How Do Teachers Teach Botany at Gymnasia? A Survey in Slovakia

We investigated the experiences of high school biology teachers in teaching botany. A questionnaire was chosen as a research tool, which was filled out by a total of 124 gymnasium teachers from 4 regions (capital city Bratislava 19 teachers, west SK 40 teachers, central SK 31 teachers, east SK 34 teachers). Gymnasia teachers do not have adequate equipment at their disposal (e. g. only 42.1% of quality microscopes in Bratislava and 73.5 – 77.5% in other regions), but they are relatively active (e. g. 73.5 – 87.1% of teachers use native microscopy and 64.5 – 84.2% of teachers use 3D models in teaching). They also use various plant materials, but algae, mosses and ferns are used less frequently (mainly by teachers from Bratislava). Also, most teachers do not consider students’ knowledge of plant biology to be adequate and have identified which areas of plant biology are problematic for students. In addition, even the teachers admit that their knowledge of plant anatomy and plant physiology is not adequate (29.4 – 57.5 % in individual regions). We also found positive correlations between the number of gaps in teachers’ knowledge and the number of gaps in students’ knowledge (r = 0.4892). The relationship between the number of tools available to teachers and their activity, i.e. the number of aids and equipment they use in teaching, was also found (r = 0.5063).