Preservice elementary teachers often lack science content knowledge and consequently the confidence to teach science. A three-phaseconstructivist teaching sequence was used in a graduate level elementary science methods course to improve preservice teachers' knowledge ofdensity and toprovide a model for approaching the teaching of science. Preservice teachers (N=23) showed gains in content knowledge between the pretest and aposttest administeredfifteen weeks apart, Additionally, their self-reported confidence levels increased as did their recognition of the need to approach science teaching by probing students' prior knowledge and exploring students' ideas in non-threatening learning environments.
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