Exploring the Construct of Pedagogical Discontentment: A Tool to Understand Science Teachers’ Openness to Reform

Abstract

It is well established that many teachers are resistant to take up the messages of reform if these messages require them to substantially shift their teaching practices. What accounts for this resistance? One well established explanation is that teachers lacks the selfefficacy required to attempt something new in their teaching-they simply do not feel capable of effectively enacting the messages. However, there are a host of studies describing teachers with high self-efficacy who remain resistant to messages of change. The purpose of this article is to address the gap in the application of self-efficacy to understand the change or lack of change of science teachers' practice through the introduction of a related construct, pedagogical discontentment. This construct reflects a state of cognitive conflict that exists when an individual recognizes a mismatch between her/his science teaching pedagogical goals and classroom practices. One potential result of this mismatch is that a teacher problematizes her teaching practices, prompting an increased receptivity to reform messages. Building on existing literature, we present vignettes of four hypothetical teachers who exemplify variations of pedagogical discontentment. When combined with self-efficacy, pedagogical discontentment provides a useful lens to understand teachers' consideration and adoption of messages of reform.

The Teaching Processes of Prospective Science Teachers with Different Levels of Science-Teaching Self-Efficacy Belief

“…Also, these prospective teachers were observed to attribute the problems they had faced with the application to the students. According to the results presented in the study by Southerland et al (2010), prospective teachers with high levels of self-efficacy were not seen to hold themselves responsible when faced with unexpected situations; also, the fact that teachers with high self-efficacy levels were not observed to exhibit greater diligence or resistance because they had attributed the problems to their students as opposed to what was expected shows parallels with the results of this study.…”

Teachers’ self-efficacy: progressing qualitative analysis

“…Alternatively, Michael's high self-efficacy might have given him the tools to carry on teaching in a way that he thought was effective without needing to change his practices. Southerland, Sowell, Blanchard and Granger (2011) have termed a similar condition, when a teacher has high self-efficacy but low programme implementation, as 'pedagogical contentment'. They suggest the omission of professional doubt, possibly caused by a lack of reflection and evaluation, leads to the lack of engagement and change in practice.…”

Research on e-Learning and ICT in Education

“…Finally , it could be that the constructivist practices teachers had adopted might have been producing better results in validated tests than the practices of the average Greek teacher who still strives to meet the guidelines of current teacher guides. This means that they did not have many reasons to feel "pedagogical discontentment" (Southerland, Sowell, Blanchard, & Granger, 2011 ) with the teaching model they were following. It is likely that neither their former practices nor the PDT program succeeded in generating the "pedagogical discontent" needed for energizing the teachers' search for ICT integration of higher quality.…”

“…For example, the presence of pedagogical discontent (Southerland et al, 2011 ) that was mentioned above is such a variable that might make a difference. Such variables need not be strictly personal.…”