PCK_SR-bio
Pre-Service Biology Teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge about Scientific Reasoning

Pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) is an essential component of teachers’ professional knowledge and often described as an “amalgam” of pedagogical knowledge and content knowledge. Teachers’ PCK has a crucial impact on the quality of their teaching and, via this, on students’ learning. While PCK develops over time due to learning and teaching experience in the classroom, as well as reflection on both, it is important for teachers to acquire fundamental PCK during their university studies. Evaluating the state of this knowledge throughout teacher training at university requires appropriate research instruments that take account that PCK is a topic-specific construct.

Although various instruments exist to assess PCK in biology education, there are no instruments to specifically assessment of PCK about scientific reasoning. Scientific reasoning, as a central component of biology education, incorporates activities such as planning and conducting investigations, generating hypotheses, and using scientific models. In this project, a multiple-choice instrument for the assessment of preservice biology teachers’ PCK around scientific reasoning is developed and applied.