This study aimed at exploring the understanding of concept inventories for classroom assessment by physics tutors and pre-service teachers in selected diploma teachers' training colleges in Tanzania. The study employed a qualitative research approach and a case study design. Eight physics tutors and 20 second-year pre-service physics teachers from…

In South Africa, there is a strong recognition of the affordances of information and communications technology (ICT) in science teaching and learning. A key indicator for the effective use of ICT is the technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) of teachers with TPACK-Practical (TPACK-P) being an important iteration related to teacher…

This study explored the perceived benefits and challenges that Natural Sciences teachers experience when using blended teaching in Smart Schools. This qualitative research focused on public township schools with challenging socio-economic contexts in the Gauteng Province, South Africa. A non-probability purposive sampling method was followed. The…

This paper addresses the important question of the nature of the subject matter (content knowledge) that should be a base for a science teacher education curriculum. We present our argument in two parts. Firstly, we report an argument conceptualising the nature of content knowledge for science teaching that we called TerSCK. This is followed by a…

Creating awareness of environmental sustainability issues through formal education may be an effective way to help citizens deal with these issues. Teachers, however, have not been sufficiently trained on how to teach with sustainability concerns in mind. For this study, a purposively selected group of six chemistry teachers was exposed to an…

This study surveyed 19 chemistry teachers' stoichiometry pedagogical content knowledge (SPCK) in Ijebu Ode local government area of Ogun state, Nigeria using Malcolm's Physical Science Teachers' SPCK test. The qualitative data were transformed to scores, which revealed the level of chemistry teachers' knowledge of students' prior knowledge,…

Information and communication technology (ICT) competences are among the most important requirements to effectively teach mathematics and science in today's classrooms. Teacher educators in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region have prioritised ICT competences for pre-service teachers (PSTs) to effectively select suitable…

Although there is a lot of interest in the development of computational thinking (CT) and the benefits it could have for every student, integrating it into science classrooms may be more difficult than traditional teaching. This can be very challenging for South African science teachers. Thus, there is an increasing need to prepare teachers and…

This study investigated the effect of in-service training in the use of the ripple tank equipment on science teachers' pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) about the topic of waves. Three Grade 10 Physical Sciences teachers participated in this qualitative case study. The Refined Consensus Model informed the conceptual framework of this study,…

Research findings show that inquiry-based science education has positive effects in improving learning of both science content knowledge and scientific inquiry (SI) skills. As a result, various science curricula, including that of Namibia, recommend the use of an inquiry-based approach in science teaching. However, the implementation of an…

This research examines the relationship between high school teachers' understanding and reported practices of inquiry-based pedagogy (IBP) in science classrooms in Nigeria. A sample of 11 science teachers from an education district in Lagos, Nigeria, was chosen for this case study. Data were collected using a semi-structured questionnaire, which…

Pedagogical content knowledge is considered a valuable knowledge base for all science teachers. Thus, promoting its development in all pre-service teacher programmes including a short 1 year Physical Science postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE) course is desirable. This paper focuses on the comparison of topic-specific pedagogical content…

Problem-based learning (PBL) is considered to be an effective teaching and learning strategy as it leads to longer retention of concepts learnt, improves problem-solving skills and enhances critical thinking. However, teachers often find it difficult to implement as they do not receive guidance during their initial training. A professional…

The importance of enabling student-teachers to acquire informed conceptions of the Nature of Science (NOS) is widely emphasised. Hence, this study investigated the effectiveness of a science pre-service teacher education programme of one university in Tanzania in enabling student-teachers to acquire informed conceptions of NOS as stages in a…

In physics education, assessments address various forms of scientific knowledge. Most of the existing test instruments emphasise the assessment of content knowledge. These tests fail to measure the epistemic aspects of science. Thus, assessing epistemic knowledge is a theme that demands investigation. This study applies Rasch analysis to help…