bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Teachers' understanding and the use of the learning cycle
Authors: Marek Edmund A. , Eubanks Carol , Gallaher Thomas H. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractThis study examined the relationships that exist between high school science teachers' understanding of the Piagetian developmental model of intelligence, its inherent teaching procedure—the learning cycle—and classroom teaching practices. The teachers observed in this study had expressed dissatisfaction with the teaching methods they used, and, subsequently, attended a National Science Foundation sponsored in‐service program designed to examine laboratory‐centered science curricula and the educational and scientific theories upon which the curricula were based. The teachers who exhibited a sound understanding of the Piagetian model of intelligence and the learning cycle were more likely to effectively implement learning cycle curricula. They were able to successfully integrate their students' laboratory experiences with class discussions to construct science concepts. The teachers who exhibited misunderstandings of the Piagetian developmental model of intelligence and the learning cycle also engaged their students in laboratory activities, but these activities were weakly related to learning cycles. For example, the data gathered by their students were typically not used in class discussions to construct science concepts. Therefore, these teachers apparently did not discern the necessity of using the data and experiences from laboratory activities as the impetus for science concept attainment. Additional results comparing degrees of understanding, teaching behaviors and questioning strategies are discussed.
Science teaching techniques associated with higher‐order thinking skills
Authors: Lawrenz Frances 
Published: October 2006

AbstractScience teachers are encouraged to emphasize higher‐order thinking skills, but little is known about the use and relationships of teaching techniques related to these skills. This study reports on a recent survey in Minnesota designed to provide a picture of the instructional styles that are used by seventh and eighth grade science teachers. Further, the data were factor analyzed to identify underlying structure and the resulting factors were correlated to examine the relationships between the factors. Although relationships do exist, it appears that seventh and eighth grade science teachers are individualistic and diverse in their reported teaching technique preferences.
Correlates of formal operational reasoning: A neo‐piagetian analysis
Authors: Niaz Mansoor 
Published: October 2006

AbstractMost Piagetian formal operational reasoning tasks show horizontal decalage; that is, subjects pass certain tasks and fail others that have the same logical structure. The study reported here analyzes the importance of individual difference variables, as postulated by the neo‐Piagetian theory of Pascual‐Leone, in explaining subject performance in formal reasoning. A sample of 72 freshman students were administered a test of formal reasoning having 20 items of different types of reasoning, and the tests of the individual difference variables. Results obtained from multiple regression analyses show that Pascual‐Leone's structural M‐capacity (Ms) is the most consistent predictor of success in the different formal reasoning tasks, followed by Witkin's cognitive style, and to a much lesser degree Raven's progressive matrices, and Pascual‐Leone's functional M‐capacity (Mf). It was found that in the total score on the 20 items of formal reasoning, Ms accounted for 23.3% of the variance (R = 0.483, F = 6.39, p = 0.014) and Witkin's Group Embedded Figures Test, increased the multiple R significantly (F = 7.77, p = 0.007) and accounted for 7.6% of the variance. Mf and the Raven test did not make a significant contribution to the regression equation. Correlation coefficients among most of the items having the same reasoning pattern but different content are generally low but statistically significant (p < 0.01). Intercorrelations among items having the same formal reasoning pattern and content are fairly high (p < 0.001). These results emphasize the importance of individual difference variables: information‐processing capacity (Pascual‐Leone) and oversensitivity to potentially misleading information (Witkin). It is suggested that in order to understand student performance in formal reasoning tasks, we should expect horizontal decalages as a rule and not the exception, as Piaget had postulated. Educational implications are drawn.
Effects of the learning cycle upon student and classroom teacher performance
Authors: Marek Edmund A. , Methven Suzanne B. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractA great deal of research has been done regarding science in‐service education and the conclusion can be drawn that positive results were generally achieved in workshop‐participant attitude and implementation of instructional approaches into the classroom. One of the most important effects of an in‐service workshop is upon the students of the teachers participating in an in‐service program, but rarely, if ever, is this parameter assessed in the in‐service evaluation design. This study investigated the relationships among (1) teacher's attitudes and implementation of in‐service workshop developed science materials (learning cycles) and (2) elementary school student's conservation reasoning and language used to describe properties of objects. Data were gathered from over 100 students from grades K‐5 and 16 teachers who had participated in an in‐service program. A representative comparison group of students and teachers was selected which generally matched the teachers participating in the in‐service workshop except for one variable–‐the comparison group taught science traditionally, that is, by exposition. Data from the research indicated that the teachers involved in the science in‐service workshop implemented the workshop‐developed learning cycles into their science classes. Significantly greater gains in conservation reasoning and language usage occurred with the students of the teachers participating in the science in‐service workshop as compared to students in the exposition classrooms.
Secondary science teachers' attitudes toward and beliefs about science reading and science textbooks
Authors: Yore Larry D. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractScience textbooks are dominant influences behind most secondary science instruction but little is known about teachers' approach to science reading. The purpose of this naturalistic study was to develop and validate a Science and Reading Questionnaire to assess secondary science teachers' attitudes toward science reading and their beliefs or informed opinions about science reading. A survey of 428 British Columbia secondary science teachers was conducted and 215 science teachers responded. Results on a 12‐item Likert attitude scale indicated that teachers place high value on reading as an important strategy to promote learning in science and that they generally accept responsibility for teaching content reading skills to science students. Results on a 13‐item Likert belief scale indicated that science teachers generally reject the text‐driven model of reading, but they usually do not have well‐formulated alternative models to guide their teaching practices. Teachers have intuitive beliefs about science reading that partially agree with many research findings, but their beliefs are fragmented and particularly sketchy in regard to the cognitive and metacognitive skills required by readers to learn from science texts. The findings for attitude, belief, and total scales were substantiated by further questions in the Science and Reading Questionnaire regarding classroom practice and by individual interviews and classroom observations of a 15‐teacher subsample of the questionnaire respondents.
The relationship between affect and achievement in science
Authors: Rennie Leonie J. , Punch Keith F. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractThe relationship between affect and achievement in science was examined in two stages. First, a model was developed and tested for science‐related affect, the complex of students' attitudes toward, interests in, and perceptions about science at school. The LISREL approach to path analysis was used to demonstrate the fit of the model to data collected from grade 8 students in two different schools on two different occasions. In the second stage of the research, multiple linear regression was used to examine the direction of the relationship between science related affect and achievement and to apportion variance common between previous and subsequent achievement and the components of science‐related affect. It was found that affect is related more strongly to previous than subsequent achievement and that much of the common variance can be attributed to students' perceptions of their competence in science.
Using analogy to overcome misconceptions about conservation of matter
Authors: Stavy Ruth 
Published: October 2006

AbstractA new approach to change misconceptions of students is to build on ideas which match their students' existing intuitive knowledge. This can be done by analogy. The use of an analogical relation between the known and the unknown can help students learn new information and discard or modify misconceptions. Previous studies have confirmed this result in such areas as mathematics. The present study examined the use of analogical instruction to overcome misconceptions about conservation of matter. Students who understood the concept of conservation of matter when iodine was evaporated were able to transfer their understanding to the evaporation of acetone. This indicates that teaching by analogy can be an effective tool in science. The author is now studying the relative effectiveness of conflict training and learning by analogy.
Achievements and attitudinal patterns of boys and girls in science
Authors: Levin Tamar , Sabar Naama , Libman Zipora 
Published: October 2006

AbstractData from the 1983–84 Israeli IEA (International Association for the Evaluation of Education Achievement) science study were used to explore gender‐related differences (and their determinants) in the learning of science. The sample was composed of 1,934 ninth‐grade students. The study involved several measures of science learning, ten attitudinal measures, and items and errors classification. Differences between boys and girls were observed in some measures of science performance–‐particularly in the physical sciences, in items with lower estimates of “opportunity to learn,” and in specific kinds of errors. Gender‐related differences were also observed in the predictive model of achievement, using science‐specific affective measures. The discussion raises the cognitive and affective readiness of boys and girls for learning science.
Are high school chemistry textbooks gender fair?
Authors: Bazler Judith A. , Simonis Doris A. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractThis study compared two generations of seven high school chemistry texts (1970/1973) and current editions analyzed for gender fairness in illustrations and in concrete analogies. Results support these conclusions: (a) considering the texts as a group, there are significant differences between relative frequencies of named and unnamed illustrations of men and women and no significant differences between relative frequencies of illustrations of boys and girls in seven high school chemistry texts in the 1970 editions compared to current edition of the same texts; (b) a current best‐seller is the only text that has achieved balance between male/female illustrations; (c) the other texts overwhelmingly favor pictures of males; (d) most current texts had more analogies than their 1970 editions; the former favored images reflecting girls' interests.
Comments on “the uses of Lawson's test of formal reasoning in the israeli science education context”
Authors: Bomide Gabriel Sunday 
Published: October 2006

AbstractIn a recent article that appeared in this journal, Hofstein and Mandler (1985) reported a study which employed the Lawson's (1978) classroom test of formal reasoning to determine, among other things, the relationship between achievement in science and mathematics in a sample of Israeli students. Based on their findings, the authors raised objections to the classroom utility of the test for diagnosing students' developmental levels. The present author, however, argued that the case has not been properly established in view of one major methodological problem which seemed to characterize the study. Accordingly, the plea to abandon Lawson's test of formal reasoning was questioned.
A qualitative study of middle school students' perceptions of factors facilitating the learning of science: Grounded theory and existing theory
Authors: Spector Barbara S. , Gibson Charles W. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractThe purpose of this study was to explore middle school students' perceptions of what factors facilitated their learning of science. Florida's Educational Reform Act of 1983 funded programs providing the state's precollege students with summer learning opportunities in science. mathematics, and computers. The programs were intended to encourage the development of creative approaches to the teaching of these disciplines. Under this program, between 50 and 60 high‐achieving middle school students were in residence on the University of South Florida campus for 12 consecutive days of study in the World of Water (WOW) program. There were two sessions per summer involving a total of 572 participants. Eighi specially trained teachers were in residence with the students. Between 50 and 70 experts from the university, government. business, and industry interacted with the students each year in an innovative science/technology/society (STS) program. An assignment toward the close of the program asked students to reflect on their experiences in residence at the university and write an essay comparing learning in the WOW program to learning in their schools. Those essays were the base for this study. This was a qualitative study using a discursive approach to emergent design to generate grounded theory. Document review, participant observation, and open‐ended interviews were used to gather and triangulate data in five phases. Some of the factors that middle school students perceived as helpful to learning science were (a) experiencing the situations about which they were learning; (b) having live presentations by professional experts; (c) doing hands‐on activities: (d) being active learners; (e) using inductive reasoning to generate new knowledge; (f) exploring transdisciplinary approaches to problem solving; (g) having adult mentors; (h) interacting with peers and adults; (i) establishing networks; (j) having close personal friends who shared their interest in learning; (k) trusting the individuals in their learning environment, including adults and students; and (1) experiencing a sense of self‐reliance. The preceding information was used to generate a series of hypotheses which were woven into a theoretical model. This model suggests that middle school science teacher education would be enhanced by helping prospective and in‐service teachers develop and implement strategies that build trust, provide immersion in learning, and use inductive reasoning. This model is currently being used as the theoretical base to convert a traditional junior high school in the South to a middle school.
Toward a social‐contexts frame of reference for science education research
Authors: Charron Elisabeth 
Published: October 2006

AbstractDuring recent decades there has been little research on social or cultural factors affecting science education. Recent literature reviews have indicated that of the studies addressing such factors, most focus on broad sociodemographic variables such as socioeconomic status, gender, ethnicity, and region. There is a need for research that depicts better‐differentiated social contexts for science education in their full complexity. Social scientists from several other fields have recently developed a promising model for research in context. Three critical conceptual and methodological strands of the model are discussed, along with their implications for science education research.
Using examples and analogies to remediate misconceptions in physics: Factors influencing conceptual change
Authors: Brown David E. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractExamples are often recognized as important in teaching conceptual material, yet little research has been done concerning the best use of examples in attempts to remediate misconceptions. This study questions the effectiveness of a traditional teaching‐by‐example technique. Results indicate that when students hold a misconception, presenting a principle with supporting examples to show the range of application of the principle may be ineffective. Rather, it appears that examples are more effective when they help students draw on and analogically extend existing valid physical intuitions in constructing a new conceptual model of a target situation. To help students in this constructive effort, first, the examples used must be understandable and believable to the students, not simply to the teacher or textbook author. Second, even when an example is compelling to the student, it may not be seen as analogous to target problems drawing out a misconception. In that case, analogy relations may need to be explicitly developed. Third, qualitative, visualizable models may need to be developed which give mechanistic explanations for phenomena.
A cross‐age study of student understanding of the concept of homeostasis
Authors: Westbrook Susan L. , Marek Edmund A. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractStudent misconceptions or alternative conceptions of scientific phenomena have become a point of focus in science education research. Cross‐age studies are useful for describing the understanding about a particular concept held by students across several grade levels. The present research utilized 7th‐grade life science students, 10th‐grade biology students, and college zoology students to evaluate changes in student understanding of the concept of homeostasis. Responses from 100 students from each grade level were selected for analysis. Each student was asked to respond to a test packet consisting of a biographical questionnaire, two Piagetian‐like developmental tasks, and a concept evaluation statement (CES). The CES was used to measure the students' understandings of the concept of homeostasis.Understanding of the concept increased across grade levels, but that understanding was limited. Thirty percent of the college students indicated at least a partial understanding of the concept, while only 3% of the seventh‐grade students showed partial understanding of homeostasis. Although the older students were more likely to offer a response to the CES, those responses were often errant. Thus, the number of students exhibiting misconceptions increased across the grade levels as the number of students responding to the CES increased. Certain errant notions concerning heart rate, breathing rate, temperature constancy, and perspiration were persistent across the age‐experience continuum. A relationship was found to exist between development level and student understanding of the concept.
Conceptual difficulties experienced by senior high school students of electrochemistry: Electric circuits and oxidation‐reduction equations
Authors: Garnett Pamela J. , Treagust David F. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractThe purpose of this research was to investigate students' understanding of electrochemistry following a course of instruction. A list of conceptual and propositional knowledge statements was formulated to identify the knowledge base necessary for students to understand electric circuits and oxidation‐reduction equations. The conceptual and propositional knowledge statements provided the framework for the development of a semistructured interview protocol which was administered to 32 students in their final year of high school chemistry. The interview questions about electric circuits revealed that several students in the sample were confused about the nature of electric current both in metallic conductors and in electrolytes. Students studying both physics and chemistry were more confused about current flow in metallic conductors than students who were only studying chemistry. In the section of the interview which focused on oxidation and reduction, many students experienced problems in identifying oxidation‐reduction equations. Several misconceptions relating to the inappropriate use of definitions of oxidation and reduction were identified. The data illustrate how students attempted to make sense of the concepts of electrochemistry with the knowledge they had already developed or constructed. The implications of the research are that teachers, curriculum developers, and textbook writers, if they are to minimize potential misconceptions, need to be cognizant of the relationship between physics and chemistry teaching, of the need to test for erroneous preconceptions about current before teaching about electrochemical (galvanic) and electrolytic cells, and of the difficulties experienced by students when using more than one model to explain scientific phenomena.
Learning about evolution and rejecting a belief in special creation: Effects of reflective reasoning skill, prior knowledge, prior belief and religious commitment
Authors: Lawson Anton E. , Worsnop William A. 
Published: October 2006

AbstractStudents in three sections of a high school biology course were taught a unit on evolution and natural selection. Prior to instruction, students were pretested to determine their (a) reflective reasoning skill, (b) strength of religious commitment, (c) prior declarative knowledge of evolution and natural selection, and (d) beliefs in evolution or special creation and related religiously oriented beliefs. Following instruction the measures of declarative knowledge and beliefs were readministered. The study was designed to test (a) the hypothesis that the acquisition of domain‐specific concepts and the modification of nonscientific beliefs largely depends upon reflective reasoning skill, not prior declarative knowledge; and (b) the hypothesis that strength of religious commitment and a belief in special creation hinder the acquisition of scientific beliefs. Although instruction produced no overall shift toward a belief in evolution, as predicted, reflective reasoning skill was significantly related to initial scientific beliefs, and reflective reasoning skill, but not prior declarative knowledge, was significantly related to gains in declarative knowledge. Reflective reasoning skill, however, was not significantly related to changes in beliefs. Also as predicted, strength of religious commitment was negatively correlated with initial belief in evolution and with a change in belief toward evolution. Interrelationships among the study's major variables, as well as educational implications, are discussed.