Enhancing pre-service primary teachers’ learning in Science education using team-based project work

This paper reports on the introduction of team-based project work in the Faculty of Education at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ), Australia. Many pre-service primary teachers at USQ lack the basic science content knowledge and self-confidence sufficient to teach science content effectively. This has prompted the Faculty of Education to investigate ways to improve student outcomes in both science content knowledge and science teaching self-efficacy in a compulsory science education course delivered in both face-to-face and virtual modes. A collaborative curriculum project designed to model the practice of effective teacher learning communities was chosen as a pedagogical strategy because teambased project work has been shown in the literature to increase long-term retention, critical thinking and teamwork skills. The team-based model chosen for implementation included advice about team management and a peer evaluation process. A survey consisting of validated measures of personal science teaching efficacy beliefs (PSTEB) and perceptions of learning was administered to 70 oncampus (ONC) and 42 online (WEB) students enrolled in a third year science curriculum and pedagogy course. Statistical analysis of the data revealed significant increases in personal science teaching self-efficacy for both ONC and WEB students as a result of the team-based learning experience. In addition, both ONC and WEB students rated their experiences of the team-based model more highly than their previous experiences of team work. Interestingly, there were no significant differences between ONC and WEB students’ responses to the survey, validating the efficacy of the team-based learning in both face-to-face and virtual contexts.