Inquiry Learning in the high School Biology: Status Survey and Problem Analysis

고등학교 생물과 탐구 학습의 실태 조사와 문제점 분석

This study analyzed the problem associated with inquiry centered science education and formulated some improvement Strategies for inquiry learning in the standard Korean high school course. In order to attain the goals of questionaire survey methods were used. To examine the current status of biology education, seperate questionaires were developed through an educational research and development procedure used for tearchers and student. The questionaires were developed to ask about instruction and evaluation methods, the level of inquiry learing and abstacles to it. Here are some of our results: 1) Biology instruction and learning is more knowledge-orinted than inquiry-orinted, 2) Inquiry approach in science teaching is hard to be applied because of crowed classroom conditions. 3) The material is too broad in range and too difficult in content. There is virtually nothing that can be related to everyday life. The material focusing on inquiry activities is unsatisfactorily selected and organized. 4) Effective methods of inquiry-based instruction and evaluation are not available. 5) Biology teachers are burdened with too many class hour a week and too many varieties of additional works. 6) 91.1% of biology teachers and 90.3% of students recognize that lab and field works are needed to enhance inquiry learning. However, in reality, such inquiry activities are lacking. 7) 73.3% of schools have no lab assistants. 8) The university entrance examination is the greatest factor against inquiry learning. 9) There are very few chances of in-service education for biology teachers to learn more about biology curriculum and science education theory.