Video as a second stimulus in developing the professional agency of primary pre-service teachers

[Extract] Decades of teaching and research has been devoted to increasing the quality and quantity of science teaching in primary schools, but with limited success (Prinsley & Johnston, 2015; Thompson, 2013). One of the challenges repeatedly identified has been the science agency of primary teachers, grounded in their lack of confidence and knowledge in science pedagogy (Gabel & Rubba, 1979; Harlen, 1997), described by Hodson (2002) as science phobia. This chapter analyses the development of professional agency in a group of pre-service primary teachers and theorises the pedagogical process in terms of Vygotsky’s second stimulus. Agency, one’s ability to engage with the world, is theorised, in this context, as relational: it includes a capacity to offer support and to ask for support from others (Edwards 2007, 2010).