixation on content can be seen as a hindrance for the preservice teachers' own learning. 25 The newly designed course "Organic Chemistry I for preservice chemistry teachers" therefore focuses on concepts rather than on content.…”

“…The teachers need this deeper understanding of contents that are relevant for their teaching at school. For science subjects, several tasks following this construct have been designed, used, and evaluated. ,− For the school-related content knowledge (SRCK) in organic chemistry, a Delphi study has been conducted and evaluated by us…”

“…However, if students only rate content that they remember from their own school days as important, a problem arises, because the preservice chemistry teachers have to learn other content that is important for their future profession as well. Although the rating of the masters’ preservice chemistry teachers showed that they also rate other content (than from their own school days) as important, the fixation on content can be seen as a hindrance for the preservice teachers’ own learning . The newly designed course “Organic Chemistry I for preservice chemistry teachers” therefore focuses on concepts rather than on content.…”

“…In the past years, several tasks following the SRCK construct have been designed, used, and evaluated by us. ,− For one seminar in this new course, four existing tasks (tasks 1–4) were used, and one task (task 5) was designed anew; the tasks 1, 3, and 5 have been evaluated by a questionnaire (for details see the methods section; for all tasks see Appendix 1). Table shows the content and design features for the tasks.…”

“…The tasks used in both studies were also not completely identical. However, only tasks with design features that have been proved to be suitable , were chosen for both studies. The differences in the open questions on the tasks of both courses were quite clear, and therefore, it can be assumed that the course organization was the reason for this observation.…”