How do Preservice Teachers use Concept Maps to Organize Their Curriculum Content Knowledge?
Brian Ferry, John Hedberg and Barry Harper University of Wollongong Abstract This paper reports on preservice teachers use of a concept mapping tool to create and modify concept maps about science related curriculum content knowledge. The preservice teachers who used the tool were planning science-based instruction that would be delivered to an elementary school class. Data gathered from interviews, journals and analysis of the concept maps constructed showed how the preservice students used the concept mapping tool to construct their curriculum content knowledge in the form of more powerful integrated patterns. It was also found that the process of concept map construction enhanced preservice teacher skills in planning instruction. Introduction Teaching has been considered the act of transferring information from the teacher to the learner who was seen as empty vessel to be filled with knowledge. This view of learning was due to the popularity of behaviourist learning theories which f
