Difficulties Experienced by Elementary School Teachers in Science Classes

초등 교사들이 과학 수업에서 겪는 어려움 분석

The purpose of this study is to discover and develop any implications which may arise in relation to science teachers' professional growth and development by investigating the difficulties experienced by elementary school teachers in science classes. 196 elementary school teachers were requested to write an anecdotal report regarding their science lessons. 30 science teachers in middle school also answered the same questionnaire. By means of inductive categorical analyzing, the difficulties were grouped into several categories. The results were as follows: (1) The difficulties elementary teachers experience in their science lessons fall into three categories; 'professional science knowledge(9.8%)', 'science laboratory activities(78.3%)', 'teaching methodology(11.2%)'. (2) Science teachers in middle school experienced similar difficulties. However, distribution differed from that of elementary school teachers; 'professional science knowledge(39.0%)', 'science laboratory activities(35.6%)', 'teaching methodology(27.1%)'. (3) The causes of these difficulties were identified as follows; a lack of time to prepare for science classes, insufficient substantial pre-service teacher education, and a lack of adaptive support to elementary school teachers.