Browsing by Author "Rantakari, Julia"

The purpose of this study is to describe what kind of understanding pre-service class teachers have about thinking skills and teaching thinking in primary school. In addition, I am interested to find out whether or not the students in the field of educational sciences and the students in the field of educational psychology differ in their perceptions of thinking. The study examines thinking skills from the perspective of cognitive processes and uses the Integrated Model developed by Moseley and his group (2005a) to support the definition. The study was conducted as a phenomenographic study. The data consisted of 12 individual interviews and was collected in February 2021 from pre-service class teachers. Data analysis was performed using phenomenographic analysis. The study showed that the pre-service class teachers perceive thinking skills as a complex concept for which there was not seen a clear definition. Thinking skills were described as individual and evolving skills whose interrelationships were described in different ways. Thinking skills were perceived as tools that a person uses to perform various tasks. The teaching of thinking skills was seen as an investment for the future, as it was believed to promote learning and cultivate citizenship. Teaching was seen to take place mainly through pedagogical means. According to the subjects, thinking skills should be developed through diverse ways, with an emphasis on co-operation and supporting student agency. In addition, the importance of the teacher, the school and the learning environment was emphasized. Teaching thinking was also seen challenging. The students in the field of educational psychology and in the field of educational sciences largely followed a common line in their perceptions of thinking, but differences were found at the subcategory level. The most significant difference can be considered as the lack of creative thinking in the responses of educational psychology students. In addition, the study found that the pre-service class teachers had challenges in defining thinking skills as well as justifying pedagogical choices. This could suggest that they lack the metacognitive and pedagogical knowledge of thinking skills that Zohar (2005) considers as a prerequisite for teaching thinking skills. In the future, it would be good to further study the abilities of pre-service class teachers in terms of teaching thinking skills.