PATTERNS OF DIDACTIC DECISIONS MADE BY TEACHERS IN PHYSICAL SCIENCES CLASSROOMS

The purpose of this study is to highlight didactic decisions of teachers in Physical Sciences classrooms. The framework used is teacher mediation of students' learning. Research questions: (a) what aspects of teaching trigger didactics? (b) What are the relationships between the didactic decisions of teachers and their triggers? Are the responses to these questions dependent on teacher or teaching level? This study reports on a multi-case study of five teachers from three teaching levels (basic, secondary and higher education). Multimodal narratives (a description of what happens in the classroom, using several types of data collected inside and outside the classroom) were used to analyse the didactic decisions of teachers and to determine what causes them to take a particular decision in the classroom. It searches for categories using open code analysis, and then use cluster analysis to find patterns. Four patterns of decisions were found, transversing teacher and teaching levels, and relate them to their triggers. It is found that each teacher and each teaching level has a singular profile for decision-making (a particular combination of patterns of decision-making, what draws the teacher's attention, and the specific decisions taken).