AbstractsEducation Research & Administration

Preservice elementary teachers need to begin developing their pedagogical design capacities for inquiry by learning how to translate their conceptions of inquiry into classroom practice through the adaptation and enactment of curriculum materials. Using both qualitative and quantitative research methods, I draw upon cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) to investigate preservice elementary teachers??? curriculum design and development of pedagogical design capacity for inquiry during the final year of their teacher education program. This study involved analysis of curricular artifacts and survey data from 46 prospective elementary teachers in two sections of an undergraduate elementary science teaching methods course, as well as interviews, observational fieldnotes, reflective journals, and other artifacts from four preservice teachers from this larger group studied during the methods and student teaching semesters. Results show that preservice teachers were able to translate their espoused inquiry frameworks into planned and enacted science lessons. This involved adapting existing curriculum materials to better promote specific inquiry practices, but also to fundamentally shift the nature of classroom science. The preservice teachers??? curriculum design efforts were constrained, however, by features of their institutional contexts and subject to emergent tensions. In attempting to resolve these tensions through curriculum design for inquiry, the preservice teachers ultimately articulated a fundamental contradiction between two distinct and competing visions for classroom inquiry: traditional classroom science, which promotes students??? reproduction of scientific explanations by objectifying students, and a novel form of classroom inquiry that repositions students as contributing community members involved in the co-construction of knowledge through lesson-specific shared problem-spaces. For each of the preservice teachers, this contradiction had important implications for the design of science learning environments and remained unresolved at the end of the study. These findings have implications for practice and theory. While they illustrate the important role both formal teacher education and science curriculum materials play in supporting teachers to engage in inquiry-oriented science teaching, they also highlight the need for schools to foster inquiry practices in the classroom. Findings also provide novel insights into the teacher-curriculum relationship, teacher learning, the nature and goals of inquiry-oriented science teaching and learning, and CHAT-based research on teachers.