Emotional arousal of beginning physics teachers during extended experimental investigations

Abstract

Teachers often have difficulty implementing inquiry-based activities, leading to the arousal of negative emotions. In this multicase study of beginning physics teachers in Australia, we were interested in the extent to which their expectations were realized and how their classroom experiences while implementing extended experimental investigations (EEIs) produced emotional states that mediated their teaching practices. Against rhetoric of fear expressed by their senior colleagues, three of the four teachers were surprised by the positive outcomes from their supervision of EEIs for the first time. Two of these teachers experienced high intensity positive emotions in response to their students' success. When student actions / outcomes did not meet their teachers' expectations, frustration, anger, and disappointment were experienced by the teachers, as predicted by a sociological theory of human emotions (Turner, 2007). Over the course of the EEI projects, the teachers' practices changed along with their emotional states and their students' achievements. We account for similarities and differences in the teachers' emotional experiences in terms of context, prior experience, and expectations. The findings from this study provide insights into effective supervision practices that can be used to inform new and experienced teachers alike.

Emotionally Intense Science Activities

“…Firstly, the students were exposed to the demonstration without any prior explanation of what might happen enabling the "surprise" experience. Secondly, the natural or spontaneous fluid conversations (Bellocchi, Ritchie, Tobin, Sandhu, & Sandhu, 2013) that flowed during the demonstration allowed emotive utterances to be shared contributing to the build-up of a positive atmosphere. Thirdly, the emotions generated under these sociocultural conditions may have contributed to the teacher's pedagogical response, which was to prolong the positive experience with a repeat demonstration (Turner, 2007).…”

“…Importantly, students' emotions are now understood to be a central part of learning (Alsop & Watts, 2003) and engagement (Milne & Otieno, 2007) in science. More recently, studies on emotions in science education have focussed on three areas; firstly, the emotional climate (or collective shared feelings) of a pre-service teacher education class and a year 7 class (e.g., Bellocchi et al, 2014;Tobin, Ritchie, Oakley, Mergard, & Hudson, 2013) secondly; teachers' emotions during the implementation of senior science inquiry tasks (e.g., Ritchie et al, 2013) and thirdly, emotional expressions of students in science classes (Ritchie, Tobin, Hudson, Roth, & Mergard, 2011;Tomas & Ritchie, 2012). The first two studies contributed understandings about practices that produced high quality experiences for pre-service teachers as well as practices that produced both high and low emotional climate in a year 7 class.…”

Expression of emotions and physiological changes during teaching

“…Collins' theory illustrated how coparticipants create a shared mood as they synchronized their actions during an activity. We began to adopt Collins' theory and as our studies progressed in the years ahead (e.g., Ritchie, Tobin, Roth, and Carambo 2007), we employed additional social theories, affording a stronger focus on faceto-face interactions and associated emotions (e.g., Ritchie, Tobin, Sandhu, Sandhu, Henderson, and Roth 2013). First, we adopted Jonathan Turner's (2007) frameworks involving primary, secondary, and tertiary emotions and Paul Ekman's theories of facial expression of emotion (Ekman 2004).…”

Exploring the Pre-service Science Teachers' Emotional Experience, Display Rules, and Controlling Strategies During Teaching Practice

“…(Hargreaves, 1998;Ritchie et al, 2011Ritchie et al, , 2013. 예를 들면, Richie et al(2013) (Gee, 2000), 교사의 직업적 정체성은 교사로서의 자신 에 대한 자기 인식이다 (Lasky, 2005) (Frijda, 1993;Turner, 2007).…”