Learning how to plan a science lesson: An exploration of preservice science teacher reflection in online microteaching

Abstract

As a compulsory approach in shaping pre-service teachers for Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK), microteaching is either essential and challenging. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the shift from offline to the online microteaching course had occurred. This major shift drives the change of planning science lessons. Our research examined how pre-service science teachers designed and reflected their planning on a 30-minute microteaching unit. The participants of our study were four groups of pre-service science teachers that consisted of five students. The participants were pre-service science teachers from two national universities in Indonesia that were chosen by purposive sampling. The data was collected through the lesson plan, self-reflection to the lesson plan, and group discussion. We conducted both qualitative and quantitative analysis on research data for content analysis. The qualitative analysis dealt with the themes and patterns of the theme, while quantitative analysis dealt with the duration and frequency of the theme. Based on the analysis, the single domains such as CK, PK, TK were shown in the lesson plan. However, the complex domain of TPACK was rarely seen. The group discussions revealed that teacher educators need to become specific and explicit about which technology is being infused to support learning. It is significant to enhance the TPACK during planning in online microteaching classes and conduct further study of the implementation of this planning in the lesson.