Does a course on the history and philosophy of chemistry have any effect on prospective chemistry teachers’ perceptions? The case of chemistry and the chemist

The creative comparisons prospective chemistry teachers make about “chemistry” and the “chemist” may reflect how they perceive these concepts. In this sense, it seems important to determine which creative comparisons prospective teachers make with respect to these and how these can change after the history of chemistry is treated in the classroom. This study seeks to investigate the impact of the basic History and Philosophy of Chemistry course on prospective chemistry teachers’ perceptions towards chemistry and the chemist. The study was conducted during the 2012–2013 academic year at a state university in Turkey with 38 prospective chemistry teachers. A creative comparisons questionnaire and semi-structured interviews were used as data collection instruments in the study. This questionnaire was administered to the prospective teachers in the form of a pre-test, post-test, and retention test. Results of the analysis showed that the prospective teachers produced creative comparisons related to chemistry in the pre-test that mostly relied on their own experiences and observations, but that in the post-test and retention test, their comparisons mostly contained r