J Sci Teacher Educ (2008) 19:235–254

DOI 10.1007/s10972-008-9091-x

Making the Hidden Explicit: Learning About Equity

in K-8 Preservice Science Education

Tamara Holmlund Nelson

Published online: 5 March 2008

Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2008

Abstract Preservice teachers in a K–8 science methods course used guided video
reflection to examine their interactions with children during science teaching. This
inquiry approach helped preservice teachers identify and respond to gaps between
their beliefs and intentions about teaching all children and their enactment of those
beliefs. The experience of teaching a science lesson and then viewing it multiple
times through a critical framework provided an opportunity for preservice teachers
to recognize hidden assumptions, unexamined behaviors, and the unintentional
meanings they may have conveyed to children. This encouraged them to think more
critically about their roles as teachers in creating spaces where all children have
access to quality science learning experiences.

Keywords Preservice science teacher education
Equity
Video reflection

Elementary science

Introduction

In light of the persistent achievement gap in science education, it is crucial that

preservice and novice teachers learn to create, implement, and support meaningful
science learning opportunities for all students. Research and assessment results
continue to document the inequities in science participation and achievement related
especially to gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, disability, and limited
proficiency in English (Campbell and Hoey 1999; National Center for Educational
Statistics 2003; Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction 2005; Rodriguez
1997). The National Science Education Standards (National Research Council

T. H. Nelson (&)
College of Education, Washington State University Vancouver, 14204 NE Salmon Creek Avenue,
Vancouver, WA 98686-9600, USA
e-mail: tnelson@vancouver.wsu.edu

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1996) call for a focus on all students, and a needs assessment conducted by
Biological Science Curriculum Study staff identified equity issues as one of four
major themes needing attention in science education (Ellis and Backe 1995). The
purpose of this article is to consider what preservice K–8 teachers might learn about
providing equitable learning opportunities through guided reflection and analysis of
videos of their own science teaching.
This research emerged over 2 years of teaching preservice K–8 science methods
courses. Preservice elementary teachers often have negative feelings toward school
science and harbor fears about teaching science (Huinker and Madison 1997; van
Zee, Lay, and Roberts 2003; Watters and Ginns 2000). Based upon their school
science experiences, many preservice elementary teachers have constructed beliefs
about who is successful in science, often seeing this as an area for ‘‘smart kids’’ and
holding a vision of scientists as Caucasian males (Bell 2001; Huinker and Madison
1997). Additionally, beginning teachers, in general, tend to center their energy on
classroom management. This need for control associates with equity issues in
science education as well, when children from a lower socioeconomic status homes
and children of color are more often perceived as causing classroom disruptions
(Haberman 1991). These children, as well as those with special needs, girls, and
English Language Learners, are also underrepresented in science achievement in
secondary and higher education.
To address the need to prepare K–8 preservice teachers (PSTs) to teach science
effectively and enthusiastically to all students and to raise their awareness of the
enduring inequities in science classrooms, I developed an assignment that engaged
my students with video reflection on and analysis of their interactions with children
during a science lesson (adapted from a mathematics education teaching analysis
developed by Maureen Neumann, personal communication, August 14, 2003). This
assignment was designed to help preservice teachers shift their attention from their
own actions, in isolation, to their interactions with children during science lessons. I
hoped this would help them recognize where and how they excluded and included
specific children. This assignment was, therefore, underpinned by an assumption
that engaging PSTs in guided reflection on an authentic teaching experience and
relating this to equity issues in science learning would help them examine
relationships between their stated beliefs and their teaching actions and decisions. I
hoped it would expose subconscious beliefs about different children’s capacity to
engage in science and would help them to reconstruct those beliefs to the benefit of
the children in their classrooms. This article provides an analysis of my students’
reflections on the gaps between their expressed beliefs about teaching science and
their enactment of those intentions.

Methodology and Conceptual Framework

This research on preservice teachers’ reflective analyses emerged after I read my

students’ analyses of their interactions with children during science lessons. It
became apparent that the use of guided video inquiry as a methodology helped the
PSTs to confront gaps between their beliefs about how they would make science

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learning accessible to diverse children in relation to their actual enactment of

science lessons. The guided analysis of the teaching video served as a self-reflective
tool when a novice teacher moved from the description of what happened to a
critical examination of why a particular type of teacher–child interaction did or did
not occur or who was served or disenfranchised by a specific teaching decision. My
analysis of the preservice teachers’ papers was framed by a philosophical stance that
reflection on teaching is one important component in modifying or changing beliefs
about teaching and learning.
There has been much written about the interplay between a teacher’s beliefs and
actions and, therefore, the importance of taking beliefs into account in teacher
education (Bryan and Atwater 2002; Pajares 1992; Richardson 1996; Yerrick,
Parke, and Nugent 1997). Haberman (1991) described actions as the manifestation
of values based upon beliefs and attitudes–or what we think and feel. He also
expressed little hope in the potential of a teacher education program to change a
preservice teacher’s values, beliefs, and attitudes, as these develop over a lifetime of
experience and the experiences in a university program are seldom powerful enough
to disrupt them.
Research on preservice teachers’ beliefs about learning and diversity needs to
make a significant contribution to improving the impact of teacher education
experiences, given the changing demographics of U.S. classrooms with respect to
underrepresented students in science. It has been found that teachers hold
expectations about students’ achievements relative to a student’s ethnicity, gender,
or both (Avery and Walker 1993; Bryan and Atwater 2002). Garmon (2004)
explored the mixed results of the impact of educational diversity experiences on
preservice teachers’ beliefs and suggested that these may reinforce existing beliefs
(either positively or negatively oriented toward diverse children), rather than change
them. Buck and Cordes (2005) reported on their attempts to reform their teacher
education program to better prepare novice teachers to work effectively with
underrepresented youth. They recommend that preservice teachers be engaged in an
inquiry approach employing reflection on authentic teaching experiences with
diverse children as a means of fostering confidence and ability.
While challenging, teacher education programs can structure opportunities for
novice teachers to recognize and confront their beliefs about various components of
practice. The intention is usually to provide intentional and often disequilibrating
experiences that create opportunities for students to examine the enactment of their
beliefs or to reflect upon how an experience may have changed their beliefs. While
it is beyond the scope of this paper to review all the research on PSTs’ beliefs, I will
mention a few that inform this analysis. Bianchi, Cavazos, and Rivas (2003) studied
secondary preservice teachers’ understandings of the nature of science in
conjunction with issues of equity and diversity in science teaching. They found
some students more able than others to align contemporary views of science with
equitable teaching goals. One of their recommendations, based upon their findings,
is the structuring of more opportunities for PSTs to take an inquiry approach toward
learning to teach, including reflection on teaching–learning connections. Watters
and Ginns (2000) also recommend reflection, through reflective journals, as an
important element in helping PSTs to examine their learning experiences. Loughran

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(2002) brought together the notion of authentic experiences and reflection when he
stated, ‘‘Experience alone does not lead to learning; reflection on experience is
essential’’ (p. 35).
Schon’s (1987) discussion of reflection on action has helped teacher educators
think about the power of reflection to push a teacher to question ‘‘the goals and the
values that guide his or her work, the context in which he or she teaches…his or her
assumptions’’ (Zeichner and Liston 1996, p. 1). Video can be used as a tool for
reflection on action in preservice education. LeFevre (2004) described the use of
‘‘video records of practice–raw footage from actual classrooms’’ (p. 238). Video of
one’s own practice can make the hidden explicit, as PSTs see themselves in action,
in context. In relation to equity issues in science education classrooms, the
authenticity of viewing oneself interacting with children can disturb beliefs about
one’s equitable practices. As Sanders (1997) stated, ‘‘Teachers are almost always
unaware of the biased behaviors they exhibit through verbal interactions, eye
contact, and body language, which means they cannot correct themselves.’’ By
using video as a self-reflective tool, beginning teachers can identify teaching actions
or behaviors that may exclude or inhibit particular children. The authenticity of the
video, viewed with a focus on equity issues in science education, grounds the theory
that PSTs encounter in their university programs.
Simply viewing the ‘‘video records of practice’’ (LeFevre 2004, p. 238) is
insufficient. Structuring or guiding the reflection on teaching is important (Richert
1990), as the activities in a classroom are complex and attention may be focused on
generalities, such as teaching styles or student behaviors, or particulars, such as the
teacher’s use of questions or student dialogue in small groups. Guided reflection
serves to focus the viewer’s attention on particulars and pushes the preservice
teacher to consider aspects of his or her practice that may remain hidden. Superficial
or merely descriptive reflection does little to engage and challenge beliefs, whereas
a more critical approach considers multiple perspectives that challenge one’s own
beliefs and examines the implications of actions in light of social, political, and
moral values (Jay and Johnson 2002; Valli 1997).

Research Question and Methods

Given this framework, guided video inquiry was undertaken as a methodology for
preservice teachers to research their own teaching by focusing attention on diverse
learners during science lessons. The intention was to help them reflect upon an
authentic teaching experience to better understand how to create, implement, and
support meaningful science learning opportunities for all children. In particular, this
lesson was a guided opportunity for preservice teachers to confront the gap between
their beliefs about teaching and learning science and their enactment of a science
lesson, with the explicit purpose of providing them with a framework on which they
would be able to reformulate their beliefs about who can learn and how to support
all learners. This guided opportunity involved preservice teachers in using video of
their own science teaching as a self-reflective tool to examine equity issues during
science lessons.

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This research emerged after I reviewed my students’ papers over 2 years and
recognized the impact on their understandings about the enactment of their beliefs
about teaching and learning. My analysis, therefore, focused upon the papers students
wrote and only included papers from students who were willing to or remembered to e-
mail me their papers after the assignment was turned in. Fifty-two papers were
collected over 2 years from a total of 88 students. Also, as the research developed after
students graduated from the program, I did not view the students’ videos myself.
Future research will focus on understanding the influence of the video reflection on
students’ beliefs from both their video analysis, as well as my analysis of their teaching
videos. Additionally, the findings from this research can be expanded by following
these novice teachers into the classroom to determine how this exercise in critical self-
reflection impacted their subsequent interactions with students.
The analysis of the preservice teachers’ reflective papers was framed by the
following research question: What do preservice K–8 teachers learn from guided
reflection on their videoed science teaching about gaps between their intentions and
beliefs about teaching and learning and their actual enactment of learning
opportunities? Any learning about equitable teaching practices, however, cannot
be attributed only to this reflective analysis on their own teaching, as all participants
were in a teacher education program that addressed equity in multiple courses.

Participants

Graduate students in my K–8 science methods courses in the autumn of 2003 and
2004 participated in this research. Each semester, when students were asked on the
first day to share their feelings about science education, approximately 90% of the
students spoke negatively about their own science experiences, and voiced fears
about teaching science. This course occurred in students’ second semester of a four-
semester education program and was associated with a semester-long practicum in a
local classroom. Prior to this course, students gained experience with diversity
issues in education during the first summer semester. In that semester, students took
courses on social contexts of education and ESL education. Also, as part of a 50-
hour diversity experience requirement, many created and implemented summer
educational programs for children living in a homeless or transitional-housing
shelter. Thus, they came to the science methods course with some common
background related to the increasing diversity of U.S. classrooms and associated
issues. Out of the 88 students in these four-course sections, only 8 were known
(through observable characteristics or self-reports) to belong to ‘‘underrepresented
populations in science’’ related to race, ethnicity, poverty, disability, gender, or
sexual orientation. All 8 of these students’ papers are included in the analysis.

The Task

Students were asked to teach a science lesson in their placement classrooms and
have this video recorded. The intention of this teaching experience was not so much

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to practice managing instructional materials or children’s activity levels or to

execute a perfect lesson. Rather, the focus was on teacher–student interactions and
how these created or inhibited equitable learning opportunities for all children.
These PSTs were placed in schools with student populations that ranged from
predominantly white, middle to upper middle socioeconomic households, with no
free and reduced lunch to highly transient, midlevel to poverty status families with
up to 90% of the children in the class eligible for free and reduced lunch. Twenty-
six of the 52 classrooms in this study included children whose home language was
other than English or who were English language learners. First or home languages
included Russian, Bosnian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Albanian, Spanish, and Vietnam-
ese. A large percentage of the classrooms (38 out of 52) also included children with
special needs, as designated by Individual Education Plans (IEPs) or identified
behavioral disorders. Ten classrooms included children designated as ‘‘highly
capable.’’ Only eight PSTs described classrooms that did not have any students in
any of the above categories.
Prior to this teaching experience, the preservice teachers engaged in activities
designed to increase their understanding of science education goals, inquiry-based
science teaching, learning, and assessment. They examined ideas relevant to
teaching science to diverse learners. Subsequent to the teaching experience, the
PSTs were asked to analyze the lesson with respect to their interactions with
children. This analysis was framed in the following way:
• Students wrote a reflection immediately after teaching. This was framed by such
questions as ‘‘How did the lesson go from your point of view?’’ ‘‘Was the
experience equitable for all children?’’ and ‘‘How do you think the lesson went
from different children’s points of view?’’
• They then privately viewed (multiple times, in most cases) the videos of their
lessons to examine their teaching attitudes and interactions with children during
the science lesson. Attention centered on their interactions with children and the
extent to which they created equitable learning opportunities for all the children
in the class.
• They were asked to collect data as they reviewed the video. Their data collection
was guided by prompts that focused their attention on expectations, interven-
tions, opportunities for children to use materials or share ideas, the use of
questions and praise, and relationships between the teacher’s actions and a
child’s status. These teacher–child interactions were cross-referenced with
student demographics, such as gender, ethnicity, special needs, and English
language proficiency.
• A variety of readings were suggested to help the PSTs understand historical
equity issues in science education and think about teaching strategies that might
help engage diverse children in science learning
• Finally, they wrote individual papers that described and synthesized their
experiences, analyses, and the literature. Their video analyses were framed by
prompting questions such as ‘‘Do you notice any difference in your expectations
for different children?’’ and ‘‘How did you respond to children’s engagement?’’
These and other prompts, along with those provided for their initial,

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postteaching reflections, were constructed to elicit information that would help

them examine their intentions and beliefs about their teaching and their
enactment of learning opportunities as related to specific children.
Attached to these papers were their original lesson plans; their initial, unedited,
postteaching reflections; and data tables generated from the video reviewing.

Data Sources and Analysis

To understand what preservice K–8 teachers learned about gaps between their
intentions and beliefs about teaching and learning and their actual enactment of
learning opportunities, 52 (17 from 2003 and 35 from 2004) out of 88 equity papers
were analyzed. Students from the 2003 cohort were sent an e-mail approximately
6 months after the course was over; I attribute their lack of response a variety of
factors: the amount of time elapsed, their preoccupation with finding jobs, finishing
the program requirements (portfolios and action research presentations), and some
students’ lack of facility with e-mail attachments. Students from the 2004 cohort
were asked for their papers at the end of the fall semester; 11 students did not respond
to the request. The nonrespondents cannot be categorized as students who were more
or less perceptive in their analyses or who struggled more with issues of equity.
Each paper was read multiple times by the author to identify emergent themes.
Coding was done, using Atlas.ti software (http://www.atlasti.com/). This provided
easy sorting of demographic data on each classroom and revealed common ideas
addressed by the student authors. Tallies within categories and across the papers
provided an indication of which areas were of most concern across all the partici-
pants. The most obvious themes that the PSTs addressed were closely related to the
framework provided for the analysis: questioning, equity pedagogy, gender differ-
ences, and engagement with children. Through this inductive approach to analysis,
evidence emerged regarding the beliefs and assumptions individual PSTs brought to
their teaching of science. Data were recoded to determine what aspects of the lesson
and their interactions with children the video specifically helped them see. Rela-
tionships between distinct codes were developed, and some categories collapsed
into others. Recoding within the broader areas revealed more specific areas that they
analyzed, including, but not exclusive to, hidden meanings that might be interpreted
from teacher actions, distinctions between equity and equality, challenges associ-
ated with differentiation, the importance of knowing the subject matter, and
structural and lesson design elements that excluded particular children. Finally, the
PSTs’ specific comments within a category were compared to determine whether
the qualitative nature of their meanings were distinct or similar.

Findings and Discussion

Findings pertain to preservice teachers’ learning in two main areas, and each will be
fully detailed in the following sections. First, by reviewing their teaching videos,

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most students recognized and evaluated gaps between their expressed beliefs about
equity and their facilitation of science learning experiences. Second, the guided
reflection on their videoed interactions with children supported many of the PSTs in
undertaking a critical examination of at least some aspect related to implementing
and supporting equitable learning opportunities for all children.
In regard to the first finding, the majority of analyzed papers reflected initial
positive feelings about the lessons; ‘‘I thought everything went well until I saw the
video’’ (P1:32)1 was a commonly expressed view in the prevideo review reflection.
After viewing their videos, most students expressed dismay with their inability to
enact their beliefs about creating and providing equitable learning opportunities. As
one student stated,
Originally, I felt this assignment was cheating, in a way. You gave us advance
warning that the reflection we were going to write was pertaining to equity in
the classroom. I felt that this knowledge would steer me out of trouble. I was
making a conscious, purposeful effort to make this experience equitable, and I
still managed to find some rather large flaws. (P3:16)
Upon viewing their videos, most of the preservice teachers were surprised by
some of their actions and words. In this way, the video made the hidden explicit. As
they explained in their papers, viewing and reviewing their teaching videos gave
them insight into their behaviors in critical areas:
• assumptions or beliefs led to inequitable teacher actions,
• preferences for or against types of children were evident,
• questions were used differently for different types of children,
• equity issues were embedded in lesson designs, and
• a need for control subsumed equitable intentions.
Due to space limitations, only the first three themes will be discussed in
subsequent sections.
With respect to the second finding, the guided reflection and opportunity to watch
their interactions with children multiple times enabled a majority of the PSTs to
evaluate the learning opportunities from other perspectives and adapt a more critical
lens. Two subthemes emerged in this area: examining equity versus equality and
struggling with how to provide for the special needs of individual children and still
engage them in rich learning opportunities. Most of the students examined how they
could improve all children’s access to meaningful learning opportunities by
changing some of the teaching actions that they had intended would provide equal
opportunities. Many explicitly recognized that equality was not the same thing as
equity and attempted to redefine their notions of the latter. Some of the preservice
teachers also noticed from their video reviews that children with special needs often
were excluded from science learning opportunities and questioned the ‘‘fairness’’ of
this practice.

1
Quotations are referenced by an Atlas.ti document number (each document is a different student’s
paper) and associated quotation number. P1:32 means document 1, with the 32nd coded quotation in that
document.

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Finally, it is important to note that 4 students (out of the 52 analyzed papers)

were unable to find any needed improvement in their facilitation of equitable
learning experiences. While their analyses of their teaching successes varied (for
example, related to organization or accomplishing the lesson objectives), these 4
could not identify any aspect of the lesson or their interactions with children that, if
continued, would hinder particular children’s participation and learning in science.
Although I did not view these students’ videos, it is evident from their papers that
there were incidences that could have been examined more critically. For example,
one student stated, ‘‘I had trouble discerning any inequitable treatment of students’’
(P29:2), and then went on to say, ‘‘I did seem to ask more girls than boys high-level
questions’’ (P29:3) without any examination of his underlying beliefs or the impact
of continuing this practice.
Another student foresaw this and wrote about the ‘‘danger’’ of this assignment:
I have to wonder if there is even a danger in looking at only one [lesson].
Could this cursory review create an environment where colleagues of ours
abdicate his or her responsibility to continue to create an equitable learning
environment by deciding they were successful this one time? I wonder if, by
asking an educator to examine a critically important issue like this by focusing
on one 30–45 minute period, it makes this issue look less important. And
although in the syllabus you mention that this glimpse at our behaviors is just a
‘‘beginning,’’ I do hope all my classmates recognize this. (P4:25)
The findings of this research show that guided reflection on an enacted lesson can
help PSTs to critically examine how they enact equitable learning experiences, yet it
also is insufficient by itself to help all recognize implications of their interactions
with children on children’s opportunities to have success in school science. The next
sections more closely examine the above themes, with evidence demonstrating what
preservice teachers learned about the gaps between their beliefs and intentions and
their enactment of science learning opportunities.

Gaps Between Beliefs and Enactment

Many of the preservice teachers stated initially that they had no ‘‘predisposed ideas’’
(P3:8) about any of the children, nor any biases. While a few held onto this belief
even after viewing their video, most found that, although they believed they would
provide equitable opportunities to all children, their actions proved otherwise. Using
the video as a self-reflective tool, the PSTs found that there were particular areas in
which their actions revealed gaps between their beliefs or intentions and their
enactment of equitable learning opportunities. In the following subsections, these
categories are examined.

Assumptions Can Be Disadvantaging

The preservice teachers’ video reflections uncovered behaviors they did not expect
to see. Overall, they were most surprised and disturbed by the realization that they

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held different assumptions about, and, therefore, different expectations of, different
types of children and that these expectations translated into inequitable teaching
behaviors. Forty-three of the 52 papers analyzed addressed this explicitly.
Many of the preservice teachers noticed in their videos that they projected
different expectations onto different types of children. Most disturbing for many
was the way in which low expectations for particular children played out in the
teachers’ actions. Many PSTs expressed a feeling similar to this one from Mandy:
I would like to think that my expectations of each student in my placement
classroom are equitable. But, as I watched my video, I don’t think that my
expectations are entirely equitable. Normally, during class, there are several
students who rarely participate or even do work. Because of this, I don’t really
expect these students to participate during the lessons that I teach. (P12:7)
By watching their actions through the lens of equity, these novice teachers
realized that not expecting some children to fully participate, and then acting upon
this expectation by holding the children to lower standards or not engaging them in
the activity or discussion, potentially perpetuated these children’s disengagement,
lack of achievement, or both. This realization was important for these novice
teachers. Once aware that, despite their best intentions, their actions may be
excluding children, they can explicitly examine the underpinnings of their beliefs to
change the resulting behaviors. It is also important that they learn to make teaching
decisions in association with children’s progress toward understanding.

Preferences for (or Against) Particular Types

A majority of the PSTs discovered that they demonstrated a preference for

interacting with particular types of children. Many were dismayed to find that they
engaged verbally with only certain students. This showed up explicitly in at least 19
of the papers and was implicit in all but 7 or 8 of the remaining papers. This
tendency was largely unnoticed until the videos were reviewed (i.e., in the initial
postteaching reflection, the lesson was viewed as equitable for all children). There
were a variety of patterns in the ways that the teacher did or did not pay attention to
particular groups. Some focused most of their attention on girls, overcompensating
for the historical exclusion of girls in science (P3; P15). Many focused
predominantly on the ‘‘high flyers’’ because they were always willing to engage
verbally with the teacher: ‘‘My reasoning for this was…because I was not getting a
lot of response from other students’’ (P8:30). At least 2 deliberately ignored the high
flyers, proposing that these children could do the task on their own and required less
attention (P22; P49). Many found they paid the most attention to those children in
the closest proximity to their teaching position: ‘‘Something as basic as standing in
proximity to students obviously affected the way the left side of the group did not
respond during whole-group inquiry and response activities’’ (P32:3). Finally, quite
a few of the PSTs described that they interacted most with the most engaging
students, no matter their achievement level.

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The implications of these preferences for interacting with particular students

were considered to varying degrees. Some of the beginning teachers realized that
their teaching objectives probably were not met if a significant portion of the
children had not had an opportunity to interact with the teacher. While only a few
explicitly stated that without having some interaction they would not know what a
child understood or could do, most did realize this pattern of interaction was
detrimental, not only to a child’s learning, but also to a child’s feeling of inclusion
in the classroom community. Having recognized this unconscious tendency to prefer
some children over others, many proposed ways to ensure that they paid attention to
all children in their classrooms. These strategies included continued videoing of
their teaching, asking others to observe, and keeping track on a chart.

Using Questions Differently

In science education, a teacher’s use of probing and prompting questions can do

much to help children extend and deepen their understanding. While the education
students had multiple opportunities in their methods course to read about and
discuss how teachers use different types of questions in science lessons, to see these
modeled in lessons, and to practice using questions through microteaching their
peers, it was not until they reviewed their teaching videos that the power of teacher
questions became real. Angie recognized that although she was using questions in
different ways, she was not using them to support all children’s learning: ‘‘One
interesting thing I did find was that the students I stereotyped as less able to answer
open questions, were not given the chance. Not only were the questions closed, but
they were lower level also’’ (P47:14).
The prompts provided to the preservice teachers for analyzing their videos
focused their attention on their use of questions (e.g., types of questions asked, to
whom, in what context). Thus, in nearly every paper, the PSTs talked about
questioning during their lessons. Ten, however, did not critically examine the
potential of their questioning strategies to encourage or discourage an individual
child’s participation or to support or not support that child’s learning. An additional
7 students explicitly stated that posing questions only to a large group, or using the
same questions with all children, was the most equitable practice. Stuart, for
example, did not recognize the need to tailor questions to particular children’s needs
for support in moving from existing understandings to new understandings.
Claiming ‘‘equity’’ in his lesson based on the distribution and type of questions
asked, he stated, ‘‘I did not differentiate the kinds of questions I posed to the various
groups [special education and highly capable] of students’’ (P9:32). Similarly,
Alissa explained: ‘‘I did not ask individual students questions. Instead, I posed
questions to the whole class and asked for students to volunteer answers in a
discussion. This allows all students the opportunity to answer the questions’’
(P21:9). Alissa did not recognize how she constrained the opportunities for some
children to respond to her questions by only using questions in a whole-class setting.
Also, like Stuart, she confused equality with equity.

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Thirty-five preservice teachers were dismayed to see that their stated beliefs
about the power of questions to scaffold children’s learning conflicted with the ways
they actually employed questions during their lessons (e.g., to control student
behavior, reinforce directions, ensure right answers, or let children ‘‘off the hook’’).
Identifying these not so impressive ways to use questions and contrasting their
employment of questions with the literature they read on equity pedagogy helped
them consider how they could better structure and employ questions to help all
children, not just the high flyers’ progress (P16:19).
Some noted that their use of questions conveyed implicit messages about who
can succeed in science and why some can and others cannot. They described how
they called on children of high ability to answer questions, confident that these
children would be ready with a response. As Berne explained about not calling on
ESL students or students with learning disabilities, ‘‘I am so concerned with not
wanting the students to be embarrassed or ashamed in front of their peers that I have
not given them the chance to take risks in learning’’ (P14:25). Yolanda teased out at
least two different messages from her interactions with children:
The way I call on the high students more often, I think my students may learn
that science is for the kids who are seen as ‘‘smart,’’ those who already have a
lot of confidence when it comes to most school subjects. I think it also builds
the idea that you have to have a ton of ‘‘scientific’’ prior knowledge to succeed
in science. The way I asked about the vocabulary made it seem like the word
was more important than the idea, which is not the message I want my
students to hear from me. (P41:17)
Both Berne and Yolanda expressed concerns that their questioning patterns
reinforced the idea that ‘‘smart kids’’ are better in science and science is about
knowing the right answer.
Viewing the videos of their own teaching helped a majority of the preservice
teachers to realize that many of the questioning practices continued to provide
opportunities to highly capable children, while excluding those who most needed
supported opportunities to try out their ideas and receive feedback. With this
opportunity to reflect on their emerging practices, some of these novice teachers
were able to consider ways to improve. Angie summed up by saying:
The reflection of this lesson has shown me that on closer scrutiny, a situation
may not be as equitable as planned and constant scrutiny and reflection is
needed to make a learning environment as equal as possible; awareness is the
key. In the future, I am confident that I will be more aware of the questions I
am asking and the effects my responses could have on an individual. (P47:28)
Like others, after reviewing her video, Angie began to pay attention to her use of
questions on multiple levels. Moving beyond a concern about embarrassing children
for not knowing a right answer, many of these PSTs were able to see that
appropriately phrased questions could help children learn. They began to make
connections between holding high expectations for all children and the need to
support children in attaining these.

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Critical Reflections on Creating Equitable Science Learning Opportunities

The term ‘‘critical reflection,’’ as used here, implies that other perspectives on or
alternative views about an interaction are considered, and, given these, the
implications for teaching and learning are analyzed. This analysis then informs a
deeper understanding or renewed perspective, prompting the preservice teacher to
consider, among other things, her or his beliefs, the structure of school practices, or
the moral or political dimensions of schooling (Jay and Johnson 2002).
The prompting questions in the assignment guidelines and the opportunity to
review the video record of their pedagogical interactions with children during a
science lesson helped the PSTs to critically reflect in two main areas: equality
versus equity and the ‘‘fairness’’ of differentiation. Most recognized that their own
preferences and expectations regarding types of children, as well as some children’s
preferences for or resistance to engagement, created barriers to equitable learning
opportunities. They raised questions about differentiation—of curriculum, of
expectations, of teacher support. This propelled many back to the literature to try
and understand how to move all children forward in their scientific understandings.
Their unresolved questions left many with a stated need to inquire more deeply into
the benefits and drawbacks of differentiation.
The next subsection addresses these areas in more detail. A final section
addresses the inability or unwillingness of some of the novice teachers to use a
critical lens in their reflections, where they focused only on technical aspects of
teaching or saw themselves as without need for improvement.

Equity, Equality, and Fairness

Based on the comments made in a large number of the PSTs’ initial reflections,
many undertook this assignment with the notion that treating all children equally
would engender the types of interactions and situations that each child needed to
achieve learning goals. The following comment by Angie reflects similar feelings
stated by other students: ‘‘Going into this lesson, and the school year itself, I already
knew I was an unbiased teacher with the confident feeling that all students in my
class were equal’’ (P47:11). Associated with this notion that it is good to view all
children as equal were beliefs that, although some children would have more ability
or motivation to learn, as teachers, they would provide all children with equal
opportunities to speak, use materials, and interact with the teacher.
Some of the PSTs explicitly expressed that, after analyzing their videos, they
found that creating equitable opportunities was much more problematic than
expected. Angie went on to describe how she felt about her initial view (stated
above) that all children were equal:
Does the fact that I do not see lines between students in regards to gender,
race, and learning disability cause inequality in itself? Although I try to create
and teach lessons that will be ‘‘learnable’’ to all my students, looking back,
does my lack of distinction between the students cause someone to get left
behind? (P47:12)

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And Alissa, while still using ‘‘equal’’ when reflecting on helping children attain
learning goals, also found that equal was not necessarily equitable. She stated, ‘‘If
you provide children with the same lesson, they will not take the same information
from it. It is difficult to actually provide equal opportunities for all students’’
(P21:4). Kris stated, ‘‘We just can’t sit back, call on every student an equal number
of times and assume we have provided an equitable learning environment’’ (P4:23).
While these comments may have been shaped by the literature they were reading,
they were also grounded in specific examples from their teaching videos.
These preservice teachers recognized that children bring differences to their
learning from their experiences with content and with natural phenomena, as well as
different dispositions toward engagement or propensities for thinking scientifically.
These teachers had been reading and discussing theories about teaching diverse
learners throughout their education program, yet the video record of actual
interactions disturbed their beliefs about how they would enact these theories. The
experience of watching their interactions with children, in conjunction with reading
about equity issues in science education, provided opportunities for these novice
teachers to problematize their conceptions of fairness, equality, and equity. As
described earlier, many found they had unconsciously expressed lower expectations
for particular children—those with learning disabilities, those for whom English
was not their first language, or those who exhibited behavioral problems. Seeing this
so explicitly played out on video, these teachers recognized the barriers these lower
expectations created for children. This was not always intentional: ‘‘Although I feel
that I try to be equitable in my teaching, there were areas where I allowed boys and
students with status to take over and let the ‘low’ learners slip by much of the
lesson’’ (P41:6).
Similarly, a majority initially felt it ‘‘unfair’’ to ask questions of children who did
not volunteer to participate, not wanting to ‘‘put them on the spot.’’ After reflection,
most of them recognized that it was their responsibility as teachers to find ways to
support more hesitant children in entering into conversations or manipulating
materials. Cherise described what might happen to these quiet children: ‘‘If teachers
do not intervene and assist these students, they become ghosts. You see them, but
the more aggressive students attract your attention, and you soon forget those
students are even there’’ (P10:19).
Additionally, some PSTs noticed that they left alone the children they perceived
as more competent to focus on those who needed additional help. They recognized
that while ‘‘equal’’ treatment was inappropriate, neglecting a child because she did
not ask for help or act out was inequitable. These PSTs were developing an
understanding that Vygotsky’s (1986) notion of a more knowledgeable other applied
to extending and deepening the understanding of children viewed as highly capable,
as well the struggling child.
A few of the preservice teachers examined equity in terms of the representations
of diverse children in instructional materials. While some PSTs used this framework
to reexamine their lessons and propose ways to better connect the curriculum to
kids’ lives and interests, Kris pushed his thinking to a more critical level as he
considered his responsibilities as a teacher to include all children in science. He
stated:

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I did learn something of value. Being equitable is not only about supporting
the students when they ask for assistance (like when they present you with a
question); rather, it is also providing them with help to see themselves as
scientists when they aren’t asking for direct assistance. (P4:21)
This comment (and others in his paper) indicates he reconstructed his notion of
what it meant to do the ‘‘necessary work needed to support and encourage all
students during this investigation’’ (P4:30). He expressed that it was the viewing of
his video that helped him reach this more critical level of reflection.
Alternately, and reflective of the novice status of preservice teachers and the
contradictions they encounter as they attempt to sort out their changing beliefs,
many also proposed that a way to be more equitable was to be more equal. Some of
the same teachers who problematized their interactions in one area went on to
propose strategies that would ensure exact amounts of equal attention would be
given to all children: tallying the number of times each child received positive
attention, using popsicle sticks to determine who would be called on to respond to
teacher questions, or having an observer keep track of interactions with different
types of children. Thus, while these teachers were concerned about providing
opportunities for all children to engage, their ideas about how to ensure the support
each child needed were still contradictory or underdeveloped.
Finally, at least 10 of the preservice teachers discovered that certain children
were never present in the classroom during science lessons. Science tended to be
scheduled when children with special needs related to reading, language develop-
ment, and other special services were pulled out of the regular classroom. Many
voiced a sentiment similar to Dorie’s statement that ‘‘Perhaps the most inequitable
occurrence of this entire lesson was the fact that no ELL students participated in this
session…those children who qualify for language services are always pulled during
science’’ (P15:8). As Alissa stated, ‘‘Students cannot learn what we do not teach
them’’ (P21:5).
Viewing their video through a lens of equitable learning opportunities caused
quite a bit of perturbation for these education students. This authentic context
challenged them to consider their beliefs about what was good and right when faced
with real children with diverse needs and abilities.

Uncritical Reflection

Despite the movement of most students to a level of critical reflection in some

aspects, there were still unexamined assumptions in place for many. It appeared
from the papers that a majority of the PSTs were able to focus on one or two
particulars from their lesson and give critical attention to those. Other interactions
went unexamined and were described in terms contradictory to the more closely
analyzed events. At least 13 papers included statements that revealed this pattern.
Most commonly, students did not revise statements made in their initial reflections
that ‘‘learning objectives were met,’’ despite going on to discuss the inequitable
distribution of their attention, their lowered expectations, or the pull-out of

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numerous children who would never get to experience the lesson. For example,
Katherine, who stated, ‘‘I definitely believe all objectives were met’’ (P37:7), went
on to describe how ‘‘a few students dominated the discussion’’ (P37:9) and that she
avoided working with a group of children with IEPs because a paraprofessional was
with them, resulting in ‘‘not know[ing] how those students were doing or if they had
any questions for me’’ (P37:9). Katherine’s and others’ failures to realize that
learning objectives are not truly met if they do not have any indication where each
child stands in relation to the objectives is indicative of a novice teacher and shallow
reflection. The learning objectives are still being viewed only from the teacher’s
perspective; these teachers are employing a dated notion that ‘‘coverage’’ implies
that all learners received the important information.
As stated earlier, there were four PSTs who continued to assert that their initial
beliefs about their skills in providing equitable learning opportunities were
unchallenged by their video reflection. These students began their reflective
analysis by stating that they believed they would ‘‘show no bias’’ (P28:1) and did
not find anything in the video record to challenge these beliefs. As one student (cited
earlier) noted, there was a danger in this assignment that a preservice teacher’s
beliefs about her abilities to create equitable opportunities for all children might be
reinforced by deciding she was successful this one time. A willingness and ability to
turn a critical lens on one’s own practice requires support, prompting, and a
framework. For some students, what was provided to them was not enough to
challenge their existing beliefs or cause them to try on another’s perspective.
Feedback written on these students’ papers may have prompted them to look again
at their video and employ a different perspective, but there was no follow-up to this
assignment as it occurred at the end of the semester.

Implications

The guided, video-assisted self-reflection did help these preservice teachers make
some connections between their pedagogical actions and individual children’s
opportunities to access the materials and content in a science lesson and to engage in
scientific thinking. What was most striking about the findings is that nearly all the
preservice teachers felt, in their initial reflection-on-action, that they had done at
least a pretty decent job of providing equitable learning opportunities. Yet, after
viewing their videos, these same students found at least one aspect of their
interactions with children that excluded children from full participation or sent
unintentional messages about who can participate meaningfully in science learning.
While this caused disequilibrium and had the potential to possibly discourage them
from further science teaching (especially in light of the fear most felt about science),
instead, it seemed to inspire these novice teachers to want to know more about
engaging the hard-to-reach child. Guiding their analyses of their videos by posing
particular prompting questions helped them stay focused. Grounding it with relevant
literature gave them a means for interpreting what they saw and determining ways
to improve their efforts.

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That is not to say that all came out of this self-reflection with an ability to
implement an equity pedagogy in science that would meet all learners’ needs. Most
of the PSTs posed many questions they still needed to pursue. Some felt they needed
no improvement, and thus demonstrated that they most likely needed more guided
opportunities to examine and reflect on their science teaching and the children’s
learning. Additionally, most of the students did not apply a level of critical
reflection to all that occurred during their lessons. They were most able to critically
examine their understandings of equity versus equality and to pose critical questions
about differentiation. However, a lack of knowledge about some of the issues in
science education may have prevented a more critical and refined self-analysis.
According to a survey done at the beginning of the course, few were able to identify
issues about equity in science education. Even in completing this assignment, few
examined broader cultural issues. For example, while a few mentioned testing and
the imperative to help all children be capable of passing high-stakes tests, none
examined the inherent inequities in these tests nor looked at the actual achievement
gap in our state test. And while many discussed that the pedagogical strategies they
might implement for teaching science would also be worthwhile to use in teaching
other subjects, few referred to or drew upon ideas encountered in their ESL or social
context of education courses. A culturally relevant pedagogy (Gay 2000; Ladson-
Billings 1995) was not explicitly mentioned, nor did these predominantly white
students examine their status as members of the dominant culture of power (Delpit
1995).
Yet, these are not readings that are typically encountered in an elementary
science methods course, where a common overarching goal is to help PSTs to see
themselves as capable of teaching (and learning) science and to develop an
understanding of science as something more than facts in a textbook. As such, I did
not expect my students to make significant connections to ideas about culturally
relevant pedagogy or other cultural conflicts beyond what they might read in a
practitioner’s journal or a methods text. Due to the discomfort caused by their
video-assisted self-reflection, I believe many of the PSTs were ready to read and
discuss these ideas. Given the limitations of time and purpose for an elementary
methods course, this would most likely have to occur elsewhere. What can be done
is to infuse ideas about equity into science methods and, by asking novice teachers
to confront their own enacted beliefs, prepare them to understand diversity in a more
complex way.
The value of this guided video reflection on the preservice teachers’ notions of
‘‘self as teacher’’ became apparent when the PSTs could explicitly describe the gaps
between their beliefs about their teaching and the actual enactment of these in
practice. This was a painful experience for many, as the video made visible their
unrecognized or unacknowledged actions and beliefs. As such, I strongly
recommend that teacher educators think carefully about requiring preservice
teachers to let others view their video records of practice, at least at an early stage in
their programs. Later, with more experience of viewing themselves teaching and
with a safe, small group of others, then I do think it would be of value—especially
for those who felt they did not need to improve. But even experienced teachers,
working in critical friends groups (Dunne and Honts 1998) or lesson study groups,

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for example, employ protocols to ensure that feedback is not taken as a personal
attack. By guiding the PSTs’ reflections through prompts, these novice teachers
were supported in thinking about children’s opportunities to learn in relationship to
their teaching actions. As demonstrated in this article, this was a considerable
learning experience for most of these PSTs. Most significantly, they experienced the
impact of holding low expectations for some children and higher expectations for
others. While this reflection did not take all of them into the deeper complexities of
science equity issues, it did help them generate questions that, I hope, they will
continue to pursue.

Concluding Remarks

This study merged the authenticity of a personal video record of practice with
guided self-reflection to shift PSTs’ focus from self to the learning opportunities
they created for each child in their placement classroom. The experience of teaching
a science lesson and then viewing it multiple times through a critical framework
provided an opportunity for PSTs to recognize hidden assumptions, unexamined
behaviors, and the unintentional meanings they may have conveyed. This
encouraged them to think more critically about their roles as teachers in creating
spaces where all children have access to quality science learning experiences.
This was but one assignment in one course, and the impact of the guided video
reflection must be considered in conjunction with other ideas these students were
encountering in other courses and experiences they were having in their field
placements. Moreover, their ability to transfer the understandings gleaned from this
activity to their subsequent science teaching has not been determined. Despite these
caveats, I found the things they learned about facilitating diverse children’s
participation in science learning to be significant. Most were able to problematize
their pedagogical actions and decisions and raise questions about what they did,
why they did it, and who it benefited or excluded.
This was but one small piece in raising these novice elementary and middle
school teachers’ awareness of their roles in closing the achievement gap in
science—but one that had an immediate impact. Whether this impact was sustained
cannot be determined from this study; as previous research has shown, reflection on
multiple and authentic experiences is needed to change teachers’ beliefs and
associated practices. The value in this research is in the findings that, for the
majority of these preservice teachers, guided video reflection exposed the gaps
between unexamined beliefs and their science teaching actions. These findings
suggest that mentors and professional development providers might find value in
adopting this model for supporting the growth of novice teachers.

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