The description of explicit didactic beliefs of a science teacher using inventories as part of an ethnographic study. Comparison with implicit beliefs

Abstract

This work is part of a research project based on the teacher-centered mediational model, which seeks to develop methodologies, procedures and instruments to study explicit and implicit epistemological and didactic beliefs of middle level science teachers (in training and in practice). The work presented has the following objectives: To describe and characterize (as part of the ethnographic methodology and using two inventories) some explicit didactic beliefs of a science teacher at the intermediate level (taken as a case) and to compare them with the implicit ones, obtained during the same ethnographic study (using as an interpretative framework for the explicit and implicit levels the same substantive theory with respect to these didactic beliefs). The methodology used in the ethnographic research focused on the topic (epistemological and didactic beliefs) is described. The explicit didactic beliefs of the case teacher were studied with the Inventory of Didactic and Epistemological Beliefs ([CDE]), developed by the work team, and with the Inventory of Pedagogical and Scientific Beliefs (INPECIP), developed by Porlán Ariza (1989). Responses to both inventories were analyzed using the substantive theory used to develop the JCDE. Some explicit didactic beliefs of the teacher were described and characterized. These were compared with implicit beliefs (inferred from other data sources and analyzed with the same theoretical framework).