As an infused or a separated theme? Chinese science teacher educators’ conceptions of incorporating nature of science instruction in the courses of training pre-service science teachers

Teaching nature of science (NOS) is beginning to find its place in science education in China. This exploratory study interviewed twenty-four Chinese science teacher educators about their conceptions of teaching NOS to pre-service science teachers. Although five dimensions emerged, this paper mainly focuses on reporting the findings relevant to one dimension, i.e., incorporating NOS instruction in the courses of training pre-service science teachers. There were two preferences: twelve out of the twenty-four educators preferred having NOS instruction infused into the teaching of various course components, including inquiry-based science teaching approach, history of science, science subject content, and school science textbook analysis. The others chose to have a separated NOS module in their courses, though they indicated NOS might be also touched upon in other course components. It was found that three factors influenced their preference; the textbooks currently used by Chinese science teacher educators to train pre-service science teachers, their views of NOS content to be taught, and their vision of teaching NOS. We argue that the findings in this study provide some hints on ways to encourage science teacher educators to give higher priority to NOS instruction in their courses, which is believed necessary for achieving the goal of developing public’s scientific literacy. Copyright © 2013 International Council of Associations for Science Education.