Emotions in science during the initial training of Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers.

Abstract

The first part carries out a review of different studies related to emotions in the teaching and learning of science during the initial training of Early Childhood and Primary Education prospective teachers. Emotions towards sciences are positive in Primary Education. In Secondary Education the emotions towards biology and geology are positive whereas they are negative towards physics and chemistry, finding differences according to gender. In relation to teachers in training, the memory of their emotions experienced in their school stage towards sciences is transferred to those they predict they will feel and to those they really feel when teaching these subjects, and there is a relationship with other affective dimensions. The emotions experienced by the teachers in training, besides being mainly attributed to the teacher, the content and to themselves as students, are part of the teacher’s pedagogical content knowledge. The second part of the article shows three interventions carried out in the initial training of Early Childhood and Primary Education teachers, where the evolution of the emotions experienced before and after each activity is analyzed. New lines of research are suggested to deepen the taxonomy of epistemological emotions. To conclude, implications for initial teachers training are presented.