Simulated Jury as a Model for Teaching and Learning in a Remote Chemistry Teaching Methods Course

Abstract

In this article, we focus on a set of remote activities regarding simulated juries, judges’ evaluations, communication of verdicts, and a post-discussion conversation. These activities aimed to promote learning of the preservice teachers about the differences between remote and in-person teaching in a chemistry teaching methods course. The set of activities was developed at the beginning of the course, during the Pandemic Covid-19, and the interchanging of roles was applied by the teacher educator. These structured activities were accomplished through the preservice teachers’ interactions and their interactions with the teacher educator by means of arguments, explanations, dialogues, and injunctions. We used a multi-level method for discourse analysis to map, sample, and analyze virtual interactions, which afforded the following results: 1) the preservice teachers strongly engaged in the remote activities and constructed arguments and counterarguments in the simulated jury activities, showing active roles as knowledge producers in all set of activities; 2) several themes and subthemes were developed; 3) the teacher educator assumed the roles of instructor, manager of the discussions, and commentator; 4) the preservice teachers evaluated positively their experience with the set of activities; 5) the application of the multi-level method allowed us to make explicit the discursive moves of the participants and a model for the simulated juries and related activities.