Teaching competences for the development of the scientific competence in Primary Education

Abstract

INTRODUCTION. The acquisition of teaching skills to promote the development of basic skills, such as science skills, amongst primary education pupils is one of the explicit aims of the curriculum in initial teacher training. METHOD. About the initial training in these skills, a study was funded to address these questions using a sample of 133 working teachers from Madrid (Spain) linked to the Complutense University’s school placement program for future primary school teachers. To these ends, an ad hoc questionnaire was used and the results were analyzed using descriptive statistics, analysis of variance and categorical content analysis. RESULTS. The results show that the teachers in the sample do not rate the initial training provided by the university very highly especially with regards to the didactic component of teaching skills. The statements collected point towards a need for didactic training in the use of resources in the teaching of the Sciences and hands on Science activities in the classroom. The perceptions of training needs with regards to the scientific component were truly scanty and referred to basic scientific processes and to a lesser degree scientific content. However, teachers do value didactic skills more than scientific competency if both are only considered to be sufficient. Additionally, working teachers with fewer years of experience rated their initial training in the teaching of Science more highly than their seniors. DISCUSSION. Studies with similar samples match the perception of initial training received as clearly insufficient, as well as the training needs declared. Finally, some improvements in the initial training in this field are suggested.