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Pre‐service Biology Teachers’ Tree Thinking Difficulties in the USA and China
Author(s) -
Kong Yi,
Pelaez Nancy
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
the faseb journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.709
H-Index - 277
eISSN - 1530-6860
pISSN - 0892-6638
DOI - 10.1096/fasebj.27.1_supplement.739.3
Subject(s) - china , mathematics education , service (business) , tree (set theory) , biology , psychology , mathematics , geography , mathematical analysis , economy , archaeology , economics
Evolutionary trees are commonly portrayed in textbooks but many students struggle to make sense of them. Students with different cultural and religious backgrounds like in China might have different difficulties when compared with American students. Moreover, pre‐service biology teachers play an important role in teaching and cultivating the future generation, so their conceptions towards evolutionary trees will shape their teaching and influence their students’ learning of evolutionary trees. This study characterized evolutionary tree difficulties that undergraduate students who are pre‐service biology teachers have in the USA and China. An interview technique developed in 2009 was used to identify student ideas about a tree thinking survey. Four preservice biology teachers from a Midwestern university of USA and thirteen pre‐service biology teachers from a Midwestern university in China were interviewed. The results demonstrate that only a portion of the difficulties are similar between the two groups of pre‐service teachers. Different educational background, cultural factors, and natural history experiences in China compared with the USA may explain the different difficulties with evolutionary trees.