• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.556-564
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• 2004

Two biology modules were developed previously for the purpose of improving creativity and scientific thinking of secondary school students. A hypothetical-deductive experimental procedure was reflected in the module when students themselves can perform a series of activities of making hypothesis and designing an experiment to solve the questions. They followed a series of scientific processes to determine some characteristics regarding plant pigments and the transport process of materials in living organisms. Four classes of 9th graders in'S' Science High School were divided into the experimental and the control group. The same contents of the modules were taught to the control group by the traditional experimental way. The students' creativity, scientific thinking, scientific inquiry skill and knowledge achievement were examined before and after the interventions. As results, the experimental groups showed more significant improvement on the areas of the students' creativity, scientific thinking, scientific inquiry skill and achievement than the control groups. Results indicated that the specially designed modules in terms of hypothetical-deductive experimental procedure were effective to improve science high school students' creativity and scientific thinking abilities.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.442-458
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• 2004

This study was conducted to develop a plan for a large-scale implementation of the Girl Friendly Science Program based on the results of analysis and investigation of its current pilot implementation, Girl Friendly Science Program materials, which was first developed in 1999 with the support from Ministry of Gender Equality, consist of 1) five theme-based units that are specifically targeted individual students' unique ability, aptitude, and career choice, and 2) differentiated learning materials for 7th through 10th grade female students. All the materials are available at the homepage (http://tes.or.kr/gfsp.cgi) of 'Teachers for Exciting Science(the organization of science teachers in Seoul area)'. Since the materials are well organized by topic and grade level and presented in both Korean word process document and html format, anyone can easily access to the materials for their own instructional use. Ever since its launch the number of visitors to the homepage has been constantly increasing. The evaluation results of the current pilot implementation of the materials that targeted individual students' ability and aptitude showed that it scored high in terms of its alignment to the original purpose, content, level, and effectiveness to implement in classrooms. However, its evaluation scores were low in terms of the convenience for teachers to guide the materials, and its organization and operation. The results also showed a significant change in students' perception of science, and students' positive experiences of science through various interdisciplinary activities. On the other hand, the evaluation of students' experiences with the materials showed that students' assessment about an activity was largely depending on a success or failure of their experiences. Overall, students' evaluation of activities scores were low for simple activities such as cutting off or pasting papers. According to students' achievement test results, differences between pre and post test scores in the Affective Domain was statistically significant (p<0.05), but not in Inquiry Domain. Based on teachers observations, numerous schools where have run this program reported that students' abilities to cooperate, discuss, observe and reason with evidences were improved. In order to implement this program in a larger scale, it is critical to have a strong support of teachers and induce them to change their teaching strategy through building a community of teachers and developing ongoing teacher professional development programs. Finally, there still remain strong needs to develop more programs, and actively discover and train more domestic woman scientists and engineers and collaborate with them to develop more educational materials for girls in all ages.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.58 no.4
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• pp.406-417
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• 2014

The importance of small group activity has recently been emphasized in the gifted education in science because of the increased needs to foster the human resources that could explore through the communication and collaboration. In this study, we investigated the characteristics of the verbal interaction according to the learning styles of the gifted-students in science in the small group activity and examined how learning style affected the interaction within a group in order to seek an effective grouping strategy. The competition, cooperative, and dependent students with learning style in the small group 1 and the cooperative, cooperative, dependent students in the small group 2 were assigned by the 6 science high school students. The analyses of the results revealed that the small group 1 showed the asymmetric interaction of the low level, whereas the small group 2 showed the symmetric interaction of the high level. In other words, the frequencies of in-depth interaction in the small group 2 were higher than those in the small group 1, and also students in the small group 2 were equally involved in the activity rather than the small group 1. These results suggested that the grouping by the students' learning styles in the small group activity should affect significantly the participation decision in activity and the level of verbal interaction. Educational implications of theses findings were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.62 no.1
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• pp.43-51
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• 2018

In this study, visually impaired secondary students' conception of "changes of state of water" was explored. Science inquiry activity for students with visual impairments was implemented to 16 middle school students and 15 high school students from school for the blind. 14 of them were totally blind, 13 had low vision and the others were not identified. Inquiry activities were conducted by communicating with the researcher while students were individually exploring the molecular models of water and ice developed for the study. After the exploration, students were asked to explain the concept of changes of state of water with the model they explored. Opinion on the need and the usability of this kind of tactile model was also asked to them. All conversations were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed. As a result, students with visual impairments answered exactly about the materials used for the model and their numbers. However, they didn't know what the model stood for. They had experiences of learning molecule of water and changes of state of water, but it was a phenomenon and superficial understanding. Students got to understand the molecular structures of water and ice, and had a positive perception on the need and the usability of the model. Based on these results, educational implications were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.58 no.5
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• pp.463-477
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• 2014

The purpose of this study is to investigate the teaching-learning effects in the experimental classes for the 'Redox' unit of science textbook of 11th grade using self-regulated learning strategy. Simultaneously, the effects of teaching-learning through the student's characteristics of the scientific high school were also included. The experimental and the controlled groups were selected by the teaching-learning method established on self-regulated learning strategy and regular laboratory activity based on the teacher' instruction, respectively. The questionaries of the scientific inquiry and scientific attitude were examined by the student. For their achievement, the total score which was obtained from the formative evaluation and performance assessment was utilized. After the laboratory activity for the unit grounded on the self-regulated learning strategy, the mean values of the scientific inquiry, scientific attitude, and achievement by the experimental group were higher than those of the controlled group. There was significant difference between the two groups in the post-test. By the results of the post-test for the experimental group, there has been somewhat relationship between the self-regulated learning strategy and the scientific inquiry, the scientific attitude, and the scientific achievement.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.372-387
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• 2012

This study aims to identify unique small group norms and their influence on the process of constructing a scientific model. We developed instructional materials for the construction of a model of blood flow in the heart and conducted research on eighth-grade students from one middle school. We randomly selected 10 small groups, and videotaped and recorded their dialogues and behaviors. The data was categorized according to the types of interaction and then analyzed to investigate the characteristics of group norms and models in one or two representative groups for each type. The results show that the types of interaction, the quality of the group models, and the group norms were different in each group. Even though one teacher guided students through the same task in the inquiry context, each group revealed different patterns of discourse and behavior, which were based on norms of cognitive responsibility, the need for justification, participation, and membership. With the exception of one group, there was little cognitive responsibility and justification for students' opinions. Ultimately, these norms influenced the model construction of small groups. A group that forms norms to encourage the active participation and justify members' opinions with cognitive responsibility was encouraged to do inferential thinking and construct a group model close to the target model. This study has instructional implications for the establishment of a classroom environment that facilitates learning through small group activities.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.476-486
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to investigate elementary gifted students' characteristics of observing and inferring in the inquiry activities. For this study, 40 students of the 4th and 5th grades participated in inquiry activities where the strata were developed well, Haenam Uhangri province. And we analyzed the outcomes of students' inquiry activities. The results are as follows. First, 119 units as observing results were obtained, but most of them showed that they were not focused on the portion of stratus, but that they were implicated in whole stratus as observing object. Second, 90 units were collected with reasoning results, but 4 units of them were wrong in constructing of inferring. Based on outcomes of students' inferring, elementary students preferred to apply deductive inferring method rather than use abductive inferring. Third, only 39 of 119 units acquired from observing were used for constructing inferring and 80 which were discovered from observing activities were discarded without applying of inquiry activities. Fourth, about 42% of students' inferring results were in accord with them of the geologists. But 58% views which didn't agree with geologists showed that they were applied to misconceptions among constructing inferring.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.202-212
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• 2004

The purpose of this study was to examine the connection among inquiry activities related to 'Metabolism' presented in life science textbooks developed according to the national common basic curriculum. To perform this, the type, process and context of inquiry activities of life science textbooks were analyzed. The number of inquiry activities is gradually increased from elementary to secondary school. As result of analysis, types, processes and skills, and context of inquiry were not balanced according to textbooks and school levels. It is suggested that the framework of evaluating inquiry activities based on curriculum objectives be provided when developing science textbooks. It also implies that teachers need to reconstruct inquiry contents and activities suitable to school situations when they teach in the real fields of education.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.69-85
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to develop criteria for evaluating final reports of free inquiry activity and to apply developed evaluation criteria to free inquiry activity reports. 323 inquiry reports submitted to internal contests in the elementary schools as well as 189 award-winning ones from the inquiry competition for students in Seoul were collected. Nine categories and 18 sub-categories of evaluation criteria were derived by collecting reports analysis, literature reviews and interviews with 15 elementary school teachers. Criteria for each sub-category were organized into three steps and 12 elementary school teachers assigned scores for each sub-category, which were averaged. 132 including both award-winning and general reports were evaluated based on the developed evaluation criteria. The content validity and the reliability across scorers were significant. Furthermore, award-winning and general reports were significantly distinguished by the developed criteria in terms of all sub-category scores. The developed evaluation criteria will be an effective tool to asses student's free inquiry activity.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.101-111
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics and proprieties of the granite observing results in the 4th grades elementary students' scientific inquiry activities. For this, the 4th, 94 students participated in granite observing activity which had objects to collecting applicable scientific facts for the distinguishing granite among the volcanic rocks. Following are the study results. First, the 829s of total results (879s) were admitted as the facts, but the rest, 50s were not the facts but the inference results. Second, the 542s results which were related to the shape, weigh, size, smell, sound, and touch (feeling) containing glittering of the rock specimen were the useless for the inquiry objects. And only the 85s results were the scientific facts which were deserved the admitting propriety for the inquiry objects. Third, the 185s results which were targeting to the particles (minerals) on the rock specimen were the admitting facts, but the 163s facts which were related to color, size and shape of the particles were deserved as admitting propriety for the inquiry objects. Consequently, the focusing on the proprieties of the granite observing results in the elementary students' scientific inquiry activities, only the 248 results (28.2%) of the total 879s were the admitting proprieties as the meaningful scientific facts in the scientific inquiry activities.