Primary School Science Teachers’ Views of the Nature of Engineering: Evidence from a Survey in Sichuan and Chongqing, China

Engineering education plays an increasingly important role in developing students’ interdisciplinary competencies for addressing real-world problems. Integrating engineering education into science curricula has become a major direction of international science education reform and presents both opportunities and challenges for renewing primary science education. Understanding primary school science teachers’ views of the nature of engineering (VNOE) is therefore essential to the effective implementation of engineering education. Drawing on a conceptual framework of VNOE, this study developed and validated a questionnaire to examine teachers’ understanding of engineering. Data were collected from 305 primary school science teachers in the Sichuan–Chongqing region of China. The findings indicate that: (1) teachers generally held favourable views of the nature of engineering, although their understanding varied across dimensions; (2) teachers’ VNOE showed modest but consistently positive associations with participation in engineering- and technology-related in-service professional development across nine of the ten second-order dimensions (all ρ < 0.30), with no significant association for Sources of Engineering Knowledge. These findings suggest a possible role for systematic professional learning without implying a strong or causal effect; and (3) no significant differences in VNOE were found across professional-background groups, while age and teaching experience showed weak positive correlations with eight of the ten second-order dimensions. These findings suggest that pre-service teacher education should strengthen both theoretical and practice-based preparation in engineering education, while professional development should provide sustained opportunities for conceptual and practice-based learning.