The Association Between Course Context and Preservice Teachers' Perceptions of SSI Instruction

This chapter explores the association between elementary preservice teachers' (PSTs) perceptions of teaching using socioscientific issues (SSI) and the context in which the PSTs initially engaged with SSI. One course engaged with SSI while learning pedagogical strategies during an elementary science methods (decontextualized) course. The second course engaged with SSI via an environmental sciences course (contextualized). The contextualized course examined gray wolf management in Northern California as part of an ecology unit, which was followed by a series of debriefings regarding the implementation of the SSI. The findings indicate that while PSTs from both courses generally held more positive perceptions of SSI instruction after engaging with SSI, the students in the contextualized course perceived a greater ability to answer SSI-related questions and expressed more positive attitudes towards science content in the post-course data. Additionally, students in both courses perceived a greater need for teacher training on SSI implementation post-course.