The influence of primary children's ideas in science on teaching practice

The purpose of this study was to explore how children’s ideas in science affects science instruction in the primary grades. The study investigated whether and how primary teachers recognize student ideas, and whether and how they react to student ideas. Two experienced second-grade teachers and one intern teacher were observed and videotaped as they taught 8-week astronomy units. Teachers and students from each classroom were preand postinstruction interviewed for their content knowledge of and viewpoints on teaching and the importance of student ideas. Midunit stimulated recall interviews were used to gain understanding of teachers’ perceptions of their instruction regarding student ideas. Transcripts of lessons and interviews were coded and analyzed for patterns of eliciting and addressing student ideas. Results showed that all teachers used discussions in a variety of ways to identify and elicit student ideas. The experienced teacher with the highest level of content knowledge had the largest repertoire for eliciting and addressing student ideas. The intern teacher addressed student ideas in ways that discouraged students from continuing to share their ideas. Implications include (a) helping teachers to use their teaching strengths to increase their content knowledge and expertise teaching primary students, (b) helping preservice teachers to develop a deeper understanding of characteristics of the learner, (c) having science educators recognize that primary teachers’ goals for instruction focus on developing literate readers and writers and the importance of fitting science into those goals, and (d) recognizing that experienced teachers with knowledge of the importance of student ideas may seek to improve their own content knowledge. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 37: 363–385, 2000. Current reforms in science education focus on the need for students of all grade levels to understand science conceptually rather than know a breadth of science facts [American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), 1993; National Research Council (NRC), 1996]. Understanding science necessitates conceptualizing content. To understand science conceptually means to know the ideas of science and the relationships among them. It includes knowledge of ways to use the ideas to explain and predict other natural phenomena, and ways to apply them to other events (NRC, 1996). Developing understanding presupposes that students are actively engaged with the ideas of science. The reforms further suggest that scientific understanding can be gained through inquiry instruction generated from student experiences. JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN SCIENCE TEACHING VOL. 37, NO. 4, PP. 363–385 (2000) © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Correspondence to: V.L. Akerson According to Kelly’s (1955) theory of personal constructs, thought processes are psychologically developed by experiences that serve to help the person anticipate future events. These experiences form background knowledge that people use to inform inferences made from future experiences. Thus, in most science classrooms, it can be expected that children will have had experiences that helped them develop stable and functional constructs about the world. These constructs or ideas will influence interpretations made of explorations in science. Children’s ideas are defined as experience-based explanations constructed by the learner to make a range of phenomena and objects intelligible (Wandersee, Mintzes, & Novak, 1994). These ideas are stable and resistant to change (Carey, 1985; Driver, Guesne, & Tiberghien, 1985; Novak, 1988; Stepans, Beiswinger, & Dyche, 1986). As long as the idea serves the learner in making sense of the world it will remain the learner’s theory (Driver, et al, 1985; Osborne & Freyburg, 1985). Children’s ideas develop very early, and by the age of 5 or 6 children have evolved a robust and serviceable set of theories about their world (Carey, 1985; Gardner, 1991; Piaget, 1929). Young children’s ideas have been studied for many decades. Piaget (1929) pioneered their study with the development and use of the clinical interview method. Science educators have adapted the clinical interview method to explore children’s ideas in a plethora of science content areas (Osborne & Freyburg, 1985; Posner & Gertzog, 1982; Thier, 1965). Results of the study of children’s ideas show that school children can proceed through their school careers and retain misconceptions about many science concepts (Anderson & Smith, 1986; Bar, 1989; Bishop & Anderson, 1990; Griminelli Tomasini, Gandolfi, & Pecordi Balandi, 1990; Hashweh, 1988; Hesse & Anderson, 1992; Nussbaum & Novak, 1976). The kinds of science instruction children receive do not seem to be effective in helping students change their conceptions of science. Students may be presented with evidence that their ideas are incongruent with an experiment or problem and reject the evidence, or reinterpret it differently within their own beliefs (Osborne & Freyburg, 1985). Even when students present what appear to be correct responses, they can continue to harbor their own ideas (Driver et al., 1985; Erlwanger, 1975; Herscovics, 1989; Osborne & Freyburg, 1985). In the absence of a teacher who understands and uses knowledge of children’s ideas to inform instruction, children are unlikely to develop their ideas toward a scientific understanding (Driver, Guesne, & Tiberghien, 1985). Previous research on children’s ideas has focused on describing them, providing knowledge of many misconceptions that are likely to be found in students of different ages in different subject areas (Bar, 1989; Hashweh, 1988; Nussbaum & Novak, 1976; Piaget, 1929). To help address the need for eliciting and effectively addressing student ideas, various teaching strategies have been developed. Three such strategies are (a) the learning cycle (Karplus & Thier, 1967; Lawson, Abraham, & Renner, 1989; Smith, 1983), (b) analogy (Joshua & Dupin, 1987; Stavy, 1991), and (c) written and oral language (Fellows, 1994; Fleer, 1992). These strategies have been used by researchers to help teachers change student misconceptions. The learning cycle consists of the following general components: (a) exposing students’ misconceptions, (b) creating cognitive conflict by having students discuss ideas or participate in activities that are not compatible with their current ideas, (c) comparing new ideas with old ideas and accepted scientific explanations, and (d) having students apply their new understandings to a novel situation. It is not always evident that the learning cycle is effective in bringing about a desired level of conceptual change. For instance, Smith (1983) found that only one student in a fifth-grade class attained the instructional target conception about photosynthesis. However, Butts, Hofman, and Anderson (1993) found that hands-on activities that included discrepant events designed to confront student ideas, coupled with opportunities to explore new patterns of events significantly increased the number of 5to 6-year-old students with accurate conceptions of floating and sinking. Thus, there is support that helping primary students to confront 364 AKERSON, FLICK, AND LEDERMAN