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pedagogy. Traditional science teaching methods, with lecture and note-taking, still prevailed as models for the prospective teachers in the field. One preservice teacher noted that once his mentor teacher allowed him to teach an inquiry lesson, he began to get tips from her in terms of implementation. The necessity of skilled, positive mentors is highlighted by McKenna (1998) who stated that, “Having mentors that are more experienced is key in helping teachers make changes in their practices (Zimpher & Rieger, 1988), particularly when the mentoring takes place ‘on-the-job’ and in the teachers’ own classrooms.”
Prospective teachers indicated several roadblocks to teaching inquiry lessons ranging from classroom management, time commitments to convert “cookbook” labs into inquiry labs, the time necessary to implement an inquiry investigation, to the cost of equipment. Some prospective teachers’ “issue with time” was tied to their possession of the false idea that inquiry lessons were designed mainly to teach process skills with little or no science content, therefore becoming an extra activity conflicting with the time they wished to dedicate to teaching content. They felt that inquiry pedagogy would displace content learning. While classroom management skills generally become better with experience, other roadblocks, such as persistent preconceptions about inquiry (inquiry being better for younger students versus older students), may not change unless that teacher is encouraged by peers or administrators to attempt to include inquiry as part of science instruction. These finding are echoed in other studies (Cheung, 2007) where teachers reported concern about the lack of class time, the need for effective instructional materials, and the difficulty of managing large classes.
In conclusion, there are statistically significant positive trends in this sample of secondary science prospective teachers’ indicating that change is taking place over time in