One hundred and eighty subjects took part in the study. They were assigned to two experimental, two control and one Hawthorne control groups. Experimental subjects participated in enrichment activities held outside the school. Control subjects were not given these activities while the Hawthorne control group was taken out on excursions unrelated to their science lessons.
The Cooperative Science Test (COST) was used to assess the acquisition of science concepts while science achievement was based mainly on school science examination scores.
The results indicated that the experimental subjects showed significantly greater improvement in concept attainment and science achievement. Correlations between science concept attainment and science examination scores were positive and significant.
The study concluded that participation in enrichment activities relevant to school science would improve science achievement. 相似文献
_____ comprehensive and unified;
_____ able to take into account the particular possibilities of individual adult educators; and
_____ easily adjustable to the particular needs within the community.
Such a scheme can only be realized through the application of a modular structure. A scheme like this is being developed at Gwent College of Higher Education for a professional training programme which will give a Certificate in Continuing Education, conferring full teacher status in adult and further education. This development is used to illustrate the points the author wants to make. The development of a programme on such a scheme raises considerable structural and methodological problems, which are discussed and compared with what is done elsewhere. 相似文献
Purpose: The focus of this research is development and testing of a new classroom observation protocol specifically designed for SSI-based instructional contexts.
Design and methods: Development of this SSI-Observation Protocol (SSI-OP) took place in four distinct phases: review of existing protocols and SSI-based instruction frameworks, writing and revision of protocol items, initial testing of the draft protocol, and soliciting feedback from SSI experts.
Sample: Following the four stages of SSI-OP development, we progressed to a series of field tests. The field tests were conducted with three different samples. The first sample was an experienced (10 + years) high school biology teacher and one of her honors biology classes. The second sample consisted of seven Turkish Pre-service Science Teachers (PST) participating in a science methods course. The third sample included two Thai PST from a field experience course embedded within a teacher education program.
Results: The final version of the protocol addressed five dimensions of SSI-based instructional activities: focus of instruction, teaching moves, role of teacher, role of students, and classroom environment.
Conclusions: The SSI-OP could be used in a variety of ways for research including documentation of current practices, impacts of professional development and/or curricula on teaching practices, and changes in teaching over time. We offer the SSI-OP as a new tool with the potential to contribute to science teacher education and research that may advance the teaching and learning of science through SSI. 相似文献
Purpose: The focus of this paper is to investigate secondary school learners’ knowledge of the optical phenomena of reflection and refraction in relation to certain contexts.
Sample: The sample for the study consisted of two Grade-11 intact groups of 70 learners in total at a selected senior secondary school in the Mthatha District of the Eastern Cape Province in South Africa.
Design and methods: The study focused on exploring the learners’ conceptions about the optical phenomena of reflection and refraction. The data were collected from three two-tier questions, which exposed the learners to certain contexts which could be explained using optics principles. The first tier of each question was a context-based multiple-choice question and in the second tier, the participants were asked to justify their answers to the first tier.
Results: Majority of the participants failed to correctly interpret the given contexts using optics principles. Moreover, only a few learners could justify their scientifically acceptable answers with scientifically acceptable explanations.
Conclusions: The participants experienced serious conceptual difficulties when they were required to apply the optics concepts in the real-world contexts presented to them. Moreover, the participants’ conceptual difficulties about reflection and refraction were also found to be associated with their inability to understand correctly the optical processes involved in vision. 相似文献
Purpose The paper aims to illustrate primary pre-service teachers’ understanding of argumentation based on a study using quantitative methodology. In particular, it aims to illustrate how these teachers view quality of arguments and teaching strategies related to argumentation in the context of a socio-scientific issue on energy.
Sample 332 pre-service teachers enrolled in a university teacher education programme in Spain were investigated. Many studies on argumentation have been conducted with small sample sizes of teachers. Hence, given the sample size, the study provides findings that are likely to be generalisable.
Design and methods A questionnaire was administered to the participants. The design of the questionnaire was guided by some existing analytical tools which were adapted for primary education purposes in the context of socio-scientific issues. This adaptation is novel in that the questionnaire items can potentially be used as diagnostic questions to assess primary teachers’ understanding of argumentation.
Results The results suggest that pre-service teachers had difficulty in understanding arguments and different pedagogical strategies to promote argumentation in classroom. For example, they did not understand the role and the meaning of warrants in scientific arguments and their understanding of the use of different kind of strategies is limited to debates, open discussions and experiments. The age range of the participants and the length of teaching experience had no impact on the quality of their understanding of argumentation.
Conclusions Pre-service science teacher education will benefit from incorporation of more robust and lengthy sessions on argumentation. For example, sessions could focus on quality as well as structure of arguments in science and more diverse pedagogical strategies to support argumentation in science lessons, such as the use of writing frames and presentations. 相似文献
Purpose: This study examines the relationships between classroom goal structure perception variables (motivating tasks, autonomy support, and mastery evaluation), engagement (behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and agentic engagement), self-efficacy, and science achievement.
Sample: The study participants included 744 seventh-grade students from 9 public schools in two districts of Gaziantep in Turkey.
Design and methods: Data were collected through the administration of four instruments: Survey of Classroom Goals Structures, Engagement Questionnaire, Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire, and Science Achievement Test. The obtained data were subjected to path analysis to test the proposed model.
Results: Students’ perceptions of classroom goal structures (i.e. motivating tasks, autonomy support, and mastery evaluation) were found to be significant predictors of their self-efficacy. Autonomy support was observed to be positively linked to all aspects of engagement, while motivating tasks were found to be related only to cognitive engagement. In addition, mastery evaluation was shown to be positively linked to engagement variables, except for cognitive engagement, and self-efficacy and engagement (i.e. behavioral, emotional, and cognitive engagement) were observed to be significant predictors of science achievement. Finally, results revealed reciprocal relations among engagement variables, except for agentic engagement.
Conclusions: Students who perceive mastery goal structures tend to show higher levels of engagement and self-efficacy in science classes. The study found that students who have high self-efficacy and who are behaviorally, emotionally, and cognitively engaged are more successful in science classes. Accordingly, it is recommended that science teachers utilize inquiry-based and hands-on science activities in science classes and focus on the personal improvement of the students. Furthermore, it is also recommended that they provide students with opportunities to make their own choices and decisions and to control their own actions in science classes. 相似文献
Purpose: The purpose of this research, consisting of two studies, was to explore Taiwanese university science-major students’ conceptions of learning science by laboratory (CLSL).
Sample: In Study I, interview data were gathered from 47 university science-major students. In Study II, 287 university science-major students’ responses to a CLSL survey were collected.
Design and methods: In Study I, the interview data were analyzed using the phenomenographic method. Based on the findings derived from Study I, Study II developed an instrument for assessing students’ CLSL by exploratory factor analysis.
Results: Study I revealed six categories of CLSL, including memorizing, verifying, acquiring manipulative skills, obtaining authentic experience, reviewing prior learning profiles, and achieving in-depth understanding. The factor analysis in Study II revealed that the ‘verifying’ category was eliminated, but found another new category of ‘examining prior knowledge.’
Conclusions: This study finally proposes a framework to describe the variations of CLSL, consisting of three features: cognitive orientation, metacognitive orientation, and epistemic orientation. Possible factors influencing students’ CLSL are also discussed. 相似文献
Purpose: In the current study, the purpose was to investigate the relations among perceived teacher affective support (PTAS), academic emotions (academic enjoyment, academic anxiety, and academic hopelessness), academic self-efficacy and behavioural engagement in elementary school science classrooms in Turkey.
Sample: A total of 633 fourth- and fifth-grade students in eight elementary schools in Istanbul, Turkey were participated in the study.
Design and methods: A self-report questionnaire was administered to participating students. The data were analysed using structural equation modelling.
Results: Findings showed that PTAS was both directly and indirectly related to the given variables. PTAS was found to be significantly positively associated with students’ academic enjoyment, academic self-efficacy and behavioural engagement and significantly negatively related to their academic anxiety and academic hopelessness in science classrooms. An important finding is that the total effect of PTAS on behavioural engagement, a factor strongly associated with academic success in all disciplines, was as strong as the effect of students’ perceived academic self-efficacy beliefs in science.
Conclusions: Findings suggest that PTAS may help promoting positive emotions and motivation among students in science classrooms, eventually leading to more desirable attitudes and achievement outcomes in science. Teacher affective support deserves greater recognition from researchers, educational policy-makers, administrators and teachers to build better learning conditions for all students. 相似文献
Purpose: The aim of this study was to explore students’ perception of teachers’ feedback given on their texts in two genres, and to suggest how writing training and feedback-giving could become more efficient.
Sample: In this study were included 44 degree project students in biology and molecular biology, and 21 supervising teachers at a Swedish university.
Design and methods: The study concerned students’ writing about their degree projects in two genres: scientific writing and popular science writing. The data consisted of documented teacher feedback on the students’ popular science texts. It also included students’ and teachers’ answers to questionnaires about writing and feedback. All data were collected during the spring of 2012. Teachers’ feedback, actual and recalled – by students and teachers, respectively – was analysed and compared using the so-called Canons of rhetoric.
Results: While the teachers recalled the given feedback as mainly positive, most students recalled only negative feedback. According to the teachers, suggested improvements concerned firstly the content, and secondly the structure of the text. In contrast, the students mentioned language style first, followed by content.
Conclusions: The disagreement between students and teachers regarding how and what feedback was given on the students texts confirm the need of improved strategies for writing training and feedback-giving in science education. We suggest that the rhetorical meta-language might play a crucial role in overcoming the difficulties observed in this study. We also discuss how training of writing skills may contribute to students’ understanding of their subject matter. 相似文献
Purpose: The objective of this study is to determine how parents view science and technology, the factors that influence their views (gender, age, educational level), and the relationship between these opinions and the students’ science academic achievement.
Sample: The present study was conducted with the parents of 169 students attending randomly chosen primary schools in a city in western Turkey.
Design and methods: The ‘Scale for Determining Views of Parents regarding Science and Technology’ (SFDVPAST) was developed by the researchers and used in the present study. The scale’s reliability was 0.88. Data obtained from SFDVPAST were analysed with SPSS 11.5 using frequency (f), percentage (%), average (X), standard deviation (SD), one-way MANOVA, a univariate ANOVA for each dependent variable as a tracking test, and simple linear regression analysis to determine the relationships.
Results: At the completion of this study, findings indicated that gender does not have an impact on how parents view science and technology, but age and educational level do impact parents’ views on this topic. The science academic achievement of the student correlates with the views of his/her parents on science and technology.
Conclusions: Parents’ views towards science and technology have affected their age and education level, but have not affected their sex. In addition, parents’ positive view towards science and technology has affected their science academic achievement of the students. 相似文献
Purpose: This study describes the development and trialling of scenarios based on the socioscientific issue of climate change. The scenarios required students to make and justify a decision and were designed to assess students’ argumentation skills.
Sample: A sample of 162 Year 10 students from five schools in Perth, Western Australia participated in this study.
Design and methods: Recent media articles were reviewed to identify relevant contexts for scenarios related to climate change that could be used to develop and assess students’ argumentation skills. In the first phase, students trialled scenarios about wind farms and hydrogen fuel buses using writing frames with scaffolding questions to generate as many reasons as possible to justify their decision. The responses were categorised into themes which were used to prepare a scoring rubric. In the second phase, students generated written arguments about the scenarios to support their decision. The arguments were analysed using both the scoring rubric developed from the first phase and Toulmin’s argumentation pattern of claim, data, backing, qualifier and rebuttal.
Results: Students’ responses to the scaffolded questions were categorised into themes of agriculture, economy, energy, environment, human impact and ethical factors. The themes of economy and the environment predominated with ethical justifications cited infrequently. An analysis of the arguments generated revealed a majority of students’ responses consisted of a claim and data with backings, qualifiers and rebuttals rarely provided.
Conclusions: Scenarios about climate change socioscientific issues can be used by teachers to both develop and assess students’ argumentation skills in classroom settings. 相似文献
All plans for this integrated training program are designed to provide training normally encompassed by the traditional two‐stage programm.
The integrated training program includes:
- studies in the areas of education and social science;
- studies in two major subjects which are later to be taught at school;
- practical studies and activities.
The new model leads to the following degrees:
- nine semesters of study for a Certificate of Qualification for primary and lower‐level secondary school;
- eleven semesters for a Certificate of Qualification for higher‐level secon dary school and the education of exceptional children.
Theoretic training in major subject areas and related didactic training as well as education and social studies take place chiefly in the form of projects. A basic assumption is that interdisciplinary projects which are practice‐ and problemoriented permit a highly desirable integration of theory and practice on the whole.
In the project, contact teachers are an essential link between field practice at school and academic training at the university. Contact teachers are under contact to the university for an extended period of time (generally three years). In place of remunation, their teaching loads are reduced by ten hours per week.
In 1978/79 the project will be put to the test as the first generation of students prepares for State Board Examinations. 相似文献
— industry must have a clear idea of its requirement for qualified engineers;
— the role of the engineer in industry — extending from research, development and production into the service area and into society (with the implied social responsibility);
— the time constraints in the educational system in relation to the rate of growth of knowledge and the consequent problems associated with course planning;
— the continuing challenge to the role of university education arising from the demands of industry and from very close links with sectors of industry or particular industrial companies. 相似文献
Purpose: LBD uses the context of design challenges to learn, among other things, science. Previous research shows that this approach to subject integration is quite successful but provides little profit on (scientific) concept learning. For this, a lack of (knowledge of) proper teaching strategies is suggested as an important reason. This study explores these strategies and more specific the interaction with concept learning.
Sample: Six Dutch first-year bachelor’s degree science student teachers, between the ages of 16 and 18, and two science teacher trainers (principal investigators included) were involved.
Design and methods: A mixed methods study was used to study LBD’s teaching practice in depth. Based on a theoretical framework of (concept) learning-related teaching strategies video recordings of a guided LBD challenge were analysed to unravel teacher handling in detail. Complemented by questionnaire and interview data and students’ learning outcomes (pre- and post-exam) the effectiveness of teaching strategies was established and shortcomings were distracted.
Results: Students reached medium overall learning gains where the highest gains were strongly task-related. Teacher handling was dominated by providing feedback and stimulating collaboration and only 13% of all teacher interventions concerned direct explication of underlying science. And especially these explicit teaching strategies were highly appreciated by students to learn about science.
Conclusions: In accordance with insights about knowledge transfer, LBD needs to be enriched with explicit teaching strategies, interludes according to poor-related science content important for cohesive understanding and de- and recontextualisation of concepts for deeper understanding. 相似文献
Methodology: A multiple regression analysis was employed to assess the combined effect of the knowledge bases, factors such as age of the household head, land size, marketing channels and geophysical factors (such as land slope) on linseed productivity.
Findings: The findings reveal no differences in productivity between trained and untrained farmers. They further show that training and the interaction between training and experience positively influence productivity. Our findings, however, reveal farmer education to have an inverse yet insignificant effect on productivity. Furthermore, we found that factors such as the slope of the land and the choice of marketing channel also play an important role in influencing productivity.
Practical implications: Moving away from the traditional top-down approach could be the answer to avoid a mismatch between the information given by trainers and what the farmers actually need.
Theoretical implications: The study used interaction variables of knowledge bases, and attempted to demonstrate the importance of a tacit knowledge base, which is often not well documented and therefore neglected in research.
Originality/value: The research demonstrates the combined effects that interactions between several knowledge bases have on the productivity of linseed farmers. 相似文献