Developing pre-service teachers’ fieldwork pedagogical and content knowledge through designing enquiry-based fieldwork

Fieldwork is a signature pedagogy in geography with widely understood and diverse benefits. Yet relatively little research exists on how to prepare pre-service geography teachers to become effective fieldwork practitioners and educators. This study developed and examined the pedagogical benefits of a fieldwork education module aimed at promoting student teachers' fieldwork pedagogical and content knowledge (FPACK) by equipping them to design their own enquiry-based geographical fieldwork tasks. Twenty-one South Korean student teachers participated in this research, in which they completed the module, a pre- and post-test FPACK test developed for the study, and a reflective journal. Participants' scores on the FPACK test instrument showed a statistically significant increase, and thematic content analysis of the reflective journals confirmed these findings. The results indicate that the FPACK development module helped to cultivate pre-service teachers' expertise in understanding and designing enquiry-based fieldwork. This article represents an initial attempt to define FPACK and demonstrate the pedagogical effects of the fieldwork education module in pre-service teacher education.