Originally, in order to teach at the high school level in Spain, teacher education was similar to what was required for university teaching. This training was based on a strong academic tradition that gave priority to knowledge and scientific scholarship. This situation implies that these teachers have been socialized as specialists in their respective academic disciplines.

The current educational reality, and what has been referred to as the third educational revolution, characterized by the extension of primary and secondary education to the entire population, has placed new professional demands on teachers. The complexity of the current teaching-learning process indicates that one of the dilemmas faced by today’s high school teachers is that the model of the teacher as a transmitter of knowledge does not seem sufficient for Secondary Education (Bolívar, 2007). There is a need for extensive pedagogical knowledge about the characteristics of students and adolescence, classroom management, teaching methodology, and team work (Esteve Zarazaga, 2003; Marcelo, 2009; Perrenoud, 2004). To address these training demands, throughout the past four decades, teachers’ initial pedagogical education has been considered from four consecutive training models. Initially, for nearly four decades, to access teaching, only a minimum pedagogical training (Course of Pedagogical Adaptation) was required once undergraduate studies were completed. Within the European convergence process, the implementation of a new plan began (academic year 2009-2010): «Master in Teacher Training in Secondary Education».

Various studies focused on the study of the construction of teacher identity in initial teacher education (e.g. Manso Ayuso & Martín Ortega, 2014; Pontes, Ariza & Del Rey, 2010; Pontes & Serrano, 2008) and the training needs of secondary education teachers (Terigi, 2011) have revealed that there is a large collective of future teachers who seem to have overcome the idea that in order to teach, it is enough to know the subject matter. Instead, these students realize that it is also necessary to know how to teach their subject. However, studies indicate that there is a stagnation of education students in this regard, as they find it difficult to accept that teachers currently require more extensive pedagogical knowledge. In addition, some authors highlight the challenge of initial teacher education programs in changing these conceptions in the students (Manso Ayuso & Martín Ortega, 2014).

Moreover, there is a group of future high school teachers who still do not consider this knowledge necessary for their professional practice. A study carried out in the Argentinean context suggested that the low appreciation of this knowledge seems to come from the initial teacher education model, where the greatest efforts seem to be poured into knowledge of the discipline. Furthermore, the study suggests that the value of pedagogical knowledge is discovered while practicing the profession.

Drawing on the previous evidence, this paper presents the results from an exploratory study focused on the construction and validation of a scale designed to analyze to what degree general pedagogical knowledge is valued by future high school teachers, paying attention to the moment when they recognize its importance for practicing the teaching profession, and examining what influenced this discovery. This paper forms part of a broader study about the initial training of high school teachers (Martín-Romera & Molina Ruíz, 2015).

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