ONE COUNTRY, TWO CULTURES – A MULTI-PERSPECTIVE

VIEW ON ISRAELI CHEMISTRY TEACHERS’ BELIEFS ABOUT

TEACHING AND LEARNING

Silvija Markic
Department of Biology and Chemistry, Institute for Science Education,
University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany
email: silvijamarkic@gmail.com

Abstract
This paper presents a study focusing on differences in Israeli Jewish and Arab chemistry
teachers’ beliefs regarding teaching and learning of chemistry in the upper secondary schools.
Israel is a country experiencing the problems of diverse cultural orientation of its inhabitants
but applying the same educational system to its diverse cultural sectors. Education includes
the same curriculum in chem-istry for both the Israeli Jewish and Arab cultural sectors as well
as final exam-inations (matriculation) set centrally by the Ministry of Education. Thus, this
study can serve as a striking case for other countries facing similar cultural diversity. The study
is based on two different instruments that are both qualita-tive and quantitative in nature. The
qualitative data stem from chemistry tea-chers’ drawings of themselves as teachers in a typical
classroom situation accompanied by four open questions. The data analysis follows three
qualitative scales: beliefs about classroom organization, beliefs about teaching objectives and
epistemological beliefs. A quantitative study gives insights into teachers’ beliefs about what
characterizes good education. The main goal of the present paper is to determine whether both
groups of chemistry teachers with different sociocultural background in Israel hold different
views about education in gen-eral and chemistry education in particular. The findings provide
evidence that in Israeli chemistry classrooms, the beliefs of Arabic teachers differ from those
of the Jewish teachers, although both groups live in the same country and operate the same
educational system.

Keywords: chemistry education, chemistry teachers’ beliefs, cultural

studies,

INTRODUCTION
At the beginning of the 1990s, Pajares discussed the importance of teachers’ beliefs related to
teaching and learning in general and regarding any interactions between teachers and their
students in the classroom in particular (Pajares, 1992). Aligning with Pajares’ report, we view
‘beliefs’ as an inclusive concept that covers any men-tal predisposition a teacher holds and
which affects teachers’ behaviour in the class-room. These beliefs can stem from personal
experience, knowledge, social and cultural background, and many other different sources
(Markic, Eilks, & Valanides, 2008). Tobin and McRobbie (1997) suggested that these teachers’
beliefs have the greatest impact on the operational curriculum (Van Den Akker, 1998) and
pedagogy in science education. Furthermore, some researchers pointed out that the success or
failure of any reform in education depends on teachers’ beliefs and consideration thereof
regarding planning of such reforms (Al-Amoush, Markic, & Eilks, 2012; Clark & Peterson,
1986; Czerniak & Lumpe, 1996; Nespor, 1987; Van Driel, Bulte, & Verloop, 2006).
The problem in educational reform is that teachers’ beliefs are seen as important, but are
also described as a major barrier for instructional modifications because the beliefs are strong,
stable and hard to modify, and emphasize factual and procedural knowledge at the expense of
deeper levels of understanding (Prawat, 1992). Shulman (1988) stated that such beliefs about
teaching are often tacit and tenacious but nevertheless extremely influential. Koballa, Graber,
Coleman, and Kemp (2000) concluded that beliefs influence all interactions between teachers

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and pupils. They also found that teachers’ beliefs about teaching and learning always include
aspects of beliefs that exclude their chosen discipline.
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, we enter a new era of reform in science
education. Both the content and pedagogy of science learning and teaching are being scrutinized
and new pedagogical and professional standards aimed at shap-ing and rejuvenating science
education are emerging (National Research Council, 1996, 2000). One of the elements that the
reform in science education has called for is to radically change the way science is taught,
namely from the traditional teacher-centred and transmission-oriented teaching strategies to
student-active and construc-tivist ones that involve the students in the teaching and learning
processes (National Research Council, 2007). Clearly, this transfer must be accompanied with
a change in the teachers’ beliefs; otherwise, it will not be visible. In the current research study,
we assess the extent to which culture affects the teachers’ beliefs by compar-ing the beliefs of
Jewish and Arab chemistry teachers within the one Israeli educa-tional system.
Several researchers focused on special groups of teachers or on specific aspects of their
beliefs. Aguirre, Haggerty, and Linder (1990) showed that science teachers often conceptualize
teaching as ‘knowledge transfer’ or ‘an influence or change in understanding’. They view
learning as ‘an intake of knowledge’, ‘an attempt to make sense in terms of existing
understanding’ or ‘an affective response’. Ballone and Czerniak (2001) showed that teachers’
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METHOD
The sample consists of 34 Arab and 33 Jewish chemistry teachers. The Arab chem-istry
teachers came from different schools from mainly the northern part of Israel. The Jewish
chemistry teachers in this study teach at different schools in different parts of the country. In both
groups, there is a strong majority of female teachers, which is typical and represents the overall
situation in Israel. Concerning age, it is fair to say that the Jewish teachers in this study tend to be
older than their Arab counterparts. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude that the Jewish chemistry
teachers in this study are more experienced than their Arab counterparts. Whereas the majority of
Arab teachers have between 1 and 15 years of teaching experience, most of the Jewish chemistry
teachers in the present study have more than 15 years of experi-ence.
The study used two different instruments, both qualitative and quantitative in nature. In the
qualitative part of the study, the participants were instructed to spontaneously draw themselves
as chemistry teachers in one typical classroom situation and to answer four open questions. This
idea was obtained from the ‘Draw-A-Science-Teacher-Test Checklist’ (DASTT-C) developed
originally in the USA by Thomas, Pedersen, and Finson (2001) supplemented with questions
about teaching objectives, and prior activities (Markic et al., 2008). The evaluation pattern was
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The quantitative study was based on a Likert-type questionnaire developed origi-nally by

Hermans, van Braak, and Van Keer (2008) and assessed the general orienta-tion and objectives
of education, the nature of the educational content and a desirable way of knowledge acquisition.
The beliefs were measured by two dimen-sions. The first dimension is Transmissive Beliefs (TB),
which assess the extent to which respondents believe education serves external goals and is
outcome oriented

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 Table 1. Some Characteristics of Israeli Arab and Israeli Jewish Teachers

Characteristics Options Arab (N = 34) Jewish (N = 33)

Age 26–30 (5.9%) 2 (12.1%) 4

31–39 (52.9%) 18 (15.2%) 5
40–49 (32.4%) 11 (24.2%) 8
50–59 (8.8%) 3 (39.4%) 13
60 and over (0.0%) 0 (9.1%) 3
Sex Female (64.7%) 22 (78.8%) 26
Male (35.3%) 12 (21.2%) 7
Number of years of 1–5 years (50.0%) 17 (6.1%) 2
teaching experience 6–15 years (14.7%) 5 (33.3%) 11
More than 15 years (35.3%) 12 (60.3%) 20

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with a closed curriculum. The second dimension represents Development Beliefs (DB) and
determines to what degree education should be oriented towards broad and individual
development, be process-oriented with an open curriculum, and to what degree knowledge
should be acquired through construction (students are active participants in and contribute to
their own development). The questionnaire contains 18 items (nine items per dimension).
The items can be rated on a six-point scale – ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly
agree). Data were interpreted by calculating mean scores, standard deviations and missing
values. The Pearson correlations and t-tests between the scales were explored as well. Data
handling was performed using SPSS 17.0G for Windows.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

All three categories from the qualitative study were interpreted as a spectrum between
traditional and more modern beliefs, where the latter are to be characterized of being in line
with educational theory and research evidence (Markic & Eilks, 2008; Markic et al., 2008).
The results, depicted in Figure 1, indicate a diversity of beliefs within both groups of
chemistry teachers for the three qualitative categories, especially regarding Beliefs about
Teaching Objectives.
Both groups of teachers hold more traditional beliefs about teaching and learn-ing.
However, a detailed look at Figure 1 shows that the majority of Arab chemistry teachers in
this sample have much stronger teacher-centred Beliefs about Classroom Organization.
Almost 90% of the participants in this group received the code ‘−2’ or ‘−1’, which describes
traditional beliefs characterized by teacher-centredness, ranging from ‘no’ to ‘very low’
activity by the students. The same result is also observed regarding the Epistemological
Beliefs and Teaching Objectives. The Arab chemistry teachers showed strong beliefs of
learning as a receptive process orga-nized by the teacher, and that the memorization of
subject matter content should be the overarching focus of the high-school chemistry lesson.

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 The Jewish chemistry teachers showed also tendencies towards teacher-centred beliefs
regarding classroom organization. However, they are less strong than among the Arab
teachers. However, only less than 10% received a score of ‘1’ or ‘2’ in this

Diagram 1. Visualization of the Absolute Frequency for the Three Qualitative

Categories

category, which presents beliefs about a student-centred classroom organization. Concerning

the Epistemological Beliefs, almost 70% hold relatively traditional receptive beliefs rather
than modern constructivist beliefs about learning. Almost 50% of the participants received
the code ‘−1’ in this category (‘Learning follows a storyboard written by the teacher;
conducted by the students, but organized and directed by the teacher’). In relation to Beliefs
about Teaching Objectives, the picture is a bit different. Here we have more or less a balance
between traditional beliefs on the one side and another group of teachers having at least
neutral or slightly scien-tific literacy-oriented beliefs. About 20% of them have been rated
even to consider problem-solving or thinking in relevant contexts as important objectives of
chemistry lessons.
An overall consideration of both groups can be obtained interpreting the com-binations of
all the three qualitative categories (Markic & Eilks, 2008; Markic et al., 2008). A 3D diagram
allows an overall consideration of each single teachers’ beliefs within a range of the code
combinations (−2/−2/−2) to (2/2/2). Table 3 presents the results for the Arab and Jewish
chemistry teachers’ beliefs about the Nature of Good Education. Both groups show beliefs
above the middle of

Diagram 2. 3D Representation of the Code Combinations

the six-step scale. In both groups, the support for the Developmental Beliefs is much higher
than for the TB. The differences between both scales regarding the two groups were found
statistically significant. Both the Arab and Jewish chemistry teachers hold beliefs that

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education in general should be oriented towards broad and individual development, be
process-oriented with an open curriculum, but hold dif-ferent views regarding to what degree
knowledge should be acquired through instruction. The Arab teachers hold an even stronger
belief in this direction than the Jewish group, although the picture from the qualitative part
of the study focusing on the beliefs about the practice of chemistry teaching revealed the
opposite view. Also, this difference is statistically significant. Concerning TB, the beliefs are
in the mid-dle of the evaluation scale, especially for the Jewish chemistry teachers. It seems
that the Jewish chemistry teachers are not sure whether the current education cur-riculum
serves external goals and its outcome is oriented toward a closed curricu-lum. Arab
chemistry teachers, however, have a definite opinion regarding this point. Also, this
difference is statistically significant.
Analysis of the correlation of the scales revealed that there is a moderate correla-tion
between TB and DB (.43*). The correlation between the two scales was found to be
significant at the .05 level. However, this is only true for the Jewish chemistry teachers.
Regarding the Jewish chemistry teachers, we can conclude that the two scales refer to the
same dimension. There was no correlation in the data regarding the Arab chemistry teachers.
The NRC report Taking Science to School (National Research Council, 2007) con-
cluded that proficiency in science is multifaceted and therefore it requires a wide range of
experiences to support students’ learning. This report defines the following four strands of
proficiency, which it maintains are interwoven in successful science learning:
(1) Knowing, using and interpreting scientific explanations of the natural world.
(2) Generating and evaluating scientific evidence and explanations.
(3) Understanding the nature and development of scientific knowledge.
(4) Participating productively in scientific practices and discourse.
The four strands imply that learning science involves a system of thought, dis-course and
practice as well as provides multiple opportunities for students to use this content and related
processes, and apply them across experiences in an intercon-nected and social context – to
accomplish the goal of working with and understand-ing scientific ideas. This perspective
stresses how conceptual understanding is linked to the ability to develop explanations of
phenomena and to carry out empirical investigations in order to develop or evaluate those
knowledge claims. It recognizes the conceptual effort needed to modify students’ naive
conceptions of the world as they learn science, rather than maintain them with little change
even when they con-tradict the material being taught.
The results that we received in this study clearly indicate that the Israeli Arab chemistry
teachers’ beliefs about the chemistry classroom are very self-centred, as it was documented
e.g. also for chemistry teachers from other Arab societies in the case of Jordan (Al-Amoush
et al., 2012). Modern science education in the means of the above discussed NRC-report
advocates student-active learning strategies in which the students have to be active learners
and must be able to influence the learn-ing process either in the epistemology of the learning
process, or in the teaching objectives. It seems that such a view until yet does not have any
prominent place in the classroom related beliefs of the Arab chemistry teachers from this
study. Their views are teacher-centred and transmission-oriented as it was described for
chem-istry teachers in other Arab societies (Al-Amoush et al., 2012, 2014).
The Jewish chemistry teachers in this study showed comparably more modern
educational beliefs, as it was documented also in Dkeidek et al. (2010) and Dkeidek et al.
2012) concerning the students’ perception of chemistry laboratory classroom learning
environment and the effect of teacher–student interaction and support on developing
questioning ability among the students. Taking into consideration the characteristics of
educational environments in more individualistic vs. collectivistic societies (Greenfield,
1999; Hofstede, 1980; Trianidis, 1995), also from this study it can be suggested that the
Jewish sector is more according towards an individualistic paradigm where the Arabic sector

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is applying a stronger collectivist philosophy. In a nutshell, since a lot of effort was made to
promote education in the Israeli Arab sector and both the Jewish and the Arab sector operate
similar systems of school education and teacher training, the findings from this study suggest
a strong cultural dimension for explaining the differences in the teachers’ beliefs for the
Jewish and the Arab sector. Such an influence of the more traditional and patriarchal nature
of Arabic societies on science teachers’ and student teachers’ beliefs was already suggested
by Al-Amoush et al. (2014) in a comparison of chemistry teachers from Jordan with their
counterparts in Turkey and Germany. However, in their study it was not clear how big this
influence was compared to the influence of the teacher education system and the socio-
economic circumstances the educational system is operating in.

CONCLUSION
It can be inferred from the results of the current study, as well as from the studies by
Dkeidek et al. (2010, 2012), that culture is a very important and often underesti-mated factor
on understanding science teachers’ beliefs, their influence on the tea-chers’ classroom
behaviour and the related effects on students’ learning. Current research revealed that
teachers’ instructional practices affect minority students’ achievements, attitudes, and
careers (Kanter & Konstantopoulos, 2010). To prevent teachers in the Arab sector from
staying with their conservative and teacher-centred beliefs and influence the students’
achievement, science-related attitudes and poten-tial career choices accordingly, explicit
investment is needed that the teachers update their beliefs about teaching and learning to
allow implementation of new and innovative teaching strategies accordingly. Maybe a more
thorough interaction between the Israeli Jewish and Arab sector will help too.
The findings from the present study could be helpful for decision makers in educational
systems in the case of Israel and beyond when educational reform intends to introduce or
implement any change in the educational system. Political decision makers and educational
reformers have to thoroughly take into account tea-chers’ beliefs for any kind of reform (Van
Driel et al., 2006).

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Hebrew).
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