The student teachers:

Understand the meaning, nature, structure and importance of Physical Science in the modern world.
Gain a perspective of the development of science and science teaching in India and about the contributions of eminent Indian scientists.
Understand the aims, objectives and values of teaching Physical Science in secondary schools.
Understand the basic theories needed for effective teaching and to perfect them.
Develops their skills for effective teaching and identifying and practise the skills required especially for the teaching of Physical Science.
Assimilate principles to plan lessons for teaching.

Nature of science; importance of science in relation to self and community; growth and development of science; science teaching in India; science as a process and product; contributions of eminent Indian scientists in the field of Physical Science; developing scientific attitude.

Importance of teaching science as a subject; Aims and objectives of teaching Physical science in secondary schools (objectives of science teaching as enumerated in National Curriculum Framework, 1988). Values (practical, disciplinary, recreational, etc.) to be attained.
Taxonomy of educational objectives; Bloom's Taxonomy; other taxonomies and approaches; taxonomy of science process skills (McCormark to Yager); writing instructional objectives in terms of observable terminal behaviours of learners and its importance.

Student-initiated learning - contributions of Piaget, Bruner and Gagne, Vygotsky
Scientific process as the base for learning. - Product of science as medium for achieving process. - Process skills at secondary stage - their development. - Problem-solving - the base for developing students' thinking skills. - Information processing - organising content into problems to be solved by students as 'new' knowledge for them. - Constructivism - as a way of learning leading to 'generate' knowledge. - Reflection - a basic process 'from learning experience'.

Teaching skills for the laying of foundation for effective teaching; development of skills through microteaching; combining the skills (set induction, explaining, probing, questioning, stimulus variation) for effective full class teaching. Identifying teaching skills specially needed for the teaching of Physical Science - their development.

Stages in Lesson Plan and the purpose served - Lesson plan format. Deciding the theories and principles to be included; selecting appropriate instructional strategy. - Strengthening instruction by means of A-V aids, video lessons and computer-assisted lessons.

The student teachers:

Assimilate the principles of constructing curriculum and become familiar with famous projects in science curriculum.
Understand how the areas and topics are included for teaching.
Develop the ability to apply educational theories and principles for the teaching of Physical Science.
Understand the new trends in science teaching and select for teaching suitable models in which the theories of learning have been applied.
Acquire the ability to select appropriate instructional strategies that are prepared from the latest models of teaching.
Acquire skills in preparing different types of tests to assess students' performance.

General principles of curriculum construction; modern trends in curriculum construction; evaluation of the State secondary school Physical Science Syllabus; specific principles of science curriculum construction with reference to Nuffield Foundation, PSSC, Chem study, CBA.
Features of a good science textbook, work book for pupils and handbook for teachers.
Concept of correlation - incidental and systematic - correlation of Physical Science with other subjects.
Need and importance of organization of field trips, excursions, science fairs and exhibitions; significance and organization of science club - facilities and support to 'create' knowledge.

1. Direct instruction - lecturing (telling) - explaining - lecture demonstration; their drawbacks - confining direct instruction according to the needs. - Improving direct instruction - enrich direct instruction with student activities; minimizing lecturing with student responses in various ways such as reporting, designing, collecting data - incorporating reflective process - meaningful verbal learning.
2. Applying principles and theories
Reception learning vs thinking skills development learning - Product vs process approach - Teacher-initiated vs student-initiated learning
Textbook approaches - scientific process approach – discovery learning, inquiry training, investigatory approach, inductive-deductive approach - problem-solving approach
Behaviourist approach vs constructivist approach.

Scientific process models - Information processing models - Concept attainment models - Inquiry training models - Constructivist model - Information gathering model - Information generating model

Scientific process method of instruction - Inquiry training model of teaching - Guided discovery method - Inductive method - Deductive method - Investigatory method of instruction - Information gathering method of teaching - Information generating strategy of instruction - Constructivist method of instruction.

Importance and organisation - Facilities for individual and group work in the laboratory - School library and class library. - Science club - Training in problem-solving and development of psychomotor skills.

Need for testing - diagnostic, knowledge about students' progress in learning. - Objective testing - Performance test - Assessing students' achievement and their skill in scientific process. - Interpreting test results.