How can teachers change the way they teach so students get access to more features
of inquiry based science teaching and learning? Four teacher educators and researchers
worked with five teachers from two schools, to develop tools to analyze teaching sequences.
The teachers’ lessons were video-taped on two occasions at least with several weeks in
between. The films were analyzed and various didactic issues discussed in seminars with the
researchers and the teachers. After the first lesson feedback, the teachers were given the
challenge to make a teaching sequence paying regard to his/her reflections on our seminar and
our analysis of the first lesson. We report a case study in which a teacher, Roy, develops his
teaching in several respects such as dialogic communicative approaches, writing, and science
content. We compare and analyze two of his lessons: the first on Electricity and the other on
the Water Cycle. The teacher Roy is able to create interesting lessons in which argumentation
and debate are included. With the second lesson Roy showed awareness of the significance of
the science content in the dialogue, and he gave a greater subject-matter depth compared to
the first lesson, as well as a wider variety of scientific ways including experimental work. The
science content was, however, superficial and vague in both lessons. The difficulty of meeting
the students in dialogue occurs when the teacher’s own knowledge is insufficient. The
teacher’s awareness of the importance of dialogue in the classroom combined with a greater
depth of subject focus, lead to learning opportunities for students that are of benefit for both
language and science skills.
2012. p. 49-56
communicative approaches, teachers professional development, dialogicinquiry, inquiry-based science teaching/learning, writing in science