2010-2013: Science Teachers’ Perceived Demands while Teaching Science with and about History and Nature of Science

Although integrating the history and philosophy of science in science teaching (HPSST) is widely appreciated, its implementation in school science teaching is poor. It is believed, that teachers’ experiences with and expectations towards teaching with HPS mediate their motivation and decisions towards implementing this approach. We aimed at reconstructing physics teachers’ perceived demands in the context of planning and conducting HPS-based physics lessons. Data collection was conducted during semi-structured interviews with 8 German middle school physics teachers. They all had participated in the European project HIPST (History and Philosophy in Science Teaching) before. Findings of the study highlight HPS-specific facets of pedagogical content knowledge necessary for making teachers comfortable with implementing HPS and point out institutional and material obstacles on the way.

Publications attributed to the project:

• Henke, A. & Höttecke, D. (2015). Physics Teachers' Challenges in Using History and Philosophy of Science in Teaching. Science & Education, 24(4), 349-385.
• Henke, A. & Höttecke, D. (2013). Science Teachers’ Perceived Demands while Teaching Science with and about History and Nature of Science. Paper presented at the Twelth International History, Philosophy, Sociology & Science Teaching Conference (IHPST), Pittsburgh, USA, June 19 – 22, 2013,http://conference.ihpst.net/Procs-2013/Henke-Hottecke%20symposium.pdf (03.06.2013).
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