What do science teachers think about developing scientific competences through context-based teaching? A case study

In this paper we explore the views and opinions of four secondary education science teachers regarding the teaching of scientific competences. Their views were gathered in the context of a training programme in which they had to design, implement, and assess their own teaching unit for developing students' scientific competences by means of context-based learning. Analysis of the data yielded a set of 14 categories distributed across 5 areas: scientific competence and context-based teaching; the teacher and his/her professional environment; implementation in the classroom; development of the teaching unit; and assessment. This process also identified the aspects which teachers believed either facilitated or acted as an obstacle to the development of scientific competences through context-based teaching. We discuss the implications of our findings and suggest ways in which a shift towards a context-based approach to teaching scientific competences can best be achieved, and consider a series of factors related to teachers' professional identity that may influence this process.