A study on the professional development of primary school teachers in teaching science

The present study aims to identify the professional development needs for improving science teaching among primary schools in Hong Kong. The study focuses on the in-service level, and describes the kinds of teacher development experiences of primary school teachers in the vision of effective science teaching. Teachers’ experiences of change captured from the qualitative and quantitative method of data collection provide very useful data for the evaluation of the teachers’ growth after their participation in the workshop, and are used as guidance for future planning of the programme. The study puts forward some suggestions of directions which help to frame teacher development programmes for effective science teaching in primary schools, and proposes effective evaluation strategies in assessing teacher development. Copyright © 2000 SEAMEO Regional Centre for Science and Mathematics.