Implementing a High-Relevance Redox Course in Everyday-Life Contexts: Effects on Motivation, Attitudes, and Perceived Relevance among Middle School Science Teachers and Pre-Service Teachers

Oxidation–reduction chemistry is central to chemistry education, yet it remains difficult because learners must coordinate visible change, particulate explanation, symbolic notation, and electron transfer. This mixed-methods study examined a high-relevance redox course delivered to two intact Arab-majority teacher cohorts in northern Israel: 50 preservice science teachers and 60 in-service middle school science teachers. The course joined everyday and societal contexts with explicit representational work, misconception analysis, demonstrations, guided discussions, and instructional design tasks. Quantitative measures assessed attitudes toward chemistry, science learning motivation, and perceived relevance before and after the course. Final projects and ten semistructured interviews were used to interpret the quantitative patterns. Paired comparisons showed significant motivation gains in both cohorts and a significant perceived-relevance gain only among preservice teachers. Attitude changes were positive, but not statistically significant. Project scores indicated that participants produced contextually grounded redox tasks under course conditions, although the study did not establish their classroom effectiveness. Qualitative evidence suggests that preservice teachers tended to describe relevance as an expansion of chemistry’s civic and explanatory purpose, whereas in-service teachers more often evaluated relevance through feasibility, curricular pressure, and differentiated student needs. The findings are interpreted cautiously because the design lacked a comparison group, and the qualitative sample was limited.