JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN SCIENCE TEACHING
VOL. 41, NO. 9, PP. 936–960 (2004)
An Investigation of Experienced Secondary Science Teachers’
Beliefs About Inquiry: An Examination of Competing Belief Sets
Carolyn S. Wallace,1 Nam-Hwa Kang2
1
Science Education Department, University of Georgia, 212 Aderhold Hall,
Athens, Georgia 30602-7126
2
Curriculum and Instruction, College of Education, University of Nevada,
4505 Maryland Parkway, Las Vegas, Nevada 89154
Received 4 February 2003; Accepted 23 February 2004
Abstract: The purpose of this study was to investigate the beliefs of six experienced high
school science teachers about (1) what is successful science learning; (2) what are the purposes
of laboratory in science teaching; and (3) how inquiry is implemented in the classroom. An
interpretive multiple case study with an ethnographic orientation was used. The teachers’ beliefs
about successful science learning were substantively linked to their beliefs about laboratory
and inquiry implementation. For example, two teachers who believed that successful science
learning was deep conceptual understanding, used verification labs primarily to illustrate these
concepts and used inquiry as a type of isolated problem-solving experience. Another teacher who
believed that successful science learning was enculturation into scientific practices used inquirybased labs extensively to teach the practices of science. Tension in competing beliefs sets and
implications for reform are discussed. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 41: 936– 960,
2004
Those interested in promoting reform in science education are faced with a difficult
paradox: We recognize the crucial role of teacher expertise and practical knowledge in
promoting reform- based curriculum (Richardson, 1996; Keys & Bryan, 2001; Anderson &
Helms, 2001; van Driel, Beijaard, & Verloop, 2001), yet research indicates that science
teachers are reluctant to make meaningful reforms within the complex culture of
schools (Cronin-Jones, 1991; Duffee & Aikenhead, 1992; Tobin & McRobbie, 1996;
Yerrick, Parke, & Nugent, 1997; Huberman & Middlebrooks, 2000; Munby, Cunningham
& Lock, 2000; van Driel et al., 2001). Approximately two decades of research has indicated
that teachers are creative, intelligent decision makers with well-established beliefs about
the needs of their students and their own roles in the context of
Correspondence to: C.S. Wallace; E-mail: wallacec@uga.edu
DOI 10.1002/tea.20032
Published online 11 October 2004 in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com).
© 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
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schooling (Wildy & Wallace, 1995). Many teachers readily participate in state and
national professional development opportunities and have collaborated enthusiastically
with university- based researchers to improve their own science learning and teaching.
However, a set of cultural beliefs (Tobin & McRobbie, 1996; Munby et al., 2000; Keys &
Bryan, 2001), such as, the need for examination preparation and the compartmentalized
nature of science, permeates school science culture, becomes internalized by teachers,
and mediates the implementation of innovative practice.
During 1999–2001, we investigated the beliefs of experienced teachers who have
been enacting what they believe to be inquiry-based science teaching in their own
classrooms. Our goal was to frame a series of case studies for inquiry beliefs to gain a better
understanding of teachers’ professional practical knowledge about inquiry. Our rationale
to study experienced teachers with an interest in inquiry, rather than exemplary
practitioners of inquiry was threefold. First, we wanted to explore the possibilities and
limitations of inquiry in typical high school classrooms. We questioned how teachers
would respond to inquiry in the context of school culture with all its ordinary
constraints; thus, we focused on teachers that taught typical high school classes and did
not have special permission to deviate from the mandated curriculum. Second, we were
interested in illuminating the roles of competing belief sets, specifically related to the
construct of inquiry, and how teachers come to highlight one belief set over another
in particular situations. We reasoned that teachers who had not already moved to a
total adoption of inquiry-based methods might better exhibit these competing belief sets.
Third, we attempted to move beyond a description of teacher beliefs and practices of
inquiry towards an explanation of why teachers practice the way they do. Examining
teachers with a range of inquiry practices could provide information that could contribute
to theoretical knowledge on teacher practice.
There have been a series of studies describing how teacher beliefs about students,
learning, teaching, and the nature of science impact teaching practices and form
barriers to the implementation of reform-oriented curricula (Brickhouse, 1990; CroninJones, 1991; Gallagher, 1991; Tobin & McRobbie, 1996; Munby et al., 2000). These studies
have been extremely valuable in characterizing the relationship between beliefs and
practice. With the present study, we sought to explain the teachers’ actions about
inquiry in terms of their own goals and purposes of instruction, as well as their
epistemologies for how students learn science. Highlighting teachers’ constructed
definitions of inquiry and the purposes for which they use it will provide keys to
understanding under which belief conditions teachers may be more apt to adopt
inquiry-based approaches. Therefore, this study contributes to the knowledge base for
professional development and reform. The research questions for the within-case analyses
included: (1) What are teachers’ beliefs about the nature of successful science learning?
(2) What are teachers’ beliefs about inquiry-based teaching and learning?, and (3) What
are the relationships among the elements of the teachers’ beliefs systems as indicated
both through espoused beliefs and through classroom practices? The within-case analyses
are presented as a series of belief profiles for each of the six participants.
Theoretical Frameworks
Teacher Beliefs and Practical Knowledge
We draw on the theoretical constructs of both teacher beliefs and practical knowledge.
There is a strong literature base for applying the construct of teacher beliefs to
research on inquiry. Reviewing the literature, Pajares (1992) asserted that beliefs are
‘‘the best indicators of the decisions individuals make throughout their lives’’ (p. 307). Beliefs
structures play a major role in
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teacher decision making about curriculum and instructional tasks (Nespor, 1987; Pajares,
1992; Richardson, 1996). Nespor (1987), whose seminal work established beliefs as a
theoretical construct, asserted that teachers rely on their core belief systems rather than
academic knowledge when determining classroom actions. The rapid pace and illstructured nature of educational environments promotes decision making based on core
affective elements and evaluations rather than step-by-step problem solving. Beliefs are
made up of episodic knowledge, characterized by remembered stories and events,
affective elements, such as feelings about students, and existential presumption, beliefs
about the existence or nonexistence of entities, such as ‘‘immaturity’’ ‘‘ability’’ and ‘‘laziness’’
(Nespor, 1987). Remembered events, feelings, subjective evaluations, and presumptions are
likely to play a large part in teachers’ decisions to incorporate inquiry-based instruction.
There is a complex interaction between teacher beliefs, which are mental, and teacher
actions, which take place in the social arena. Our view is that teacher actions represent
one aspect of a teacher’s beliefs and should not be perceived as separate entity from the
belief system as a whole. What a teacher actually does in the classroom is representative of
her beliefs. Researching teacher actions as well as cognitively perceived beliefs helps us to
understand the complexities of a belief system as it played out in context (Richardson,
1996; Meijer & Verloop, 1998). Thus, interview and observation research is a reflective,
iterative process that encompasses the entire belief system. In-service teachers continue
learning to teach through the elaboration of their practical knowledge (Richardson,
1996). Beliefs are an important component of practical knowledge and serve as the filter
through which practical knowledge is developed. Practical knowledge includes constructed
knowledge of subject matter, as well as, contextualized knowledge of the classroom
(Munby et al., 2000). In a recent review, van Driel and colleagues signified the
importance of practical knowledge in fostering reform, ‘‘It is generally agreed that a
teacher’s practical knowledge guides his or her actions in practice. Consequently, practical
knowledge can be seen as the core of a teacher’s professionality’’ (2001, p. 142). Research on
teachers’ practical knowledge has revealed that it is based on experience, action oriented,
rooted in context, related to views of
subject matter, tacit, and integrated (van Driel et al., 2001).
Sociocultural Perspectives on Teaching and Learning
A second relevant framework for this study is that of a sociocultural perspective on
teaching and learning. First, sociocultural theory impels us to recognize the culture of
secondary school not simply as an obstacle to reform, but as the realistic construction in
which teachers move and work. In researching teachers’ beliefs about inquiry instruction, it
is important to consider not only their personal cognitive understandings, but also how
these understandings have been developed socially and within the context of the culture
of the classroom. Gee (1990) points out that social and cultural beliefs form the
foundation of discourse and meaning generation. According to Gee, cultural
understandings lie at the heart of making meaning as humans attempt to understand the
language of others. Beliefs and values fall into patterns that involve assumptions and choices
about meaning based on simplified models of the world. Gee describes these cultural
models as ‘‘something like movies or videotapes in the mind’’ (Gee, 1990, p. 78) that represent
idealized or typical realities. Humans react to language and actions based on their cultural
models. Cultural models, therefore, necessarily impact communication in the classroom
as teachers and students interact together. Similarly, cultural models impact researchers’
and teachers’ understandings of classroom instruction and reform initiatives. The construct
of cultural models informs our research by framing the work in authentic communication
between researchers and teachers and by attempting to establish a common language for
reflective discourse on inquiry.
EXPERIENCED SECONDARY SCIENCE TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ABOUT INQUIRY
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We recognize that teacher beliefs are strongly influenced by school culture and there
has been quite a bit of research on this phenomenon (Tobin & McRobbie, 1996; Yerrick et
al., 1997; Munby et al., 2000). It has been shown, for example, that teacher beliefs
about the need to cover the mandated curriculum are so strong that science teachers
subvert reform-oriented curriculum, yet claim publicly that they are teaching it (Olson,
1981; Yerrick et al., 1997). We sought to recognize these cultural beliefs as a driving social
factor in classroom decisions about inquiry. Thus, we reject Tobin and McRobbie’s (1996)
characterization of cultural beliefs as ‘‘myths’’ of science teaching in that they are real to
teachers. Our goal was to explore the integration of cultural beliefs and individual beliefs
as they impact decisions about inquiry-based science teaching.
Literature Review
Inquiry
The concept of inquiry-based science teaching was well articulated by Joseph Schwab
during the 1960s (Schwab, 1962). Schwab protested the teaching of science as a
presentation of facts already known, which he called a ‘‘rhetoric of conclusions.’’ He envisioned
a school curriculum that more accurately represented the scientific endeavor as engaged
in by practicing scientists, including active questioning and investigation. Since that time,
the idea of students posing questions, designing experiments, collecting data, and drawing
conclusions has been almost universally appealing and at the same time very difficult to
implement in real classrooms. A comprehensive report on the efficacy of inquiry-based
curricula from the 1970s indicated that despite ten years of development and inservice
teacher education, the amount and quality of inquiry-based teaching was well below the
desired state (Welch, Klopfer, Aikenhead, & Robinson, 1981). Teachers in the study
perceived several barriers to inquiry-based teaching including safety issues, lack of
equipment, management difficulties, and the need to teach a mandated curriculum. Most
importantly, the inquiry-based curricula of the 1970s had been largely designed by scientists,
with emphases on cognitive rigor and the structure of scientific reasoning. The Welch et al.
report (1981) indicated that teachers felt these curricula did not engage or meet the needs
of most of their students.
Since these early endeavors, inquiry has once again become the focus of science teaching
with the National Science Education Standards calling for inquiry as the ‘‘central strategy for
teaching science’’ (NRC, 1996, p. 31). Inquiry-based pedagogy may be thought of a set of
concepts about scientific investigation and the reasoning skills that promote the use of
those concepts, rather than as a specific teaching model or set of strategies (Keys & Bryan,
2001). Concepts to be learned by the students include how to pose a scientific question,
identify and conduct procedures to answer the question, look for patterns and meaning in
their data, construct a knowledge claim to answer their question, support their claim with
evidence, and explain their findings in light of a framework of scientific information (NRC,
1996).
Recent research indicates that for those teachers who persist in promoting inquiry,
either by posing interesting questions for children to answer, or by facilitating children to
pose their own questions, inquiry-based learning can be a very successful practice. One
element of success is that children have positive attitudes towards inquiry. Students like to
be involved in asking their own questions and formulating ways to answer those
questions (Crawford, Krajcik, & Marx, 1999; Gibson & Chase, 2002; Hand, Wallace, &
Yang, 2004). A second element of success is that students improve their ability to ask
researchable questions and to coordinate questions with knowledge claims and
evidence as they become more accustomed to inquiry-based learning (Crawford et al.,
1999; Hand et al., 2004). Many elementary teachers have embraced open inquiry
EXPERIENCED SECONDARY SCIENCE TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ABOUT INQUIRY
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and have written stories of their own successes (Keys & Bryan, 2001). However, students
need assistance in reframing the culture of the classroom in terms of what is expected
of them as successful learners (Crawford et al., 1999).
A further consideration for professional development of inquiry-based science is
research on the complex and demanding roles for a teacher using inquiry. Crawford
(2000) found that an excellent teacher of inquiry-based science teaching exhibited
many nontraditional roles in the classroom, including scientist, diagnostician, motivator,
guide, innovator, monitor, mentor and collaborator. Typically, teachers are not prepared
for these roles during teacher education and most teachers do not see these roles
exemplified by their peers in the school. Clearly, inquiry-based teaching requires
education in new ways of working with children that go far beyond simple notions of
teacher as facilitator (Minstrell & van Zee, 2000). Sustained and supportive professional
development is the most promising approach to making a lasting impact.
Beliefs About Science Teaching
Previous research indicates that teacher beliefs about students and student learning,
the nature of science, epistemology, and the role of the teacher are all significant elements
of teacher beliefs systems that may impact views of inquiry. Teacher beliefs about the
limitations of their students in terms of ‘‘ability’’ or ‘‘maturity’’ can be an obstacle to more
student-centered instruction. For example, Cronin-Jones (1991) conducted two case studies
of middle grades teachers implementing a constructivist-based curriculum. She found that
both teachers held strong beliefs that students of this age group needed explicit
direction, that students learn best through repeated drill and practice, and that factual
content acquisition is the most important student outcome. These beliefs prevented
the teachers from enacting the curriculum in ways that the developers intended.
Cronin-Jones concluded, ‘‘In order to ensure more congruence between intended and
implemented curricula, developers should put more effort into determining and
considering existing teacher belief structures before developing new curricula’’ (1991, p.
248).
Similarly, teachers’ understandings of the nature of science may create barriers to
im- plementing inquiry-based instruction. Previous studies have indicated that many
teachers have a view of the nature of science as an objective body of knowledge created
by a rigid ‘‘scientific method’’ (Duschl & Wright, 1989; Brickhouse, 1990; Gallagher, 1991).
Frequently teachers have no educational background in the history or philosophy of
science, nor do they have first hand experience practicing science. Thus, they tend to
portray science as a collection of facts, principles, and concepts with little or no
instructional attention given to the processes by which scientific knowledge is made
public and validated (Gallagher, 1991). One implication of this dilemma is that without a
firm understanding of how scientists work, teachers may be inhibited to involve students in
activities that explore questioning, deviate from exact procedures, interpret data, or
obtain a variety of explanations for the phenomena.
Hashweh (1996) characterized science teachers as learning constructivists, learning
empiricists, knowledge constructivists and knowledge empiricists. Learning and knowledge
constructivists tended to believe that scientific knowledge is tentative and invented,
recognized students’ naive science ideas, and believed that the learner has an active
role in constructing knowledge. In contrast, learning and knowledge empiricists tended to
believe that scientific knowledge is an objective collection of facts, were not aware of
naive conceptions, believed in reinforcement as a method of learning, and emphasized the
‘‘scientific method,’’ both as a paradigm for scientists and for instruction. Hashweh found
that these epistemological beliefs affected the nature of science teaching with
constructivist-oriented teachers eliciting and
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recognizing students’ prior conceptions, and using a wide variety of teaching strategies to
develop conceptual understandings. In contrast, empiricist-oriented teachers recognized
students’ prior conceptions as incorrect, and used fewer teaching strategies to convey the
correct information to students.
Research on beliefs that undergird science instruction have shown that teachers
construct cultural beliefs that impede reform (Tobin & McRobbie, 1996). Tobin and
McRobbie (1996) identified four major ‘‘myths’’ of secondary science instruction: the
transmission myth, the efficiency myth, the myth of rigor, and the myth of preparing
students for examinations. The secondary chemistry teacher in their study viewed
himself simultaneously as a powerful keeper and transmitter of chemistry knowledge,
and as a relatively powerless individual in terms of transforming the chemistry
curriculum. The authors assert that the story of this chemistry teacher is representative of
many middle and high school teachers that their group has studied over a period of ten
years in both the United States and Australia. Beliefs about the necessity of covering the
curriculum, preparing students for examinations, and keeping the science classroom
efficient are pervasive, and any attempt to foster inquiry-based instruction in the
secondary science classroom must take these entrenched cultural beliefs into
consideration.
Additional studies confirm that teacher beliefs about the nature of knowledge,
teaching science, and the mandated curriculum impede and ‘‘filter’’ innovative practice
suggested by professional development (Yerrick et al., 1997; Huberman & Middlebrooks,
2000; Munby et al., 2000). Powerful cultural influences, most especially, the school
curriculum document continue to shape belief systems and educational decisions. Yerrick
et al. (1997) concluded that an intricate cognitive system of resolving and rationalizing
mechanisms allowed teachers to believe they had incorporated reform practices without
changing their core beliefs. Munby et al. (2000) suggest that when science is separated
from its original contexts of investigations and questioning and becomes transplanted in
secondary school culture, it becomes inauthentic. This inauthenticity limits the nature
of science and the understanding of teachers of the nature of science, thus, limiting
professional development and growth. Similarly, Huberman and Middlebrooks (2000)
documented the ‘‘dilution’’ of rich inquiry-based science curriculum embedded in the Voyage of
the Mimi. A review of these studies presents a grim picture of the possibilities for reform.
In a quantitative study, Haney, Czerniak, and Lumpe (1996) reported that teacher beliefs
were a strong predictor of their intentions to implement reform-based strategies. They
determined that the following four beliefs were most salient to teachers’ intention to
initiate inquiry: (1) increase student enjoyment and interest in science; (2) foster positive
scientific attitudes and habits of mind;
(3) help students learn to think independently; and (4) make science relevant to the
students’ everyday lives. The study further indicated that experienced teachers wanted
training in inquiry approach and the most powerful component of lasting reform
may be the opportunity to experience success with inquiry-based teaching.
Methods
Research Design
This study was an interpretive multiple within-case study that was conducted
from an ethnographic perspective. It was interpretive in the tradition inspired by Erickson
(1986), in which the participants own meanings and points of view were sought. While not
a true ethnography, we used an ethnographic lens to capture a sense of the learning culture
in each classroom we observed. A sociocultural constructivist perspective guided the
research.
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Participants and Professional Development Activities
Six experienced teachers were selected for this study, from a pool of 15 teachers who
attended summer workshops on inquiry, had an interest in implementing inquiry, and who
volunteered to participate in the research. The workshops were conducted during the
summers of 1999 and 2000 and included a few follow-up group meetings during the
respective fall semesters. The first author of this study was the instructor for the
workshops. The goal of the professional development workshops was for teachers to
construct their own concept of inquiry-based science teaching within a community of
learners. Three types of activities took place during the workshops. First, the participants
explored their own and their peers’ initial conceptions of inquiry through concept mapping,
journaling, and discussion. Second, they engaged in inquiry-based activities designed by
workshop staff, such as, building a ‘‘water strider,’’ observing and creating investigation
questions for protists, and investigating the ecology of a local lake ecosystem. Third,
participants designed their own inquiry-based laboratory activities to further extend and
define their know- ledge. During the entire professional development experience, the
participants engaged in numerous discussions about what they believed were the
characteristics of inquiry. Rather than impose her own ideas, the researcher supported the
teachers’ own knowledge construction (Keys
& Bryan, 2001).
There is little question that ideas surfacing in the workshops and professional
development meetings influenced the participants’ views of inquiry. The researchers
conducted interviews with the teachers about their views of inquiry at the beginning of
the workshops and these, along with concept maps and journals, were used as data in the
study. However, the researchers’ goal was not to capture any change in the participants’
views of inquiry as a result of the workshop. The reasons for this are twofold. First, we do
not believe that a 1-week workshop (even with follow-up meetings) can change the
core beliefs of a teacher. Second, our philosophy was that of creating a dialogue with the
teachers so that all the participants in the learning community could construct a clearer
understanding of how inquiry-based instruction might work in real classrooms. The
researchers learned as much from the teachers as vice-versa. Therefore, the specific
impact of the professional development was not investigated as a focus of the research
study. Teacher beliefs before, during, and after the workshop were probed as one
unified view of inquiry that is manifested in competing beliefs sets. In addition,
teacher practices back in the classroom were used as a primary data source for evidence
concerning teacher beliefs. We agree with Richardson (1996) that practices and espoused
beliefs should be used together to gain a deep understanding of core beliefs.
The six teachers were purposefully selected to represent a range of school
settings and subjects. Teacher participant, Pamela (European American, 16 years teaching
experience), taught ninth grade physical science at a rural high school. Pamela had been
a laboratory technician in chemistry and had raised a family before becoming a teacher
in midlife. She had completed a master’s degree in science education during the late
1980s. Jerry (European American, 25 years teaching experience) taught eleventh and
twelfth grade chemistry and physics at the same high school as Pamela. Jerry’s
background was in biology and he had done graduate work in the field of ecology many years
prior to the study. The school where Jerry and Pamela taught was moderately sized and
served a largely White population. Many students at the school were below the poverty
line and it was acknowledged in the school culture that very few students would go on to a
four year college. Jerry enjoyed teaching what he believed were the academic elite
students at the school in chemistry and physics.
Tom (European American, 20 years teaching experience) taught diverse non-collegebound students in physical science and principles of technology at a suburban high
school. He had a
EXPERIENCED SECONDARY SCIENCE TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ABOUT INQUIRY
943
master’s degree in science education at the time of the study, which he had obtained many
years before. The population at Tom’s school was about 60% White, 30% Latino, and
10% other. Tom’s physical science students were generally ninth graders, while the
principles of technology students (considered to be low-achieving) were tenth and
eleventh graders. Tom enjoyed teaching students who were younger or placed in lower
level classes.
Ellen (European American, 15 years teaching experience) taught ninth grade
honors and gifted biology at a diverse suburban high school. Ellen had completed her
master’s degree in science education just one year prior to the study. Students at
Ellen’s high school were approximately 75% White and 25% Black. Ellen wanted to
present a challenging course for her high level students. Rose (Nigerian, 12 years
teaching experience) taught college preparatory chemistry in a mostly White suburban
high school. Rose taught both average students and honors students for chemistry. Rose’s
previous educational background was unknown to the researcher, but she had taught
secondary chemistry previously in Nigeria. Finally, Jane (European American, 29 years of
teaching) taught ninth grade honors biology at the same suburban high school as Rose.
Jane, whose husband is a science education professor, was a recognized teacher-leader in
the state. She had been active in professional organizations, conferences, and
workshops for many years. Coincidentally, Jane had been the cooperating teacher
mentor for Ellen during student teaching several years previous.
Data Sources and Collection
To investigate the teachers’ beliefs and practices about inquiry, multiple data sources
were obtained. Three participant teachers were studied during one academic year,
and three were studied during the second academic year. Data sources used to determine
teachers’ inquiry beliefs and practices included: (1) semistructured formal interviews; (2)
informal interviews; (3) field notes from observation and video tapes of classroom
teaching; (4) lesson plan and student materials documents; and (5) written reflections
of the teachers.
The first data collection technique was a series of formal interviews used to
probe the teachers’ beliefs about inquiry and other related aspects of teaching and
learning throughout the study year. Participants were each interviewed three to four
times including, early in study year, midway through the study year, and towards the end
of the study year. Initial interview questions included probes of teachers’ beliefs about their
students, the science curriculum, their views of the nature of science, purposes for
laboratory activities, and inquiry-based teaching. As the study progressed, interview
questions were often designed to probe specific teaching actions seen in classroom
observations. For example, in midyear Jerry was asked, ‘‘What is the influence of the
curriculum on your teaching?,’’ ‘‘What did your students learn about torque today?,’’ and ‘‘Why do you
structure your labs the way you do?’’ The third and/or fourth round of interviews included
questions designed to provide member checks on data analysis. Data analysis was
presented to the teachers as a representation of their beliefs and further comments and
clarifications were elicited. All interviews were audiotaped and transcribed in full.
A second source of data was informal interviews conducted before, during, and
after classroom observation visits. The researchers asked the teachers what they
planned to do in the lesson that day, what were their purposes for the lessons, and how
they thought students responded to the lesson. The informal interviews were
conversational in nature. The researchers recorded data arising from the informal
interviews in their field notes during the site visits.
To investigate actual classroom practices, observations were conducted by the
researchers from fall of 1999 through spring of 2001. Researchers attended 4–10 classroom
sessions of either 55- or 90-min duration. During the first year of the study, 9 or 10
observations were made of each
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teacher. Our data analysis, as well as the literature (van Driel et al., 2001), indicated that
teachers’ belief sets as enacted in the classroom were similar to their espoused beliefs
during interviews. Therefore, the number of classroom observations during the second
year was reduced to four or five. During each observation, the researchers recorded
extensive field notes and the class lesson was videotaped. Observations were made
during instruction that the teachers self-identified as having an inquiry component or
orientation, including demonstrations and laboratory activities. The videotape data were
transcribed in full.
A fourth data source included lesson plan documents and handout materials for
students created by the participants in preparation for teaching what they identified
as inquiry-based lessons. Approximately five sets of documents were collected for each
teacher participant. The documents were photocopied. Finally, in some cases we had
access to teachers’ written reflec- tions. Ellen provided a document of several pages in
length that she had written in preparation for National Board Certification. It contained
reflections on her inquiry-based teaching. The teachers also kept brief learning logs
during the summer workshops and these were used for additional insight into their
thinking.
Data Analysis
All interview audiotapes were transcribed in full. Four to eight videotapes for each
teacher were transcribed in full; as coding proceeded we determined that our data
analysis was saturated and additional video transcriptions would not reveal new data
patterns. Interview transcripts, video transcripts, journal entries, and field notes were
typed into computer word-processing files. Four iterations of coding took place. Prior
to coding, the data corpus was unitized into segments representing a single idea,
usually one to three sentences. Then, the unitized data were first descriptively coded,
using coding categories suggested by the interview questions and adding emergent
categories. These descriptive categories included nature of school science, goals of
laboratory, teaching strategies, student characteristics, student learning, assessment, and
inquiry. After descriptive coding, the first round of interpretive coding took place. The
two researchers each took the data for the three teachers from the first year of the
study and created interpretive codes within each descriptive category independently.
These codes interpreted the teachers’ meanings within each category. For example,
the first author created the following codes for participant, Tom, for the inquiry
category: imagination, deep thinking, posing questions, deve- loping lab techniques,
challenge students, more than one answer, and autonomous thinking. Next, the two
researchers met and compared their interpretive coding lists, adding, deleting, and
combining codes until a consensus coding scheme was achieved.
The third coding iteration (second round of interpretive coding) then took place as
the two researchers split and independently recoded data from the first set of three
teachers, according to the consensus coding scheme. At this time, the frequencies of
codes were determined (Miles & Huberman, 1994) and the most common patterns were
noted using constant comparative analysis (Glaser & Strauss, 1967). From these data, a
summary was made of the most important coding categories for each participant’s
beliefs. For example, Tom’s most salient beliefs about inquiry included deep thinking,
challenging students, developing lab techniques, and having more than one answer. Once
each participant’s beliefs about each topic were characterized, we went back to the data to
select excerpts that exemplified each main category as a further check on validity. The final
steps in this round of analysis were the coding, frequency analysis, and constant
comparison of the data from the three teachers in the second year of the study.
In the fourth and final coding iteration, we dropped one of the original descriptive
categories that did not seem directly relevant to the research questions and the
emerging belief profiles,
EXPERIENCED SECONDARY SCIENCE TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ABOUT INQUIRY
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assessment. Additionally, the categories for student learning and nature of school
science were collapsed into one category that appeared to be emerging as one of
importance—nature of successful science learning. Third, we renamed the teaching
strategies category to implementation of inquiry. The entire data corpus was reviewed in
light of these changes, and exemplars from the data were modified as well. All patterns and
themes were then synthesized into narratives of belief profiles that appear in the paper.
Results
The results comprise five beliefs profiles for the six science teachers in the study.
Ellen’s Profile
Nature of Successful Science Learning. Ellen’s beliefs about successful science learning can
be described as enculturation into scientific practices. A large focus of Ellen’s work with
her students was introducing them to scientific techniques, equipment, language,
and ways of thinking. To Ellen, constructing an understanding of science was
dependent on engaging in authentic scientific practices. Her goals were to ‘‘develop the
students’ ability to use the inquiry process, to learn to communicate using scientific
vocabulary, to teach the students a variety of tools in the lab to collect data, to explore the
nature of science, and to advance the students’ problem solving, thinking, and reasoning
skills’’ (Ellen, excerpt from written reflection on inquiry). Ellen believed that successful
science learning had occurred when students were able understand a scientific
problem, use the tools and techniques appropriate to investigate the problem, and engage
in authentic discourse relevant to the problem.
Interview, observation, and videotape data supported the theme that Ellen believed
students are learning science when they can engage meaningfully in scientific practices.
Her focus on tools and techniques was evidenced in her careful teaching about using
mathematics to understand population size in the yeast lab, microbiological techniques
in the herb lab, and field equipment and its use in the limnology lab. In the following
excerpt from her written reflection on inquiry, she explained how she believed she met her
goals for enculturating her students into microbiological techniques:
In the second segment of the videotape, the students are implementing phase two
of their investigation. At this stage, many students are comfortable with
microbiological techni- ques and equipment used in this investigation. They have
learned how to make their extracts using the mortar and pestles, balances,
micropipettors, and graduated aliquots and cylinders. They demonstrated the
correct technique to spread the herbs on the plates and inoculate them with
bacteria’’ (Ellen, excerpt from written reflection on inquiry).
In addition to becoming proficient with lab techniques and tools, Ellen described
science learning as using scientific language and thinking skills for authentic purposes.
The use of scientific thinking concurrently with language and technique formed the core of
Ellen’s beliefs in enculturation into scientific practices. When asked what it means for an
activity to be successful, she responded:
I think when I see students using scientific vocabulary, using process skills, like it was
the most natural thing in the world. Like they’re really not even thinking about it
any more, like it’s just been incorporated into their problem solving skills. That’s
when you have a
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really successful activity. If they’re telling me ‘‘that thing over there’’ or ‘‘I don’t exactly know
what we did here,’’ constantly referring back to their notes, I think we have a
problem here. I think they’re telling me right there that they didn’t learn too much
from that activity . .. but I found in particular in the herb lab that they were using
many terms, like they would use any other common term—like they would use
‘‘pencil.’’ They were coming up with ‘‘where are my aliquots’’ or ‘‘there’s something wrong
with my agar.’’ I think that has to do with success, when a kid can explain it back to you
or, and this is a big one, when they can take what they learned and apply it in a
similar situation. (Ellen interview, 4 /27 /01)
Purposes of Laboratory and Inquiry. Ellen believed that the purpose of doing laboratory
in science class was to develop problem-solving skills, including understanding the
nature of a scientific problem, setting goals or subquestions to solve the problem, thinking
through a plan, and interpreting data. In an interview, Ellen explained how her
thinking about the purposes of laboratory has changed significantly over the past few
years. The following excerpts illustrate how Ellen rejected her previous beliefs about the
value of laboratory for teaching and reinforcing science content:
Researcher: What would you say are the main purposes for doing laboratory
activities in science?
Ellen: If you’d have asked me that question probably two years ago, I would probably
tell you that it was to reinforce content. Probably since I’ve started my master’s I’ve
really changed my outlook on the purpose of labs. And really what I want them to do
is to be able to think. To be able to develop a plan and follow through and then be
able to do something with that data. Do they just look at the data and go, ‘‘Okay, I’ve got
my data, now what?’’ or do they, can they, look at that data and make meaningful
conclusions from that data?
. . . [several interchanges later] They should know, before they start any activity, what
is it they are trying to achieve. And, like I said with some of the other [cookbook] labs,
I don’t think they do know that, they are just following the steps, and being very
careful. Most of them will be very careful to follow the steps, but they really don’t
know why they are doing it. So I guess you could say my goal is to get out of it, to
understand, first of all, understanding their problem and the working towards a
solution to that goal. (Ellen, interview, 9 /8 /00)
Ellen now believes that the value of cookbook labs is very limited. She strives to
inculcate in her students a chain of reasoning including, deep understanding of a
scientific question or problem, designing laboratory methods to solve the problem,
collecting meaningful data, and interpreting and inferring from the data. Her purposes
for laboratory were closely related to her conception of successful science learning,
which highlights thinking and problem solving. Because her purpose was centered on
scientific thinking, she is inclined to incorporate inquiry- based labs into her teaching
repertoire.
Implementation of Inquiry. Ellen’s implementation of inquiry-based science was to
conduct five or six inquiry labs during the two-semester biology course that she teaches.
During the study year, Ellen implemented inquiry-based labs on the following topics:
yeast population change, photosynthesis, osmosis, herbal antibiotics; and lake
ecosystems. Each of these labs took approximately one week of class time (55-min
periods). Ellen viewed the content goals of the lab
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as being teacher-directed. Although her primary belief in successful science learning
was enculturation into scientific thinking, she also subscribed to the school cultural belief of
the need to prepare students for high stakes exams. As she expressed, ‘‘To me, let’s get rid of
the content and let’s really work on problems in depth, that’s what I would like to do anyway.
But because of where I am and what I teach, I don’t have the opportunity to do that’’ (Ellen,
interview, 4/ 18/01). Ellen eased the tension in these conflicting belief sets by designing
inquiry-based labs that embedded content-driven goals of her teaching, ‘‘For the most part,
it’s my goal, this is what I’d like them to learn about . . . . I’d say I do more of a guided inquiry for
the most part, not all the time, but for the most part with a specific teacher-centered goal
in mind.’’ Therefore, Ellen set the inquiry problem for the students, but encouraged them
to develop subquestions. For example, in the herbal antibiotics lab, she posed the
problem, ‘‘How do herbal medicines affect bacteria?’’ (Ellen, document data) but left the
students to choose the specific variables they wanted to test.
Tom and Rose’s Profile
Nature of Successful Science Learning. Tom and Rose have similar belief sets
concerning the nature of learning, purposes of laboratory and inquiry, and the
implementation of inquiry- based teaching. Because of the similarity of their profiles, their
data have been combined into one section. Both teachers held a primary belief that
successful science learning is developing a deep understanding of scientific concepts.
They also held a secondary belief that successful science learning involves thinking and
problem solving. For example, Rose illustrated her beliefs about the importance of
content and conceptual understanding as follows:
What is important is for them to understand the concepts and be able to build on
that. So, I think of ways to make it easier for them to understand . . . . Specifically, if I
do a lab, I want the children to find out the basis for the lab. If they understand the
basis for the lab, then it’s easier for them to go through the lab. I want them to
understand the lab, to understand the basis. (Rose, interview, 8/31/00)
Tom and Rose’s primary belief that successful science learning is conceptual
understanding was very closely related to their purposes for laboratory. Tom asserted that
science was ‘‘hands- on’’ topic, ‘You can’t teach science just off the blackboard. You have to get in
there and see the relationships before fully understanding. You have to get in there and see
it and do it, and see what will work’’ (Tom, interview, 6/23/99). Both Tom and Rose taught
concepts prior to doing the laboratory, so their students would have an optimal
opportunity to understand the conceptual basis of the lab, ‘‘The day before I do the lab I hit the
concepts as hard as I can’’ (Tom, interview, 6/ 21/ 99). Rose similarly stated, ‘‘I usually do labs
after we have done the theory, we have covered the concept and now we want to go to the
lab and go through the practical aspects’’ (Rose interview, 8/ 31/00). They were concerned
that students could relate concepts from lecture and discussion to the concepts in the
lab.
Both Rose and Tom were interested in using inquiry-based methods to satisfy their
secondary goal of science teaching; helping students become independent thinkers. Their
desire to teach for conceptual understanding and to promote independent scientific
thinking may be viewed as competing belief sets, because it is difficult to give students
the freedom to develop their own labs, yet teach for canonical science understandings
simultaneously. Both Rose and Tom expressed their interest in using inquiry to foster
autonomous thinking. Early in the study year, Rose expressed her desire to try more
inquiry: ‘‘I realize that a lot of the labs can be modified into
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inquiry-based labs. And it makes the children think more and participate more in labs and
even in the classroom. So, I am going to try and modify as many labs as I can as I go to
inquiry-based labs, so the students will get more out of the labs’’ (Rose interview,
8/31/2000).
Tom similarly stated, ‘‘I like the inquiry techniques or giving students more chance to
use imagination, the more deeper thinking other than just following the steps or
recipe’’ (Tom, interview, 6/ 23/99). Thus, for both Rose and Tom, successful science learning
is made up of two elements, deep conceptual understanding, and independent scientific
thinking. The teachers’ understanding of successful science learning is directly related to
their purposes for conducting laboratories, discussed below.
Purposes of Laboratory and Inquiry. Both Rose and Tom believed the primary purpose
of laboratory to be the visualization of scientific concepts. For them, laboratory served as a
visual and kinesthetic aid to connect concrete objects and events to scientific language
as discussed in the lecture portion of the class. These teachers had a view of laboratory
closely related to Millar’s (1998) idea of science labs as elaborate visual aids. Rose and Tom
believed that students would use the information gained by their senses in laboratory
to synthesize a deeper understanding of scientific concepts.
Tom talked repeatedly to the researchers about the use of hands-on activities for
students to ‘‘see’’ scientific ideas and relationships, ‘‘One purpose I have is to have the kids just
visually do or manipulate whatever the concept we are going to talk about. I mean, I think in
science, a picture is worth a thousand words.’’ Tom described how he used a solutions lab
and post lab discussion to synthesize lecture notes with lab findings. He stated, ‘ [I’ll] let
them reflect back on the notes I gave them yesterday. ‘That’s what happens when you crush
it to increase surface area. When you heat it, you increase molecular motion,’ and see if
they can tie those things back together. And take the notes they got out of class and pull
it into what they were doing in lab and give them the connection . . . . They can really see
it [factors on dissolving rate]. You know, I can say that the crushing increases dissolving
rate. When they actually crush it for themselves, then they can see it’’ (Tom, interview,
3/23/ 00). Similarly, when asked ‘‘What are your purposes for doing laboratory?’’ Rose
responded:
First, to practicalize what we talked about in theory. Because sometimes you say
these things in theory and they [the students] cannot visualize them. So when you do
it in the lab, hands-on, the students are more able to understand what you are
talking about. Like the significant figures, if I was just talking about it they probably
wouldn’t get it, but because we had gone through this lab, they didn’t have any
problem. (Rose, interview, 8/21/00)
However, both Rose and Tom also believed that the purpose of inquiry-based
instruction was to promote autonomous thinking and problem solving. Thus, they had a
secondary belief in using lab to foster problem-solving skills. As Rose stated, ‘‘When you do
inquiry-based labs and you start to ask questions, and somebody comes along [in their
thinking] and you say, ‘Oh, fantastic, you did it and that is very good’’ (Rose, interview,
9/21/00). Tom values inquiry for promoting deep thinking in science. Tom believes that
the opportunity to make mistakes, hypothesize, and manipulate equipment is an
important reason to conduct inquiry:
As long as students have a chance to work with it, think about it, manipulate it, and
even make mistakes, get some wrong answers—I think they are learning. Even
though it makes them totally lost. I’ve had kids that get totally frustrated trying to rig
up a set of pulleys. They’ve never had to wire a pulley before and they can’t figure
out, ‘How do I run that
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string through here.’ But I think when we finally get it figured out, they’ve actually
learned something. They may not erect a pulley in their life again, but the
thought process of thinking through the problem, that they may use again. And if I
can teach my kids to think, I will be happy. (Tom, interview, 6/23/99)
Implementation of Inquiry. Tom and Rose conducted many standard cookbook
laboratories with their students that they did not self-identify as inquiry. Examples of these
labs would be Tom’s teaching of factors that affect dissolving and Rose’s lab on the
preparation and reactions of gases. These labs had step-by-step instructions for the
students and little room for independent scientific thinking. The teachers considered these
labs to be essential for demonstrating important concepts, so that students could visualize
them. Tom and Rose implemented cookbook labs throughout their courses.
Rose and Tom, however, remained interested in inquiry and implemented a few inquirybased
laboratories with their students during the study year. They viewed the inquiry activities as
distinct problem-solving events, lasting for one or two class periods. Their inquiry activities
were designed to have students develop laboratory procedures or think through
patterns in the data. Rose developed inquiry-based laboratories for the separation of
mixtures and grouping ions according to their valence numbers (Rose, laboratory
activities documents). The latter activity required students to sort models of ions into
groups, determine common characteristics within each group, and relate each group to
its place in the periodic table. Field notes revealed that students were engaged in this
problem solving activity, were using scientific thinking, and were successful in recording
family relationships for the ions (Rose, field notes, 9/29/00).
Tom’s self-identified inquiry-based labs in physical science during the study year included
an open-ended classification lab, designing bottle rockets, and designing a method
to test for coefficients of friction for different materials (Tom, field notes, various). During
the bottle rocket lab, Tom briefly discussed factors that could affect the height of the
rocket, then gave his students complete freedom to create their rockets. Students were
engaged in social negotiation of science ideas with their peers during this lab.
Tom and Rose, therefore, enacted inquiry-based labs as discrete problem-solving
events to
promote independent thinking as a separate secondary goal of instruction. Cookbook
labs were implemented to promote their primary goal of concept visualization. They
resolved the competition between two competing belief sets for successful science
learning by including two distinct types of labs in their repertoire, with inquiry-based
labs taking a secondary role in the culture of their classrooms.
Pamela’s Profile
Nature of Successful Science Learning. For Pamela, successful science learning can
be described as explaining everyday phenomena. She was concerned that students learn
things in her classes that will help them become informed citizens. This belief was
portrayed consistently in her classes through her extensive use of everyday science
examples in lecture, as well as the use of everyday objects and substances in lab. She
stated:
I want them to go out into the world with an understanding of these topics. I think
going out into the world, then, you need to know what it is, what it can do, what you
can do, what to fear, and what not to fear. So I always felt this crazy desire to get as
much knowledge into their heads as possible. (Pamela, interview, 3/16/2000)
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According to Pamela, students should have a wide range of information on why and
how things work as consumers of science. Her teaching goal was to give students as much
explanation as possible and to encourage them to use their science knowledge. Pamela
often related to us how she felt rewarded when students are able to explain science
independently:
I always liked the gold penny thing. I didn’t announce we were doing an experiment
with alloys. I just said, ‘‘Okay, we are going to do an experiment.’’ . . . . I never told them
we alloyed. They told me that was an alloy. Sooner or later somebody figured that
out. We had already covered the subject. (Pamela, interview, 3/16 /2002)
Like Tom and Rose, Pamela exhibited two competing belief sets about the nature of
successful science learning. While Tom and Rose had a primary belief in learning as deep
conceptual understanding, Pamela had a primary belief in learning as reproducing
scientists’ explanations and also had a secondary belief in learning as independent problem
solving. She felt an urgent desire to communicate the scientific view, so students could use it
in their everyday lives, as shown in the above quote, ‘‘I always felt this crazy desire to get as
much knowledge into their heads as possible.’’ At the same time, she valued problem solving
highly: She consistently defined inquiry as being able to ‘‘figure something out.’’ She stated, ‘‘They
[students] love to figure things out. My whole teaching career I’ve seen that. It’s a high for
them to figure things out’’ (Pamela, interview, 6/21/99). Thus, Pamela faced a tension similar
to that of Tom and Rose in her teaching as she attempted to enact her competing belief sets.
These competing belief sets were played out in Pamela’s classroom actions, as discussed
below.
Purposes of Inquiry and Laboratory. Pamela’s espoused purposes for laboratory and
inquiry were very closely related to her secondary belief about the importance of
independent problem solving. Pamela’s definition of inquiry is ‘‘Any activity in which they
[students] have to figure something out. It might be as extensive as figuring out the
procedures for a laboratory exercise, it might be simply figuring out why something happens
that we observed in the classroom’’ (Pamela, interview, 11/15/ 99).
Pamela believed that the purpose of demonstrations, which she defined as an
inquiry-based activity, is for students to generate explanations. For example, at the
culmination of a unit about phase change, she did a series of several demonstrations using
dry ice to illustrate concepts such as, evaporation, freezing, and sublimation. She taught
her students to make careful observations, record their observations, and then write an
explanation for what it was they observed (Pamela, field notes, 9/15/99). Her goal was
to have students use scientific vocabulary and cause-effect relationships to verbalize an
explanation. For example, when observing dry ice in a flask, she prompted the students
as follows:
I want you to observe as it comes around. I want you to write what you observe
inside and outside and I want you to write down why you think it is happening and
identify what it is. Remember, write down what you observe. [A couple of minutes
later.] Okay, what did we observe? (Pamela, video transcript, 9/15 /99)
Pamela’s ideas about student participation in hands-on laboratories also
illustrated her secondary purpose for laboratory, that of independent problem solving.
A foundation for this belief set was her dissatisfaction with traditional cookbook labs.
She stated:
I’ve often felt that the typical lab was like a 1040 form, and when they’re finished they
have no more idea what they’ve done than we do when we go at our income tax.
And the nice
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thing about inquiry is that’s not the case. They can figure out what they’re going to do, so
they know what they’re going to do—it makes sense to them. (Pamela, interview,
11/15/99)
Pamela believed that an important element of inquiry is that students come up with
their own procedures for conducting the lab. She viewed inquiry laboratories as
opportunities for student thinking about laboratory procedures. She wrote five labs
during the study year that incorporated students’ own procedures for determining
quantities such as volume, density, work, and mecha- nical advantage for everyday
situations and objects in the classroom.
Implementation of Inquiry. The data revealed that Pamela used two main types of
engagement in inquiry, demonstrations with questioning, and laboratory activities in which
students determined all or part of the procedures. Pamela’s beliefs about demonstrations
as inquiry were shaped by research she did when obtaining her master’s degree several
years ago. She was particularly impressed by a research paper indicating there was no
significant difference in science achievement between students who engaged in hands-on
laboratories and those who watched demonstrations, as long as there was questioning and
discussion related to explaining the concept. She stated:
I am influenced by a paper that I read when I was getting my master’s degree here in
1981– 1986 .. . . And what they found out was that using inquiry methods of
discussion, that it didn’t matter, whether they touched it, watched it, or just talked
about it. They did say that the students who did the hands-on gained some
manipulative skills that the others didn’t. But the point they were making was that
the inquiry discussion was the most important part. So, I like these little activities,
experiments, my kids call them, to spark that kind of inquiry discussion without
having to take the time for a full hands-on activity. (Pamela, interview, 6/21/99)
Pamela’s belief that inquiry could take the form of demonstration was reinforced by
other elements in her belief system, which represented constraints to more studentcentered forms of inquiry-based instruction. First, she believed that science instruction
must be efficient, because there is so much content to cover in a short period of time.
Second, her belief that her students are ‘‘immature’’ and ‘‘unsafe’’ led her to use the
demonstration method over the laboratory method when any harsh chemicals or
complicated procedures were involved. These beliefs worked to support Pamela’s main
focus on demonstrations as a form of inquiry, especially the need to be efficient, which
permeated many of her classroom actions. She described her demonstrations, ‘‘It’s very
efficient, you’re doing your topic, you do your experiment, you discuss it, you move on. No
set up, take down time, no socializing, no milling around’’ (Pamela, interview, 6/21/99).
Her belief in efficiency was related to her primary teaching goal of transmitting canonical
scientific information. She desired that each student had an opportunity to create their
own understanding of the demonstration. Yet, her need for efficiency caused a tension in
her teaching. Rather than let students discuss their observations and explanations at
length, she typically called on a student who would have the correct explanation right
away, elaborated the explanation herself, and then moved onto a different point. For
example:
Pamela: Okay, do you see any fog in here?
Students: No.
Pamela: No, so we see no fog in here, so the fog must not be coming from the dry ice.
Where is the fog coming from?
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Student: Water in that little jug.
Pamela: I heard someone say water and that is correct. As the bubbles come up
through the water, they picked up water vapor. Just the water vapor, not
the food coloring and it got so cold that it condensed into fog. But you have
to have water to get the fog (Video transcript, 9/15/99).
While Pamela asked provoking inquiry-oriented questions, e.g., ‘‘Where is the fog
coming from?’’ she seized the first correct utterance made by a student, then elaborated the
concept herself, rather than let students construct and verbalize their own explanations.
Thus, one major tension identified in Pamela’s belief system about inquiry was her desire to
use inquiry-based questioning strategies and her need for efficiency in instruction.
The urge for efficiency also mediated Pamela’s use of inquiry in the laboratory. All
Pamela’s laboratory activities occurred after the main concepts had been introduced and
discussed in class. For example, with the volume and density lab, students had already
discussed the density formula and worked practice problems in class. Pamela felt that
students would be able to conduct inquiry- based labs only when they had background
knowledge, such as the density formula, to use as a resource. Second, she believed that
she needed to provide enough structure and guidance so that students would complete
the lab in one class period without running into major stumbling blocks. When asked how
she thought inquiry-based laboratories were working she replied, ‘‘Some of them very good.
Some of them sort of marginally, we need to come back and make it easier for the
students to figure out what to do, to know what to do. Some of them have been a little
too open inquiry, they’re going to need more guidance’’ (Pamela, interview, 11/ 15/ 99).
In summary, Pamela implemented inquiry as demonstration with thought provoking
ques- tions, and the design of procedures for lab activities, as she sought to satisfy her
secondary goal of having students ‘‘figure things out.’’ Unlike Tom and Rose, who separated
their competing belief sets through the use of different types of labs on different days
for different purposes, Pamela attempted to satisfy both her competing belief sets
with the same activities. This attempt at reconciliation led to her cutting student
involvement and independent thinking short, as her desire to tell students what they
needed to know overtook most of her activities.
Jerry’s Profile
Nature of Successful Science Learning. Jerry’s main goal of science teaching was to develop
scientific habits of mind in his students. He felt that his students, who are among the top
achievers in the school, are well equipped to learn about scientific thinking, as well as,
content. Jerry referred to scientific habits of mind using many different terms, such as, ‘‘how to
think’’ or ‘‘scientific philosophy.’’ He elaborated on what he meant by teaching how to think in
his courses:
The goal of my courses, chemistry and physics, is to teach students a little bit about
how to think, to show them that we can explain how things in the world work, to
give them a little bit of the scientific philosophy of raising a question, generalizing,
and to try to explain that things are explainable and that the underlying rules are
not really all that complex. (Jerry, interview, 2 /18 /00)
One of Jerry’s primary concerns was to encourage his students to be aware of the
process of science while they are learning science. He was unique among the teachers in
our study in that he purposefully designed his teaching around nature of science
concepts. He asserted that he has
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struggled to present science as both a body of knowledge and a process of developing
explanations of how things work.
Jerry’s view of successful science learning as learning scientific habits of mind was
illustrated in his emphasis on experimental error during the teaching of labs. He used
experimental error to point out the limits of scientific knowledge and emphasized to his
students that lab results are not exactly the same as science theories predict. He pointed
out that science theories describe what is likely to happen, rather than what really
happens (Jerry, field notes, 9/ 14/ 99). For him, a science theory is a model that has
limitations. He insisted on avoiding the word ‘‘theory’’ in describing science knowledge;
instead, he used the word ‘‘model’’ to convey the tentativeness and limits of science
knowledge in explaining how the world works (Jerry, informal interview, 10/2/ 99). Jerry
elaborated on how he emphasized the tentative nature of science:
My model behaves this way. If the model behaves this way, then the real world
should behave the same way. So the example that I am giving is [that] Bohr’s model
of the atom predicted the existence of certain lines in the ultraviolet part of the
spectrum, which had never been seen before .. . . He said there should be this
wavelength and people looked in that part of the spectrum and said, ‘‘Wow, you are
right!’’ Therefore his model has some validity . . . .[But] it turned out that he wasn’t quite
right. He got false in something .. . then we modified our theories . . . .I am trying to
teach [that] scientists don’t say this is the truth. (Jerry, interview, 2/18/99)
In summary, Jerry’s notion of successful science learning is for students to understand
the nature of science knowledge including both tentativeness and valid explanatory
power. While he felt compelled to cover the content curriculum, he identified certain parts
of his course where he is able to point out the nature of science; laboratory activities are
among those parts.
Purposes of Laboratory and Inquiry. Jerry had two parallel beliefs sets concerning the
purposes of laboratory that were connected to his beliefs about students. Jerry believed
there was a large difference in both the ‘‘ability level’’ and the ‘‘maturity’’ of students in the chemistry
classes compared with the physics class:
In chemistry, I’ve found if I don’t give them cut-and-dried information, they can’t do the
labs. They don’t work as well in lab; they are more likely to spend the time socializing
and just sit there unless I tell them exactly what to do. I’ve discovered that the older
students [in physics] are able to proceed more independently. (Jerry, interview,
6/23/99)
He was very open about the fact that he felt the cookbook labs he used in chemistry
taught little more than reading directions and some basic laboratory manipulative skills. He
justified his actions of conducting traditional labs in chemistry with his belief that chemistry
students could not work independently. He, therefore, felt that lab was expendable in
chemistry, ‘‘Like at the end of the year, when I’m busy saying I need to cover this and this and this,
um, I’m going to cut down the number of labs that I do, because that’s what I find as being
expendable.’’ (Jerry, interview, 6/23/99)
Both interview and observation data provided evidence for a second strongly
held and seemingly contradictory belief set about the purpose of lab in physics. In physics,
Jerry used lab to achieve the following teaching goals: (1) promote thinking and problem
solving in science; (2) foster students to ‘‘discover’’ physics phenomenon by observing
patterns and inducing relation- ships; and (3) provide opportunities to confront
misconceptions by considering evidence that is counterintuitive. In this sense, Jerry used
what science educators might recognize as a conceptual
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change model of teaching. Jerry used inquiry-based laboratories to foster the discovery of
physics phenomenon, ‘‘I don’t tell them what the answer should be. They do not know what
the answer should be’’ (Jerry, interview, 6/23/99).
An example of allowing students to discover physics phenomenon was a laboratory on
torque that asked students to investigate by balancing several weights on a beam.
Rather than giving students the equation to verify, Jerry provided the opportunity for
students to derive the equation from their own authentic data in the laboratory. Jerry
discussed this lab in an interview:
Researcher: What do you think the students learned about torque?
Jerry: Most of the students by the end of the period had the equation. They did not
know it [before the lab]. That’s why I wanted to give this lab before they’ve heard of
torque, so they can derive the equation for themselves. I don’t want them to
read. This is a simple equation. Most, I think everybody got it. It was really nice to
see [students] B and T, I did not expect them to get it. [Some students came up with
the standard form of the equation] but many groups came up with the form of ‘‘d1/d2
¼ f 2/f 1,’’ which indicates they were coming up with it themselves not using the data
table, so it’s nice to see independent thought. (Jerry, interview, 2/19/00)
A defining characteristic of inquiry for Jerry was that the results of the laboratory be
unexpected, ‘‘Frequently, I try to have the lab be, I want to say counterintuitive, but it’s that
they don’t expect what’s going to happen. Thus, in a pendulum lab, the students think a heavy
pendulum will swing faster. I don’t tell them ahead of time, I let them take their
measurements and try and interpret the numbers (Jerry, interview, 6/ 23/99).
Therefore, Jerry believed that it was possible for students to construct science
concepts and principles first hand through inquiry, although he practiced this only with his
physics students. His emphasis on successful science learning as scientific habits of
mind is exemplified through laboratory in both chemistry and physics in his explicit
teaching of science as models as valid, but subject to change and error. The difference was
that in physics, students sometimes derived the models for themselves, while in
chemistry, they verified well known models.
Implementation of Inquiry. Jerry implemented inquiry-based learning only in physics
during the study period. He did several labs in physics that he described as ‘‘structured
inquiry’’ and several that he described as ‘‘guided inquiry.’’ He wrote in his reflection log:
In physics, I do many low level inquiry labs. I sketch the outlines of what I want
the students to do, they do not know the answer. Sometimes they think they know
the answer, the lab is a discrepant event. They are frequently required to use their
data to come to a mathematical conclusion (and a qualitative one as well).
Sometimes the labs are directed, they are told what and how to do, other labs are
more open-ended, they are given the tools and told what the goals is. (Jerry,
reflection log, 6/23 /99)
As an example of a structured inquiry, Jerry conducted a lab early in the study year on
speed and distance in physics. During this lab, students were given simple directions
about dropping a ruler and throwing a baseball, while measuring time variables. They then
used these measurements to calculate and interpret outcomes, such as the time the ball
was thrown in the air or the maximum height reached. Jerry considered this lab to be
structured inquiry, because the students needed to take their own data, and use their
own ideas about mathematical formulations to arrive at their
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conclusions. In the more open-ended guided inquiry labs, Jerry demonstrated a
phenomenon to the students, such as a swinging pendulum or balance (used in the
torque lab noted above). He then supplied the students with materials and asked them to
use trial and error to determine variables and their relationships that affected the
outcomes.
Jane’s Profile
Nature of Successful Science Learning. For Jane, successful science learning can
described as creative thinking about science. It was important to Jane that students take
scientific concepts and apply them in a creative fashion to make a product or artifact that
is unique. She desired her students to gain ‘‘ownership’’ of their laboratory projects and to
‘‘think outside the box.’’ Throughout her teaching and assessment, Jane illustrated that
individual thinking is valued:
I want students to begin to see. I want them to think for themselves. I don’t want them
to be a little parrot, parroting everything [that] everybody says. I do essay questions
periodically with my exams. Um, memorization, on an objective exam, they can
just memorize it. Putting it indirectly makes them begin to think, and put, you
know, the ideas and concepts together. Concept mapping begins to show
relationships. Open labs [inquiry] do the same thing. They have to start thinking for
themselves. (Jane interview, 5/14/01)
Jane believed that successful science learning involved a synthesis of important ideas
or big concepts, which was related to her ideas about creativity. If students could
synthesize ideas and devise creative representations for ideas, they demonstrated a deep
understanding. Jane’s beliefs about successful science learning were well illustrated by her
conception of a ‘‘kim-chee’’ lab. In the kim-chee lab, students use the medium of making
kim-chee to demonstrate several of the biological principles and concepts they have
been studying over the entire semester, such as osmosis, transport across cell
membranes, photosynthesis, and respiration. She had each student group choose a
concept to demonstrate, so that the collection of projects illustrated each of the major
concepts studied over the first semester. The creative product for the students was their
demonstration of a biological concept. She stated, ‘‘Creativeness they learn. How to think
for themselves. They know that I’m willing to accept off the wall type of any experiment or
that it doesn’t have to fit within the box. That they can extend outside the box and it can still
be viable’’ (Jane interview, 5/ 14/01).
Purposes of Laboratory and Inquiry. Both cookbook laboratories and inquiry-based
laboratories had specific functions in Jane’s classroom. Jane started the school year with
cookbook laboratories so that students may become accustomed to manipulating
laboratory equipment and bridge over to inquiry by doing small pieces of laboratory
independently. Jane referred to these experiences as a ‘‘bits and pieces’’ approach to
teaching inquiry. For example, early in the semester, Jane implemented a lab with set
procedures, but left the data analysis methods up to the students, ‘‘I may let them devise
their own, [the students say] ‘Don’t you have a chart for us to put the data in?’ [and I reply]
‘Maybe this data needs a bar graph? Maybe this data needs a line graph Maybe it’s the pie
graph? Maybe a chart would be better, but you have to come up with a chart for this.’ So
that’s what I mean by bits and pieces’’ (Jane interview, 5/ 14/ 01). Thus, throughout several
laboratory activities, Jane provided experiences for the students in designing laboratory
procedures, data collection techniques, data analysis techniques, and drawing
conclusions.
A second function of cookbook laboratories was to provide a direct contrast to inquirybased laboratories. About halfway through the first semester, Jane introduced a cakebaking analogy to
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the students to illustrate the distinction between cookbook and inquiry labs explicitly
to the students:
I liken both labs to baking a cake. In a cookbook lab, you have a recipe, for which you
bake a cake. And I use this analogy with the students. And I say, ‘‘You go and you get, you
know, your recipe and it tells you to get out, you know, flour, sugar, and eggs, and to
cream your eggs and it gives you the directions. And it tells you what to do and
what’s your result going to be. So what’s creative? What’s unusual? . . . . I tell the
students, yeah, there’s a place for that. What’s different about the open lab? And then
we begin to start, ‘‘I’m giving you the ingredients. Looking at these ingredients, how do
you think we’re gonna do it? Why would we cream butter and sugar first, why not
just add the butter after? Why do you do things a particular way? Can you vary a
thing? Which ones can you vary?’’ (Jane interview, 5 /14 /01)
Jane viewed the purpose of inquiry-based lab as a vehicle for students to develop their
creative and independent scientific thinking. This purpose for inquiry was directly related
to her notion of successful science learning as creative thinking, described above. Jane
sought to have students create not only their own procedures and conclusions, but
actually create their own methods of learning through science laboratory. To accomplish
this, Jane allowed a great deal of choice in developing methods of data collection, so that
students might choose the best way to answer their own questions. She designed a few
extensive laboratories throughout the school year in which students had the opportunity
to create their lab methods that matched their chain of reasoning. As she stated when
asked her definition of inquiry-based labs:
I like an open lab where a student is allowed, um, with some directions, is
allowed to devise and develop a product of work that is his own. That hasn’t been
dictated to by the teacher. An open lab is a lab where students are given the
opportunity to explore ideas and concepts that they may have. Inherent in this is
that the most difficult portion is that they don’t realize they can do this. And it takes
a while to develop these skills or to think about using skills that they’ve never used
before. (Jane, interview, 1/19/01)
Thus, for Jane, the purpose of inquiry-based labs was to promote creativity and
ownership in scientific problem solving. Her goal was for students to go beyond teacher
direction and generate an independent product of scientific thinking. These ideas are well
illustrated with her teaching of the ‘‘evolution lab,’’which is described in depth below.
Implementation of Inquiry. Like Ellen, Jane preferred to conduct four to five in-depth
inquiry labs over the course of the school year, each lasting 1 week or longer. Jane’s
biology inquiries included the kim-chee inquiry, the meal worm inquiry, the evolution
inquiry, and a required science project based on Wisconsin fast plants. Also, similar to Ellen,
the content and goals of Jane’s inquiry labs were teacher-centered. Jane believed that inquiry
topics should be chosen by the teacher, so that important mandated curriculum goals were
achieved. Thus, neither Ellen nor Jane promoted a brand of inquiry where students chose
their own inquiry topics. Jane described her method of assessment, which clearly related to a
teacher-centered goal structure for inquiry, ‘‘So, I have to go back and look at the purpose for
which I devised the lab at the beginning. And what was it I was looking for when I thought
about this particular lab? What is that I wanted them to see, to measure, to do, to
achieve? . . . . What is MY objective of this particular lab?’’ (Jane interview, 5/14/01).
Jane began her evolution lab by describing to the students how paleontologists might go
about developing observations of a primate skull. The goal of the lab was to ‘‘devise a model
that could
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be used on unknown skulls by using known information (Jane, informal interview,
1/19/01). She then posed questions to guide student thinking and to draw students’
attention to salient features of the skulls. Starting with paper models (diagrams), the
students were to make as many observations as possible of three skulls, then design a
model, against which new unknown skulls could be compared. Her goal was to have
the students develop a model to illustrate the evolutionary progression of skull
features in primates. Jane allowed students to choose their own groups for the lab.
Jane’s teaching technique during the lab was to circulate among the groups and ask
probing questions. She often reiterated that the students needed to think for
themselves. She reminded them of the major goal of the lab, ‘‘Take your time, be creative,
think about how you will use the model. Next week, I will hand you a new skull and expect
you to figure out where it fits into your model’’ (Jane, field notes, 1/19/01). She emphasized
that students were doing scientific processes in order to reach the creative goal of the
model, and that there should be a reason for each task they undertake, ‘‘Why take
measurements if you don’t know why you’re doing it? Are you going to take measurements,
observations, or both?’’ (field notes, 1/19/01). Over the next few days, the student groups
completed and turned in their models. Several groups constructed two-dimensional
continuums, similar to a time line with quantitative data, some did pictorial models, and
some used qualitative data on their continuums.
Discussion and Implications
The findings of this study illuminate the tensions that secondary classroom teachers face
when considering the implementation of inquiry. The study suggests that two major belief
strands may need to be reconciled within the teachers’ practical knowledge base. The first
belief strand appears to stem from school culture and centers on constraining factors
that limit inquiry. Some of the results of this study match the findings of previous
studies (Munby et al., 2000; Tobin & McRobbie, 1996; Yerrick et al., 1997) in that
beliefs about students, efficiency, rigor, and exam preparation override inquiry
implementation. In the current study, Pamela, Tom, and Rose believed they had to
present canonical concepts and explanations in an efficient manner. Pamela and Jerry
exhibited cultural beliefs that some students are too immature and lazy to accomplish
inquiry. Jerry believed that laboratory was expendable in chemistry class when time was
limited and the curriculum needed to be completed. Ellen was concerned that her
gifted students be presented with a rigorous curriculum and also believed the
teacher must choose laboratory problems that match the mandatory curriculum.
Therefore, this study supports findings of other studies that indicate inquiry-based
teaching will be difficult to implement in the current school culture.
However, this study also illustrates another strand of teacher beliefs that work to
promote inquiry. All six participants retained interest in and achieved some level of inquirybased activities in their teaching. Each teacher exhibited a core belief set in favor of
inquiry. Pamela, Tom, and Rose believed that inquiry could foster independent thinking,
deep thinking, and problem solving. These represented skills that they valued for their
students. Jerry believed that physics students could gain conceptual understanding from
inquiry-based investigations. Ellen believed that using inquiry-based strategies was the
best way to enculturate students into scientific thinking practices, while Jane believed in
inquiry for stimulating creativity in science learning.
Thus, the teachers held competing belief sets. The belief sets that constrained
inquiry-based teaching were more public and culturally based, while the belief sets that
promoted inquiry were more private and based on the individual teacher’s notion of
successful science learning. While the culturally based beliefs of exam preparation and
efficiency in covering the curriculum exhibited a
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powerful influence, the teachers also had learning goals for their students that stood in
contrast to the culturally supported goals.
The private and individual goals of the teachers for their students represented
aspects of learning that are not explicitly named in state or district mandated
curriculum including deep thinking, independent thinking, creativity, learning the
techniques and language of science, and deriving important ideas from patterns in data.
Because these goals were not officially sanctioned, the teachers may struggle to reconcile
their own learning goals for their students with the culturally mandated learning goals. We
believe that this causes a substantial difficulty for teachers, who are placed in the position
of trying to choose between what they believe to be best for their students with what
society has deemed best for their students.
The difficulty of resolving this tension was observed in our study through the
various techniques teachers used for decision making. Jerry separated his competing
belief sets about learning goals by segregating them into his two courses. In physics, he
used an inquiry-based approach often as an integral part of teaching. In chemistry, he
conducted a teacher-centered class. Tom and Rose segregated their competing belief sets
by conducting most activities in a manner to achieve culturally based learning goals
(e.g., conceptual curriculum) and conducting a few separate activities to foster their
private goals for scientific thinking. Pamela attempted to integrate her competing belief
sets into the same activities, but in practice, she failed to allow students time to
accomplish meaningful inquiry. Ellen and Jane may have achieved the most
successful integration of their belief sets. Ellen implemented several meaningful inquirybased laboratories each year and reconciled the time it took to achieve her private
learning goal of enculturation into science by staying within the content of the mandated
curriculum. Jane integrated her ideas about creativity into her on-going class activities,
but like Ellen, stayed within the bounds of teacher- guided inquiry. It is also interesting
to note that both Ellen and Jane taught generally high achieving students, whom
they may believe have the cognitive capacity to process both the learning goals of the
mandated curriculum, as well as, the teacher’s private learning goals.
The private beliefs about independent and deep thinking resonate with recent calls for
establishing argumentation as a central form of teaching science. Driver, Newton, and
Osborne (2000) state that a social constructivist view of teaching science implies an
education in scientific investigative and discursive processes, and that ‘‘Consideration needs to
be given to the purpose of the experiment to be carried out. What would be an appropriate
design to address this question? What methods would give reliable data?’’ (Driver et al.,
2000, pp. 298 –299). Once the data have been collected, alternative interpretations need to
be considered. It is at this point, in particular, where students need to appreciate that
scientific theories are human constructs and that they will not generate a theory, or reach a
conclusion, by deduction from the data alone.’’ This view echoes that of the teachers in this
study. It further implies that students can learn both concepts and the nature of science
from rich problem solving activities, without necessarily expecting that students can derive
theory from their hands-on investigations. This study therefore suggests that a view of
inquiry as application and problem solving after concept introduction may be more viable
in the secondary classroom that inquiry as induction of concepts. Exceptions to this
generalization could be made for many topics that are amenable to ‘‘discovery,’’ such as those in
physics.
The results of this study suggest possible new emphases on inquiry in curriculum
materials and professional development activities. For example, curriculum activities
could suggest a driving question, but allow students the opportunity to design
subquestions and investigative procedures. Professional development activities might
focus on developing teachers’ core beliefs about the importance of enculturation into
scientific practice and argumentation skills as a major focus of science class. The sharing
of private learning goals with fellow teachers in learning communities may facilitate
teachers to act on core beliefs that run in opposition to the mandated
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curriculum. At the policy level, school boards should make explicit the value of rich
and meaningful learning goals for students by supporting curriculum standards for
scientific thinking.
Another major implication of this study is for future research on inquiry. The findings
suggest that research is needed on student performance related to teacherdesigned inquiry-based instruction. One question raised by this study is whether modified
versions of inquiry (e.g., where students do not raise their own investigation questions),
such as those designed by the participants will be efficacious in developing students’
nature of science understandings, reasoning, or conceptual knowledge structures.
Teachers in this study intuitively believe that inquiry-based activities will promote
scientific thinking skills, but as yet they have little evidence to support this hypothesis.
Research is needed on several aspects of students’ responses to inquiry in order to justify
its current revered status in reform documentation. We need to know more about both
the cognitive and affective influences of inquiry on science learning including
motivation, science identity, creativity, conceptual growth, scientific thinking, and nature
of science understandings. Studies of student response to inquiry should take place in
classrooms where teachers are currently implementing inquiry within the constraints of
school culture, rather than special camps, classes, or programs.
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