• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
• /
• v.39 no.5
• /
• pp.655-668
• /
• 2019

In this study, we investigated the middle school students' processes of scientific graph construction from the perspective of the problem solving process. Ten 9th graders participated in this study. They constructed a scientific graph based on pictorial data depicting precipitation reaction. The think-aloud method was used in order to investigate their thinking processes deeply. Their activities were videotaped, and semi-structured interviews were also conducted. The analysis of the results revealed that their processes of scientific graph construction could be classified into four types according to the problem solving strategy and the level of representations utilized. Students using the structural strategy succeeded in constructing scientific graph regardless of the level of representation utilized, by analyzing the data and identifying the trend based on the propositional knowledge about the target concept of the graph. Students of random strategy-higher order representation type were able to succeed in constructing scientific graph by systematically analyzing the characteristics of the data using various representations, and considering the meaning of the graph constructed in terms of the scientific context. On the other hand, students of random strategy-lower order representation type failed to construct correct scientific graph by constructing graph in a way of simply connecting points, and checking the processes of graph construction only without considering the scientific context. On the bases of the results, effective methods for improving students' ability to construct scientific graphs are discussed.