Abstract:

Science consists not only of already achieved and generally accepted knowledge, but also of the processes by which this knowledge is obtained. Process scientific skills are thus an important part of science literacy. This is also reflected in demands placed on school science education. One approach to the development of scientific skills is the use of inquiry-based education. However, teaching cannot have the desired effect without sufficiently developed scientific skills of teachers. These are a necessary prerequisite for teachers to be able to implement the given activity correctly, but above all for adequate support of pupils in the development of their skills. For these reasons, the research was concerned with the scientific skills of pre-service teachers. The aim of the research was to find out how pre-service biology teachers solve inquiry-based tasks. Specific attention was paid to their ability to formulate a research question based on the given inquiry procedure, their recording of data and formulating an answer to the research question based on conducting their own inquiry. Thus, attention was paid both to the operationalization of the research problem and to its solution. The research was conducted on a sample of 26 Czech pre-service biology teachers at the beginning of their follow-up master’s study (ISCED 7) from the Charles University, Faculty of Education in the academic year 2021/2022. The students practically solved four inquiry-based tasks verified on lower secondary schools’ pupils. Two tasks involved an observational type of research problem and two an experimental type of research problem. Closed coding by two researchers was used to analyse their solutions. The results were descriptively evaluated, and a principal component analysis was performed. It was found that formulating both the research question and the answer is very complicated for pre-service teachers. Only in two cases was the research question formulated completely correct and in full agreement with the given inquiry procedure. The most critical aspects for pre-service teachers were the identification of a research problem that is answerable based on the inquiry and the formulation of results based on exact data. In particular, the type of research problem plays a significant role in recording data and formulating an answer to a research question. Understanding specific problems in teachers’ scientific skills can help design appropriate interventions and improve their teaching practice.

Keywords:

Scientific thinking, scientific skills, inquiry-based learning, tertiary education, biology education.