Examining How Preservice Chemistry Teachers Conceptualize Transdisciplinary Practice Stipulated in a Chemistry Curriculum

This study conducted semistructured interviews to examine how preservice chemistry teachers conceptualize transdisciplinary practice within the context of a chemistry curriculum reform in China. Sixteen preservice chemistry teachers were selected as participants. The lesson plans of transdisciplinary practice activities designed by participants were also collected and analyzed to provide support for the interview data. The results indicated that they superficially understood the essential characteristics of transdisciplinary practice, not completely up to the transdisciplinary level. When representing the relations between various disciplines in transdisciplinary practice, they agreed with problem solving and disciplinary integration, and stressed the role of chemistry, but less valued engineering. They incomprehensively described the values of transdisciplinary practice, mainly focusing on the perspective of individual development. They proposed various factors affecting transdisciplinary practice implementation, among which deficient professional competence, insufficient curriculum resources, and inappropriate evaluation systems are the biggest challenges. Finally, explanations for these results, implications of the findings, and suggestions for future research were discussed.