Training impact upon teachers field trips projects: a preliminary evaluation

Abstract

School visits to museums and science centres are considered a powerful learning resource when carefully planned and integrated into classroom activities. Well-designed visits imply a set of activities linked with the students’ curriculum and occurring during the visit as well as before and after. Pre- and post-visit occurrences are typically developed in the classroom. However, the literature has shown most teachers do not prepare for field trips, do not define the visit purpose and do not relate the school curriculum with museum's exhibits. In this work, we examined ten field trip projects developed by in-service teachers' participating in a training course where science education practical activities in formal, non-formal and informal contexts were explored. In particular, guidelines for selecting, planning, conducting, and evaluating field trips were provided. This qualitative descriptive-oriented study aimed to evaluate: (i) field trip projects developed by in-service teachers' before and after the training course, (ii) teacher’s didactic proposals to be developed with students before and after the training course. Results indicate that the teacher-training course contributed positively to the professional development of the in-service teachers with regard to their preparation of field trips to museums and science centres. Furthermore, teachers recognised the importance of planning pre- and post-visit activities to optimize students' learning. This study contributes to improve future teacher training courses related to effective planning of field trips to museums and science centres.