As a counterpoint to the biblical prohibition to access to the science tree, the computer and the digital culture represent the immediate openness to the contents and images of all fields of knowledge, but also to a new counterculture. The new forms of scientific knowledge construction, supported by communication technologies, demand a new methodological strategies and ways of educating (Levy, 2008; Wieman et al., 2008). The communication technologies offer a very rich platform for an innovative science teaching and learning, widening the possibilities of using models, conceptual maps, images, simulations and metaphors. The media exuberance and the enormous digital data bases are altering and augmenting the multiple ways of accessing and producing scientific knowledge. The accelerated expansion of the virtual space is increasing the role of the social and digital networks in the production of knowledge. According with the new fluid waves of scientific contents, science education must adapt its methodological perspective to prepare all students to live and work in the new visual and social culture. Digital technology –digital libraries, images, conceptual maps, videos, podcasts, web pages, blogs, electronic mail, etc.- opens new possibilities to understand scientific knowledge individually or through social networks. In this scenery, teacher preparation is one of the major impact variables to increase science education quality. With the goal to advance teacher education, the aim of this investigation is to analyse in which measure the students in initial teacher education adapt their strategies of studying in harmony with the present scientific culture. We have hypothesized that teacher students are evolving from a form of traditional study, centred in their notes of classes and handbooks to a more virtual learning (Brown, 2008; Jones et al., 2008). A second hypothesis is that the time spent in the cyberspace increases the capabilities to make learning tasks in collaboration. We assume that, in this epochal moment, all teachers must have the right, the media and the capabilities to do research and that the educational labour is one that should be centred in the collaborative work of all agents of the educational ecosystem (Coach-Smith & Zeichner, 2005). In this sense, it is expected that the social software and the new social tools with which we interact will alter life and teacher education (Duguid, 2008; Pisano & Verganti, 2008).

The analyses about how students take learning decisions to organize their time and habits of study in the actual digital space, has been supported by a survey with closed and open questions. The research includes two samples of 30 participants, one constituted by students in their first year of the teacher education degree (novices students) and another sample with students in their fourth year (seniors students), both groups at the Faculty of Education of Alicante’s University (Spain). The participants answer questions around their habits of study and the weaknesses and strengths that they experience. The data has been processed through a systematic codification and a subsequent process of clustering and categorization (Coach-Smith & Zeichner, 2005). Using an inferential and recursive process, we have produced a narrative which describes the ways of learning of the investigated participants.

The evidence obtained attests that the use of digital technology in the distribution of study time is low. The conventional ways of study dominate the current scenario. The disposition to individual study is also prevalent. In sum, the process of investigating in collaboration using the great data bases that characterizes the sciences today is not assumed for the teacher students (Alberts, 2008; Hines et al., 2008). The participants confer great trust to Google on searching information and they don’t know specific data bases and digital libraries (Mervis, 2008). Subsequently, the hypothesis that the participants are adapting their study strategies to the digital culture has not been proven. On the other hand, the new collaborative way of producing science and knowledge (Duguid, 2008; Goleman & Boyatsis, 2008) has not affected the predominance of individual learning in the participants.