Historical inquiry is a multifaceted phenomenon. S. G. Grant describes it as "the passion for pulling ideas apart and putting them back together" (2000, 196). Historical inquiry as an instructional strategy benefits students and the classroom dynamic. It promotes students' appreciation of their personal histories while they are exploring…

In this article, I argue that the social studies methods course is an appropriate place to practice and reflect upon doing democracy. I review the literature on kinds of citizens the methods course might support. I consider pre-service teachers' prior and present experiences with doing democracy. I pose a framework for doing democracy centered on…

An integrated mathematics and science methods course was designed to focus on the knowledge, skills, and beliefs of teacher candidates. Teacher candidates were involved in experiences that would prompt them to consider the influence of their experiences on their beliefs, the influence of their beliefs on their instructional decisions and the…

In order to assess whether students fully grasped the six teaching standards in the "Professional Standards for Teaching Mathematics" (NCTM, 1991), the researcher had each student submit peer evaluations of the team lessons that were taught in a Methods and Materials of Teaching Mathematics in the Middle Grades class during the Fall semester of…

This study investigated perceptions of mathematics teaching effectiveness among elementary preservice teachers with high and low levels of mathematics teacher efficacy. Participants in this study included four elementary preservice teachers at a mid-sized university in the southeastern United States who had just completed a mathematics methods…

Slow motion animation ("slowmation") is a new teaching approach that uses a simple animation process to engage learners in creating their own comprehensive animations of science concepts. In this paper, preservice elementary teachers used slowmation, a form of stop-motion animation, to make models of science concepts and take digital…

Research has called for courses to be developed that provide preservice teachers opportunities to actively engage their pedagogies under construction in order to effectively translate their beliefs into sound instructional practice. This article presents research that examined how a service-learning writing tutoring program affected preservice…

This is the report of a qualitative emergent-design study of 2 different Web-enhanced science methods courses for preservice elementary teachers in which an experiential learning strategy, labeled "using yourself as a learning laboratory," was implemented. Emergent grounded theory indicated this strategy, when embedded in a course organized as an…

Whether for use in a special methods course in teaching chemistry or a general methods course in teaching science, this guidebook is designed to assist the methods instructor in the task of fitting the ChemSource materials into the established patterns of the course. Each of three sections contains a number of units that accommodate the patterns…

Seventy-six undergraduate students in an introductory science methods class for prospective teachers were randomly assigned to either a student directed or an instructor directed section. Using analysis of variance, it appeared that neither approach had an overall advantage in the attainment of course objectives, although interaction patterns…

Through specific practices in methods classes, prospective teachers can be taught the benefits of professional activism. One such strategy is to provide students with complimentary copies of "Language Arts" and ask them to read two or three articles that especially interest them. Another strategy asks students to read, select, and submit one or…

The distinguishing feature of the secondary level language arts methods course at the University of North Florida is that all readings, assignments, and class activities are designed to promote the highest possible degree of student participation in and responsibility for the learning process. Underlying all course activities is the premise that…

This paper offers suggestions about the content and organization of a foreign language methods course. It begins with a list of basic skills that must be taught: (1) directing a pattern drill, (2) teaching a concrete word, (3) teaching an abstract word, (4) teaching a short dialogue, (5) teaching a contrastive structure in morphology and syntax,…

This study examined the nature of English methods courses in Iowa institutions which train secondary English teachers. Instructors from about 70 percent of the institutions in the state provided a copy of their course calendar. Data were drawn from these calendars about methods course content, the proportion of time allotted to each course, and…

Difficulties encountered and insights gained while designing, implementing, and evaluating a preservice reading methods course at the University of Minnesota are presented. An analogy is drawn between the university teacher training program and the elementary school reading program. Both are seen to include planning, teaching, evaluating, and…