Collaborative Teaching: Effects on Science Teachers' Pedagogical Content Knowledge and Students' Understanding of Particulate Nature of Matter

Abstract

This study is about an alternative school-based model of professional development for Science teachers and sought to help address the research gap about improving the Science teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge to improve science teaching student learning. It is a qualitative case study that analyzed the changes in the pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of Particulate Nature of Matter (PNM) of teachers who underwent Collaborative Teaching (CT), and how these changes affected the conceptual understanding of PNM of their students. The study involved six Grade 8 Science teachers, the Collaborative Teaching group who underwent CT for almost eight weeks and six other Science teachers who were assigned to the Conventional Teaching group. The changes in the PCK of PNM of the teachers and their students’ conceptual understanding of PNM were monitored using multiple sources of data: classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, lesson plans, pre-lesson reflection guides, and questionnaires. Analysis of data from these various sources using the constant comparative method shows that the PCK of the six teachers from the Collaborative Teaching group improved. Their knowledge of science content (KSC) about PNM improved as demonstrated by their corrected misconceptions about PNM and ability to explain phase changes using macroscopic, sub-microscopic and symbolic representations. Their knowledge of students’ understanding (KSU) improved as they reflected awareness of students’ misconceptions and learning difficulties in their lesson plans and adjusted teaching strategies to address these misconceptions and learning difficulties. Their knowledge of teaching strategies (KTS) also improved as they shifted from more lecture-based teaching to using interactive strategies, models and higher order thinking skills (HOTS) questioning. These PCK improvements were supported by data from the PCK improvements were supported by data from the PCK-PNM Observation Rubric which showed that the PCK of teachers from the Collaborative Teaching group improved from “Emergent” to “Proficient” whereas that of the Conventional Teaching Group remained as “Emergent”. Data from the CPK-PNM Questionnaire also showed a 40% increase in the PCK of Collaborative Teaching group from 26.8 out of 48 in the pretest scores to 37.5 in the posttest. The KSC mean score of the group increased by 52%, the KTS by 28% and the KSC by 40% in the posttest scores. The posttest scores in the PCK-PNM Questionnaire of the Conventional Teaching group showed their PCK of PNM increased by 26%. The posttest scores of the Conventional Teaching group increased by 26% in KSC, 33% in KTS, and 7% in the KSU. In terms of the posttest Particulate Nature of Matter Assessment (ParNoMA) mean scores of students, the Collaborative Teaching group increased by 95 percent while that of the Conventional Teaching group increased by 50.7 percent. The Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test shows that the ParNoMA posttest scores of the students from the Collaborative Teaching group are statistically higher than their pretest scores (p = 0.000 at a = 0.05 and 1-tailed test). Furthermore, the Wilcoxon-Mann Whitney Test shows that the gain scores of the Collaborative Teaching Group students are statistically higher than that of the Conventional Teaching Group (p = 0.000 at a = 0.05 and 1-tailed test). The empirical data also shows that the observed improvement in the teachers’ knowledge of science content, knowledge of students’ misconceptions and knowledge of teaching strategies helped students (a) correct various misconceptions about phase changes of matter such as particle size of water molecules during evaporation and freeing; (b) shift from the continuous view of matter to the particle view and (c) develop their ability to visualize and to represent the particles of matter during various phase changes. The results of the study showed evidence that Collaborative Teaching is an effective mode of developing science teachers’ PCK of PNM and of improving their students’ conceptual understanding of PNM. It is thus recommended that Collaborative Teaching be used as a framework for designing professional development programs of Science teachers with emphasis on the different components of PCK in order to help improve students’ conceptual understanding of essential science concepts