Korean Elementary Teachers’ Beliefs in Constructivist Science Teaching Practice

Korean Elementary Teachers’ Beliefs in Constructivist Science Teaching Practice

This study aims to explore elementary science teachers’ perception of constructivist teaching practice. Teachers’ belief may well be related to actual teaching practice in their classrooms. More than that, these days are called as the era of post-constructivist teaching. In order to depict how close Korean elementary classrooms are to constructivist teaching practice, the first and critical indicator would be science teachers’ perception on that. Philosophy of Teaching and Learning(PTL) and Seven Constructivist Questions(SCQ) were used as self-evaluation questionnaires. The SCQ consisted of seven questions describing of the seven constructivist teaching elements including Content, Context, Constructivism, Curriculum, Curiosity, Assessment, and Inquiry. Based on the results, it will be hardly generalized but it could be stated that Inservice teachers’ believes regarding science teaching are at the conceptual stage of constructivist teaching practice.