From beginning teacher education to professional teaching: A study of the thinking of Hong Kong primary science teachers

This is a longitudinal study of the thinking about teaching science of beginning Hong Kong primary teachers. The research explores how their thinking changed from pre-service teacher education through to their first year as classroom teachers. It takes a more holistic view of teacher thinking than typical in the literature considering the nature, interrelationships, and changes over time of four major aspects: conceptions, planning, teaching, and reflection. Positive findings were that the majority of participants became more constructivist in terms of their conceptions and practice of teaching, but they also tended to become more simplistic in planning and less coherent in thinking as they progressed from pre-service teacher education to beginning teachers in schools.