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ENGAGING ELEMENTARY PRESERVICE TEACHERS WITHACTIVE LEARNING TEACHING METHODOLOGIESÖzlem Sila Olgun PhD aa Department of Primary Education, Faculty of Education , University of Mustafa Kemal ,Antakya, TurkeyPublished online: 31 Mar 2009.

To cite this article: Özlem Sila Olgun PhD (2009) ENGAGING ELEMENTARY PRESERVICE TEACHERS WITH ACTIVE LEARNINGTEACHING METHODOLOGIES, The Teacher Educator, 44:2, 113-125, DOI: 10.1080/08878730902721772

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The Teacher Educator, 44:113–125, 2009Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 0887-8730 print/1938-8101 onlineDOI: 10.1080/08878730902721772

RESEARCH ARTICLE

ENGAGING ELEMENTARY PRESERVICE TEACHERS

WITH ACTIVE LEARNING TEACHING METHODOLOGIES

ÖZLEM SILA OLGUN

Department of Primary Education, Faculty of Education,University of Mustafa Kemal, Antakya, Turkey

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of active learn-ing on preservice teachers’ dignity, energy, self-management, community, andawareness (DESCA) abilities, attitudes toward teaching, and attitudes towardscience. Third year preservice teachers (n D 77) from two different classeswere involved in the study. One intact class was assigned as the experimentalgroup, whereas the other intact class was assigned as the comparison group.The comparison group students received the instruction by traditional teaching,and the experimental group received instruction through an active learningparadigm. DESCA abilities and attitudes were measured before and after in-struction. Results revealed that there was a significant difference favoring theactive learning instruction on preservice teachers’ DESCA scores; however, therewas no significant difference on preservice teachers’ attitudes toward teachingand science.

Although preservice elementary educators have preconceived notionsand strong beliefs concerning how to teach, they often have notconstructed a firm representation for their ability to teach scienceand mathematics until taking courses in methodology ( Johnston,2003). The pedagogy modeled by professors has important influenceon prospective teachers’ teaching practices. Heikkinen, McDevitt, andStone (1992) reported that course instructors tend to teach the sameway they were taught, using lectures and promoting rote memorizationof disconnected facts. Due to recognition for preferred styles of learning

Address correspondence to Özlem Sila Olgun, PhD, Assistant Professor, Altaymahallesi KC Göksupark Havuzlu Evler C5 Blok, Daire: 16, Eryaman–Ankara, Turkey.E-mail: ozlemsila@gmail.com

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and the growing acceptance of constructivist approaches as effectiveinstruction, teacher educators should adapt their instructional styles tomodel these approaches (Vredenburg, 2004).

There is a steady increase in the variety of effective techniques forteaching. According to Huinker and Madison (1997), Balas (1998), andSottile, Carter, and Watson (2001), the levels of active learning expe-riences in teaching science influence the teacher’s ability to perceivethemselves as successful science instructors.

Active Learning

Drawn from a constructivist framework, active learning refers to a learn-ing situation in which students are active participants rather than passiveobservers. However, this is not simply a matter of participation in a classactivity, but engaging in an active learning process, utilizing cognitiveabilities, and interpreting content in a personal fashion. In this kind oflearning process, students actively direct their learning, use high-levelcognitive and decision-making skills and cooperate with other learners.

Learners engage in a variety of open-ended activities (i.e., projects,discussions, and role-play exercises). The approach of active learningallows students to take on a more protagonist, less passive role thanin traditional transfer of knowledge approaches. That is, due to theeclectic nature of active learning, different techniques, strategies, andmaterials can be used such as inquiry, online field trips, asynchronousdebate, Web quests, field trips, guest speakers, games, journaling, andmulti-age projects (Acikgöz, 1999; Keyser, 2000; Center for Teachingand Learning, 1989; Vredenburg, 2004; Cookson, 2005).

Murdoch and Guy (2002) investigated the effect of class size onintroductory accounting students and their performance within thecontext of an active learning environment. In class, group activities wereimplemented as an integral part of the learning environment in bothsmall and large sections. The results demonstrated a class-size effect,where students in the small section scored significantly higher on thefinal exam.

Baldwin (1993) and Hill (1998) also studied how class size impactsthe efficacy of active learning instruction, specifically using group casestudy analyses. It can be argued that group cases could be used moreeffectively in small classes to enhance critical thinking skills becausethe instructor can devote greater attention to groups and individualstudents. As predicted, students in smaller classes demonstrated supe-rior performance on course exams that focused on analytical thinkingrelated to the content.

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Active Learning in Education 115

In addition to these studies, Zehr (2004) examined student at-titudes in response to active learning exercises using role play to in-struct the history of psychology. Students reported that the instructionalmethods were interesting, helpful in promoting understanding for thecontent, and worthy of repeating in future classes.

Dignity, Energy, Self-Management, Community, andAwareness (DESCA)

All students have an inherent ability to live with dignity, to engagetasks with energy, to be appropriately self-regulating, to work in thecommunity with others, and to be aware of what is going on aroundthem. Collectively, these DESCA abilities highlight the students’ best,most productive selves.

Students have an innate ability to live and work with dignity. Theydo not want to feel belittled, demeaned, diminished, unimportant, orunworthy. Yet traditional school practices can fail to take advantageof this ability to work with dignity. Some practices, in fact, frustratestudents’ impulses to do so. Students also have a natural zest for life.They suffer when they have to sit still or stand around for too longwith nothing to do. All humans also have the ability to self-regulate. Aseducators, we do not want students asking us every question that comesto mind. Rather, we want students to think for themselves, makingprudent decisions. This is what they, too, want. They do not want tobe told what to do, nor do they want to lose control. Students have anability to get along and relate comfortably with others, and they wantto do so. They do not want to be rejected or feel isolated. Finally,all students have a sense of awareness. They have the ability to bealert, observant, and attentive. Indeed, it is their very nature to avoidboredom. Educators want students to stay alert and aware. Teachershave a great deal of control of how students will express these DESCApotentials and apply them to daily schoolwork (Harmin, 1994). Activelearning activities encourage students to have these skills in school.

Attitudes Toward Teaching

Attitudes toward teaching are proposed to influence teaching in thatpositive attitudes drive motivation and enthusiasm for teaching to higherlevels (Pigge & Marso, 1997). Studies conducted on preservice teachersindicate that those with high grades and positive attitudes report want-ing to enter the teaching field early (Villeme & Hall, 1980). Ramsay

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and Ransley (1986) also reported that teachers with positive attitudeshad a positive influence on students’ achievements (Turkmen, 2007).

In the literature, many factors relate to teachers’ attitudes towardteaching. According to Bradley (1995), inadequate funding of schools,lack of parent and community support, and insufficient salaries are citedto affect teachers’ attitudes toward teaching. Marchant (1992) addedthe role of experience to the factors influencing teacher’s attitudestoward their profession. Alghazo, Dodeen, and Algaryouti (2003) re-ported that the teachers’ gender influences their attitudes. They foundthat female teachers have more positive attitudes toward teaching thanmale teachers. Flores (2001) asked 14 newly graduated elementaryschool teachers what affected their attitudes toward teaching. Mostof them said that their attitude toward teaching was impacted by thesocial and political control over teachers and the profession, and theeconomic problems.

Attitudes Toward Science

The manner in which students evaluate their feelings toward scienceis a learned response that takes place within a particular environment(Koballa, Crawley, & Shrigley, 1990). Science is a primary content coursefor most students from elementary school to college. The current mainobjectives of science courses is classified as fostering scientifically literatepeople who are capable of using process skills and have positive attitudestoward science. Science and elementary science teachers have importantroles in conveying positive attitudes to the students (Turkmen, 2007).

It is not uncommon to find media reports on the failures ofscience education. It is also not uncommon to hear prestigious scientistspublicly lament the rise of anti-science attitudes. Chin (2005) investi-gated whether first-year preservice teachers attending college in Taiwainhave satisfactory levels of scientific literacy. The domain of scientificliteracy selected in this study included: (a) science content; (b) theinteraction between science, technology, and society; (c) the natureof science; and (d) attitudes toward science. The results of the studyrevealed that, in general, the basic scientific literacy was at a satisfactorylevel. The results also showed that those who majored in high schooleducation scored significantly higher in physical science, life science,nature of science, science content, and test of basic literacy (TBSL)than elementary school science majors. Males performed better thanfemales in earth science, life science, science content, and TBSL.

Science preservice teachers gain an implicit sense of suitable in-structional methods through authentic practice when authentic practice

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is treated as an indispensable part of instructional knowledge (McLaugh-lin & Talbert, 1993). Strong evidence in research illustrated how au-thentic practice is correlated to a greater sense of preservice teachingsuccess (de Laat & Watters, 1995; Mulholland & Wallace, 2001). As such,this study was designed to examine the effectiveness of promoting activelearning to influence students’ DESCA responses as well as attitudestoward teaching and teaching science.

Methods

Subjects

The data for the current study were obtained from 77 elementary schoolpreservice teachers (n D 36 females; n D 41 males) from two classesconducted by the same instructor in a public university located inHatay, a small city in Turkey. The sample varied between 21 to 23years of age. Each of the two modes of instruction were randomlyassigned to two classes. The experimental group received the activeteaching and learning of constructivist methods, whereas the compar-ison group was exposed to the traditional instruction. The data wasanalyzed for 39 students in the experimental group and 38 students inthe comparison group. In addition, 6 random students in the experi-mental group were asked to write reflection letters before and after thetreatment.

Measures

The data for this research are based on preservice teacher’s responsesto a DESCA questionnaire (administered after each teaching activity)and pretest–posttest measures of attitudes toward teaching and science.

DESCA Questionnaire

As an indicator of active learning, the DESCA Scale for Rating aClass scale was adapted from Harmin’s (1994) DESCA questionnaire(see Appendix). DESCA was administered to the experimental andcontrol group after every teaching activity. Each section in DESCAwas rated from 4 (first sentence) to 1 (last sentence). Students puta tick to the most suitable item of the sections in the DESCA question-naire. Scores of each section were gathered together to get a sessionscore.

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Attitude Scale Toward Teaching (ASTT)

Askar and Erden (1987) developed the Attitude Scale TowardTeaching, which measures preservice teacher’s attitudes toward teach-ing. The instrument contains 10 items with a 5-point Likert rating scale.It has 6 positive and 4 negative items. The Cronbach Alpha reliabilityof the scale is .80.

Attitude Scale Toward Science (ASTS)

Sahin, Çakır, and Sahin (2000) developed the ASTS, which mea-sures preservice teacher’s attitudes toward science (Cronbach Alphareliability D 0.95). The scale has 27 items and utilizes a standard Likert-scale response.

Treatment

The data collection for this study took place during the 2005–2006school year. The study was conducted over a 4-week period during whichthe topics related to science education methods and materials werecovered as a part of the regular curriculum in the science educationcourse. The preservice teachers’ participation in the science methodscourse, which falls in the fifth and sixth semester of the preservice teach-ers’ third year, was a program requirement. Even though the methodscourse in science was not a content course in pure science, science andthe strategies for teaching science were taught in an integrated fashion.

The comparison group classroom was exposed to the traditionalmethod course instruction, whereas the experimental group was in-structed to engage in active learning. The lessons for both groupswere regularly scheduled with eight 45-minute periods. In traditionalinstruction, preservice teachers were given a reading assignment to becompleted prior to the lesson. When the teachers present the lessonwith knowledge of the reading assignment, the students recorded theteacher’s explanation in the classroom. Following the presentation, theteacher asked questions about unclear parts during the lesson instruc-tion.

Preservice teachers in the experimental group implemented con-structivist activities by creating an active learning environment. Theobjective of the experimental group was to get preservice teachers torelate what was going on in the course to their lives and to promoteproblem solving and critical thinking. During each activity, the instruc-tor provided a risk-free environment to encourage preservice teachersto talk about their own ideas. Activities were constructed with the aideof Internet sites and experimental books. The following four activitieswere applied for this group.

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Activity 1—Drawing a Scientist Image in Science Class

In this activity the instructor asked preservice teachers to draw animage of a scientist in their mind. Then, preservice teachers were askedto study in pairs. They exchanged their drawings with their partnersand noted similarities and differences among the scientist conceptu-alizations. Preservice teachers concluded by discussing the reasons forsimilarities and differences between the imagined scientists. This ac-tivity was repeated in another session to represent a science learningenvironment. First, preservice teachers imagined and drew a scienceclass where they would teach. The focus of this imaging activity was toexplore what science classes should contain, as well as explore basicunderlying conceptions for ‘‘what science teaching is.’’

Activity 2—Factory Explosion

In this small group activity, the instructor described a scenario inwhich an explosion occurred in a wooden factory. Each group thenreceived a set of materials that had been collected from the factory.These materials including paper, paper clip, cigarette, pine cone, anda partially burned piece of paper with a secret note. The groups wererequired to role-play as inspectors with the mission to discover the causeof the explosion using the materials in their possession. Students wererequired to then present their solution and explanation to the class—which engaged in critical analysis of their solutions. As a conclusion, theinstructor led a discussion of methods for scientific problem solving.

Activity 3—Magic Ink

The magic ink activity was the third activity in this research project.Students wrote in lemon juice on paper (which is invisible), then re-vealed the letters by exposing the paper to lit matches (without burn-ing the paper). Students generated explanations for why this occurredin small group, then whole class, discussion. The conclusion of theclass was that lemon juice had a ‘‘C’’ atom that was burned whenexposed to heat. The students generated examples of different livingthings with the ‘‘C’’ atom, in the end concluding through the help ofthe induction-deduction decision-making process that ‘‘all living thingshave C atoms.’’

Activity 4—Flying Paper Plane

The instructor asked small groups of students to test 10 questionsthey generated about flying paper planes. Through creation of differentpaper plane designs, they tested hypotheses regarding length, width,and weight of paper planes. The preservice teachers recorded data

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including velocity and time in air for the various designs. At the end ofthe activity, findings of each group were discussed in class.

Results

Analyses of variance were conducted to compare effectiveness of the ac-tive learning approach and traditional approach in preservice teacher’sDESCA abilities, preservice teacher’s attitudes toward teaching, and pre-service teacher’s attitudes toward science during a 4-week time period.ASTT and ASTS were administered two times (pre- and posttest), andDESCA was administered four times (after every teaching activity).

DESCA Questionnaire

Preliminary analyses revealed that there was no violation of normality,homogeneity of variance, and homogeneity of intercorrelations assump-tions in the data (p > 0.05). The multivariate ANOVA revealed no sig-nificant within-group effects over the 4 weeks, F(3, 69) D 1.14, p D 0.34,�

2D 0.05 (see Table 1). However, the results indicated that there was

a significant interaction effect, indicating the level of change over timein preservice teachers’ DESCA scores varied by group, F(3, 69) D 3.13,p D 0.03, �

2D 0.12, with the data suggesting a slight preference in the

active learning group for Activity 2 (Factory explosion). Furthermore,the main effect of group status demonstrated a significant difference infavor of active learning group F(1, 71) D 518.77, p < 0.001, �

2D 0.88.

Attitudes Toward Teaching and Teaching Science

The multivariate ANOVA test examining attitudes toward teaching andscience revealed significant main effect for change over time, F(2, 73) D

29.71, p < 0.001, �2

D 0.45, as well as a significant interaction between

TABLE 1 Means (M) and Standard Deviations (SD) of the DESCAQuestionnaire

Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4

GroupNo. of

students M SD M SD M SD M SD

Experimentalgroup

35 16.57 1.50 17.00 1.80 16.37 1.96 16.51 2.05

Control group 38 10.03 2.03 9.21 1.85 9.39 1.57 9.95 1.54

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TABLE 2 Means (M) and Standard Deviations (SD) of the Pretest andPosttest Results of the Attitudes Scale Towards Teaching (ASTT),Attitudes Scale Towards Science (ASTS) as a School Subject

Group n

Pre-ASTTM (SD)

Post-ASTTM (SD)

Pre-ASTSM (SD)

Post-ASTSM (SD)

Experimentalgroup

39 42.37 (5.51) 44.29 (4.13) 89.58 (18.00) 103.05 (12.86)

Comparisongroup

38 41.50 (7.2) 42.71 (6.55) 94.89 (14.65) 96.87 (16.06)

group and time, F(2, 73) D 12.61, p < 0.001, �2

D 0.26 (see Table 2for descriptive statistics). Follow-up analyses demonstrated that theseeffects were driven entirely by a group by time interaction on theASTS, demonstrating an increase in the active learning group’s attitudestoward science with no similar increase in the control group, F(1, 74) D

24.66, p < 0.001, �2

D 0.25.

Discussion and Conclusion

The results demonstrate two findings related to science instructionfor teacher educators. First, the active learning group reported higherlevels on the DESCA scale, indicating more positive learning experiencerelated to dignity, energy, self-management, community, and awareness.Second, the active learning group gained a significant advantage overthe control group in attitudes toward science.

DESCA Ratings

Higher DESCA ratings for the active learning group are believed tobe connected to the instructional opportunities to discuss, analyze,and develop science understanding through active engagement. Activelearning was promoted through a variety of open-ended activities, whichplaced students in a less passive role than in the transfer-of-knowledgeview of education. Through active learning, experiences in sciencelearning shaped the potential teachers’ abilities to perceive themselvesas successful science instructors (Huinker & Madison, 1997; Balas, 1998;Sottile, Carter & Watson, 2001). The first goal of active learning wasto transform the role of the learner from passive observer to activeparticipant. Therefore, active learning encouraged the learner to takeactions in various ways concerning how to learn, how to use mental

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abilities, and how to think and interpret the information. In this kind oflearning process, students actively direct their learning using high-levelcognitive and decision-making skills and cooperate with other learners.Therefore, the results support the view that we need to establish activelearning and enriched learning environments to stimulate thinking andlearning in our students (Cookson, 2005).

Attitudes Toward Science

In science, attitudes are important for several reasons. Learners withpositive attitudes toward science are more likely to approach sciencelearning, interact with scientific topics, and hold greater motivation toexamine science. Similarly, Harlen (1986) pointed out that a teacher’sattitude toward a subject determines if and how the subject is taught.Before teachers can be classified as good elementary science teachers,Fraser-Abder (1985) postulated that teachers need to feel that they havean adequate knowledge of science in order to teach it without fear,be comfortable using science equipment in the classroom, and takeinterest in science and pass on this interest to their students.

The results of this study demonstrated that active learning instruc-tion led to greater gains in attitudes toward science as well as a slight(non-significant) gain in general attitudes toward teaching. Althoughthe data do not allow deeper analyses of the relationship betweenDESCA and attitude change, it is viable to suggest that the more positiveperspectives represented in the DESCA ratings for the active learningsessions predisposed learners to a more positive personal reaction to thescience content. That is, active learning practices that were associatedwith higher student-reported DESCA values led to greater group growthin attitudes toward science.

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APPENDIX DESCA Questionnaire

DignityI had strong, good feelings about myself.I felt fairly positive and secure.I am unsure how I felt.I didn’t feel very good about myself.I thought I was inadequate, hopeless, bad, or stupid.

EnergyI was comfortably active and energetic all the time.I was comfortably active and energetic most of the time.I am unsure how I felt.I did not put much energy into my work.I felt inactive and low, or anxious and stressed.

Self-ManagementI made many choices, managed myself, always felt self-responsible.I was rather self-managing, somewhat self-responsible.I am unsure how I felt.I drifted along, not using much of my own willpower.I was controlled or bossed, not at all self-responsible.

CommunityI felt that I was a part of the group and wanted to help others.I had generally positive feelings about others.I am unsure how I felt.I did not feel fully accepted by others and didn’t much want to help

them.I felt only selfishness and rejection from others.

AwarenessI was aware and alert all the time.I was aware and alert most of the time.I am unsure how I felt.I often was unresponsive or bored.I paid little attention. I was very unresponsive or bored.

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