Search results for: Kier Meredith W.

The authors want to understand how preservice teachers, who enrolled in elementary science concentration, negotiate a science teacher identity to support their motivations and goals to teach elementary science. Results suggest that when elementary preservice teachers learned science through hands-on, constructivist practices, they negotiated norms about how they believed that science could be taught and compared it to their own previous experiences. In early experiences with constructivist practices, participants described learning science as fun and innovative. Elementary preservice teachers who completed three or four classes saw themselves as a possible teacher of science as well as a learner of science. The authors conclude that providing elementary preservice teachers with individual courses that focus on the standards and expectations of elementary students in a particular domain influences the progression from learner to teacher in content and in practice.