Fachdidaktisches Wissen von Lehrkräften und multiple Ziele im naturwissenschaftlichen Sachunterricht

Recent investigations in the field of mathematics have demonstrated that teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge, as a central component of teachers’ professional knowledge, plays a significant role in high-quality instruction and students’ learning gains. The study presented here explores the significance of teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge for gains in pupils’ understanding of scientific concepts and for motivational and self-related outcome criteria in primary science education in Germany. It reports on findings from a study with a pre-post-design comprising 60 primary school teachers and their 1326 pupils. Teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge and pupils’ learning gains as well as motivational and self-related outcome criteria were directly assessed with paper-and-pencil tests. Two-step models controlling for several relevant variables at the individual and the class level were specified. Results revealed a substantial positive effect of the measured pedagogical content knowledge on pupils’ achievement gains as well as on pupils’ situational interest and perceived competence. [Editor]