• Journal of Science Education
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.64-78
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• 2019

The purpose of this study is to investigate how Integrated Science, a new subject introduced under the 2015 revised curriculum, was implemented in 2018 when it was first enacted at the school level. Through a survey of 258 high school science teachers, we explored how Integrated Science was organized and implemented at the school level, how teaching & learning and assessment were conducted in Integrated Science courses, how teachers' learning communities were operated, what kinds of support are required for the settlement of Integrated Science, etc. Major results are as follows: A similar ratio is found between schools with eight units and schools with six units of integrated science, and in about 2/3 of surveyed schools, multiple teachers are in charge of Integrated Science lessons per classroom. In addition, lecture-type teaching methods are still dominant in the majority of the classes, and science teachers have difficulties with lack of understanding of non-major areas or burden of designing integrated teaching depending on their teaching experiences, and so on. Discussed and suggested in the conclusion are ways to raise awareness of curriculum integration, ways to support for activation of teacher learning communities, ways to support the settlement of Integrated Science, and reexamining the system of science teacher certification.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.40 no.6
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• pp.595-609
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• 2020

The purpose of this study is to analyze the experiences of teachers who participated in the development of online science class videos in the context of covid-19, their perception of online science class, and the characteristics of the online science class content developed by teachers. A survey and interviews were conducted with ten elementary school teachers who made online science class videos themselves. Also the characteristics of the online science class were investigated by analyzing the online science class video produced by the participants. As a result, participants in the study recognized the lack of production time, difficulty in filming and editing, concerns over misconceptions, the problem of solving copyrights for existing materials, and the burden of external disclosure. Although it was a teacher who had experience producing online science class video contents, no research participants actively answered the merits of online science class. On the other hand, the study participants cited that the shortcomings of online science classes were that students had fewer opportunities for inquiry and lack of communication or interaction. In particular, these shortcomings were thought to have a great influence on the quality of online science classes, especially in making inquiry classes difficult. Some teachers took a negative view that online science classes could not completely replace face-to-face classes. However, if multiple teachers are presented with supplementary teaching activities that complement the content-based online teaching method, the method of combining online science classes and face-to-face classes is not. Through the analysis of the contents of the online science class, the introduction and arrangement steps of the online science class were similar to the process of the face-to-face science class, but the inquiry step and the conceptual explanation step showed a big difference from the face-to-face science class.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.15 no.7
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• pp.607-614
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• 2006

A survey of middle school students and teachers in Mokpo city has been done to understand the perception of environment of students and the present situation of environmental education in middle school. Only 2 of the 14 middle schools have chosen the environmental education course as a required subject. The majority of middle-school students in Mokpo city have learned the environmental education as a subordinate course included in the other subjects such as science, social science or technology. The environmental education in school has been done mostly through non-subject activities such as club activity, group work etc. The survey shows that almost all students think the environmental pollution is serious problem(83% of respondents) and they are especially interested in separate garbage collection(72%) and environmental conservation activity(63.9%) to protect the environment. The concerns about the environmental problems of students(57.7%) has increased after environmental education regardless educational methods or subjects. The students and teachers think that environmental education in school has not been carried out enough and almost all of them(68.4% of students, 97.5% of teachers) agree that the environmental education should be done as an independent subject. In order to more practical and effective environmental education, many opportunities to experience environmental conservation activities should be given during the environmental education course and the environmental education should be separated from other subjects to be taught independently. Moreover, it might be necessary to increase proportion of teachers in environmental disciplines and to develop various teaching methods.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.851-866
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• 2016

The purpose of this study is to investigate pre-service elementary teachers' views of the law of action-reaction by examining their degrees of understanding and Typically-Perceived-Situations (TPS). Data were collected from 177 Grade 3 pre-service elementary teachers. The results of analyzing these data show: First, the participants did not sufficiently understand about the law of action-reaction, and their degrees of understanding were different depending on the situation provided in the questionnaire. Second, in relation to the TPSs of the law of action-reaction, the participants thought of irrelevant situations to the law of action-reaction such as "a situation generated by inertia" as well as commonly relevant ones such as "a person pushing a wall", and had somewhat biased TPSs in terms of 'action type' and 'result motion type' of action-reaction. Finally, several suggestions on the science education for promotion of understanding about the law of action-reaction were given.

• The Korean Journal of Community Living Science
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.343-355
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to examine the efficacy of child care and the education and the influence of job-stress on job-satisfaction of child care and education teachers. 172 child care and education teachers were chosen from 40 child care centers located in Incheon, Gyeonggido, and Seoul. Data were collected using the efficacy of child care and education index, the job-stress instrument, and the job-satisfaction instrument, and were analyzed using t-test, one-way ANOVA(Duncan test), correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis. There were significant differences in child care and education teacher's job-satisfaction according to the teacher-related variables, including the type of institution, the number of classes, the age of children, the education, the teaching experience, the income, the age of teacher, and the marital status of the teacher. Correlation analysis indicated that the teacher's efficacy of child care and education and the job-satisfaction had significant correlations, especially the satisfaction of job itself indicated high positive correlations. Job-stress and job-satisfaction of the child care and education teachers had significant negative correlations in all sub-variables, especially the stress from the working environment and the satisfaction of administration system indicated high negative correlations. It was also found that stress from the working environment, stress from the overload, stress from the peer relations, and the efficacy of child care and education were all significant predictors of the child care and education teacher's job-satisfaction.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.107-115
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• 2018

To learn the Earth's shape is a very important achievement standard in the earth science education. The purpose of this study is for helping school experiments by investigating effective experiments of the Earth's shape of each stage of school. Researchers suggest various experiment methods to learn the Earth's shape and investigated appropriate experiments to stage of elementary school, secondary school, high school and university for 26 pre-service teachers. As a result, there is difference between schools in effective experiments of the Earth's shape. Pre-service teachers thought that to observe a sail of ship to come back to a harbour is effective for elementary school students. And they responded that to compare the altitude of the polar star by latitudes is good for the secondary and high school students and to compare difference of sight according to height of the ground is effective for university students. They thought that level of the experiment method, abstract thinking and depth of background knowledge should be considered when teachers choose an effective experiment of the Earth's shape.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.79-101
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• 1999

Astronomy is a good area to introduce a student to the study of science. The student often questions what causes the change in seasons, in the day and right, and in the rotation of stars, etc. Attempts to find answers to problems related to these astronomical observations influence the student`s intellectual development. This study is to investigate the effect of running an astronomical observations program on the preservice elementary teachers' astronomy achievement, astronomy teaching efficacy beliefs, and scientific attitude. Students consist of twenty four preservice elementary teachers. Three instruments are used: one is the astronomy achievement test, which is of an essay type, and 5 items. The other is the astronomy teaching efficacy beliefs test, which is of a Likert scale type, and 22 items. Another is the scientific attitude test, which is of the Likert scale type, and 10 items. Data are collected before and after instruction in the astronomical observations program, through the use of these tests. Data are compared. The results are: \circled1There is a significant difference between before and after instructions in the astronomy achievement test(t=11.31, p=000). \circled2There is a significant difference between before and after instructions in the astronomy teaching efficacy beliefs test(t=5.98, p=.000). \circled3There is a significant difference between before and after instructions in the scientific attitude test(t=270, pde. There fore, the a=.013). As a result, running an astronomical observations program has an effect on the preservice elementary teachers' astrono my achievement, astronomy teaching efficacy beliefs, and scientific attituuthor urges the teacher to teach astronomy through the astronomical observations in school.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.622-634
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• 1999

We have investigated the 6th middle school science curriculum and its implementation based upon the results of middle school science teachers' and professors' ratings and self-reportings. The national-wide survey was administrated to obtain the data from 213 teachers of 112 middle schools and 43 professors of colleges of education. The survey items correspond to four stages of science curriculum. In the stage of the planned science curriculum, 'goals', 'framework of contents' and 'contents' are relevant to the basic guideline for curriculum revision, 'the more emphasis on inquiry activities'. However, the amount of contents is not appropriate, and 'methods' are difficult to attain. In the stage of the written science curriculum, 'goals', 'framework of contents', 'contents', 'methods' and 'evaluations' are not useful for teachers to teach science. In the stage of the implemented science curriculum, a small number of teachers use the issues of local community, organize the different group activities, develop assessment tools cooperatively, and conduct a lesson and a program considering students' diversities. This is partially because of the large amount of learning contents, the lack of materials and the weakness of supporting system. Finally, in the stage of the attained science curriculum, the students' achievements under the 6th curriculum is not higher than those under the other curricula.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.539-556
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to examine preservice secondary science teachers' understanding of the nature of science, by using nature of science (NOS) questionnaire on the basis of atomic model, and compare this to pre-studies. 'Understanding of nature of scientific model,' 'Tentativeness of scientific knowledge,' 'Subjectivity in science,' 'Use of inference and imagination,' 'Myths of the scientific method,' and 'Comparison between science and art.' were examined. Preservice teachers showed great comprehension of the tentativeness of scientific knowledge (the orbital model) and the subjectivity in science (the different interpretation about the experiment of particle scattering), but displayed the lowest comprehension of the scientific method. For understanding of nature of scientific model (the atomic model) and the comparison between science (Bohr's atomic model) and art (Picasso's work), preservice teachers brought out a combination of ontological and constructivist perspective and showed the contradictory thought about imagination in science research. In the result of comparison to pre-studies using the NOS instruments contains general terms, represented high levels of agreement about the tentativeness of scientific knowledge by using concrete examples of 'atomic model'. When concrete scientists such as Thomson, Rutherford, Bohr were presented, respondents revealed more informed views about the scientists' research method.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.717-727
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• 2016

Using TIMSS survey data, we analyzed whether there were any significant changes in the learning environment of middle school science classes over the last 10 years. Our study selected questions from teachers and school principals' questionnaires and divided them by category: science class, teacher professional development, and school environment. The science class components were subdivided into three categories: science learning activities, evaluation, and homework. Within teacher professional development, the sub-categories included teacher training, collaboration to improve teaching, and teacher evaluation. School environment subdivided into two aspects, these being school characteristics and school system. Our research confirmed that there has been a positive change overall in learning environments. However, most classes are teacher-conducted and also teacher-oriented; the proportion of science investigation activities has declined compared against the prior ten years. Our study show that students do not engage in a range of inquiry-related activities. The questions on tests and examinations involve mostly knowledge application and understanding, although recent methods of evaluation show improvement. As for the science teachers, they participate in many professional development programs but focus on science content, science curriculum, and pedagogy. In addition, teachers do not have many opportunities to participate in the training to integrate information technology into science, science assessment, or improving students' critical thinking or inquiry skills. The teachers are satisfied with their profession, and the shortage of science resources does not seem to affect instruction.