Abstract:

Globally there has been a step up from routine teaching to technology enhanced classrooms and from teachers disseminating information to students accessing, organizing and using information. This has mandated changes in the nature, purpose and methodology of science teaching especially in developing countries. The use of computer applications in classrooms has become the hallmark of educational institutions poised for change in this direction. Microsoft PowerPoint presentation is a widely used instructional tool to communicate ideas effectively through slides created for presentation either through over-head projectors or on-screen electronic shows. Due to the benefits accruing from its use, skills in creating and using PowerPoint presentations are considered required skills to be acquired in many teacher preparation programs. However in Nigeria, not much has been accomplished in their use for teaching and learning especially at the primary and secondary school level. To enable teachers at this levels teach with power point presentations, they must be equipped with the requisite knowledge and skills and also exhibit a positive attitude and commitment to their use. One way of achieving this is to make teachers in training use this application in teaching and to involve them in reflections on their experiences in the creation and use of PowerPoint presentations. Reflecting on their teaching experiences will yield useful information which will enable them identify areas for improvement, areas they need support and clarify their beliefs on the use of this technology, thereby contributing to their professional development.
This study focused on the reflections of two groups of pre-service science teachers on their teaching experiences during micro-teaching sessions. The participants in the study were Thirty –eight (38) pre-service Science teachers in their second year in a College of Education in the South-West of Nigeria. These had been exposed to a science methods course as a pre- requisite for micro-teaching in the previous semester and had successfully transited to the next academic level. Using a quasi-experimental design, the study sought to examine, describe and compare pre-service science teachers’ reflections as they taught science concepts with or without PowerPoint presentations based on an adaptation of categories of reflectivity by Amobi, ( 2005) to Describe, Inform, Confront and Reconstruct the contents of the lessons during micro teaching sessions. Four research questions guided the study and data collected mainly by observation and use of reflective journals were used to identify, quantify, distribute and describe teacher reflections according to pre- determined categories. The implications of results for reflective practice in technology based classrooms were discussed and recommendations were made.

Keywords:

Reflections, PowerPoint, Pre-service teachers, Micro-teaching.