Teacher Degree Students Attitudes Towards STEM Activities in two Spanish Universities

Abstract

The attempt to train undergraduate primary school teachers in STEM skills faces an evident handicap, since students enrolling Teacher Degrees usually have humanistic secondary school backgrounds. Attitudes towards STEM on a sample of 336 under-graduate teachers from two Spanish universities were analyzed. Students answered a questionnaire, and responses were analyzed qualitatively (open text questions) and quantitatively (Descriptive Statistics and Statistical Implicative Analysis). Results describe a young collective, with a clear majority of women, mostly interested in languages and history, with high vocation (rather spontaneous than hereditary) to work with children. There is evidence that school advice services fulfill a role to discourage certain students from STEM. These conclusions give valuable information that could be used to replace institutional practices and improve the perception future teachers have towards the teaching of STEM in Primary Education.

Keywords

• initial teacher training
• primary education
• stem education
• school advice