• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.69-88
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• 2005

This study was to understand the components that influence preservice secondary teachers' conceptions about 'seasonal changes' We selected 74 university science education students among whom 23 were in the second, 23 in the third, and 28 in the fourth year. The data collected from the paper-pencil test and individual interview with students. The results of this study show that the students had considerable apparent alternative conceptions, and that the 'distance theory' had most important effects on their alternative conceptions. It can be said that preservice secondary teachers' initial models of the seasonal change have their origin in their belief sets (specific theory) related to 'seasonal change', on the basis of which they can interpret their observations and cultural information with the constraints of a naive frame-work of physics. The structures and possible sources of their alternative conceptions for overcoming these alternative conceptions were also discussed. Implications for preservice science teacher education related to the results were discussed.

• Hwankyungkyoyuk
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.40-50
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• 2001

To meet the objectives of environmental education, teachers especially have to perceive the importance of environmental education, comprehend various characteristics of teaching/learning methods, and be able to conduct classes by choosing proper teaching/leaming methods in accordance with a specific purpose and educational focus about environmental education. Therefore, it Bs necessary to investigate the current status of Korean environmental education and provide teachers with appropriate environmental teaching/leaming methods. To this end this study aims to examine Korean science teachers'perceptions'on environmental education and the kind of teaching/learning methods which can be utilized in environmental education. Teachers who completed the survey were 135 science teachers from middle and high schools in Seoul, and 126 social science teachers from Kyoungki province. The majors of the science teachers were in physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and earth science. Also, there was one teacher who majored in special education. For social science teachers two majors were common, geography and general sociology. After analysis of the data from the surveys the results are as follows. First, science and social science teachers in middle and high school recognized the necessity of environmental education in school education. Second, most teachers had applied environment related topics to their subject of study occasionally, but they mostly concurred that environment related contents should be included in their textbooks. Third, science teachers agreed that field trip, discussion, and the STS approach were the most proper methods for environmental education, and social science teachers agreed that field trips, inquiry, and discussion were the most appropriate methods for a teaching environment. They realized that they should decide good teaching-learning methods appropriate to the objectives and content needed for effective environmental education as they selected different teaching-learning methods according to detailed environmental objectives and contents in their textbooks.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Library and Information Science
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• v.23
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• pp.63-106
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• 1992

The opening period of Korea was the period of modernisation amidst the conflicts between conservative and progressive sections with penetration of Western powers after 1876. With the opening modernisation accompanied modernisation of education. Missionary schools established by protestant missionaries played a crucial role in educational modernisation in the period of opening. In this article, the process of educational modernisation and the ways in which the ideas of democracy and equality were taught in the earliest schools, Paejae, Ewha, Kyoungsin and Chungsin are analysed through the method of bibliographical investigation of the textbooks used by these schools. No textbook prior to 1900 was found and in general there were no textbooks such as we know today. Usually English reading material and the Bible were the main teaching materials. Teachers kept their own copies of hand-written texts which were translated versions of American textbook. Since the same teacher taught in a number of schools, they shared same curriculum. In the early period, English Bible was taught so that English and the Bible lessons were not separated but gradually history and geography were added. Teaching of Hangul, and Korean history were added to encourage the sense of national identity and patriotism. In the case of Chungsin, for biology class, pupils were sent to Che-jung-won to learn human physiology, chemistry and physics, which shows an emphasis on science education. Vocational education was carried out; in the case of Paejae, a printing workshop was set up enabling students to earn some money at the same time as learning. Also in Kyungsin, skills of woodwork and basket weaving were stressed. Ewha also held a bazaar of the work made in sewing classes. Establishment of missionary schools brought about a great contribution in modernising Korean society and the Christian spiritual education of these schools lay the foundation for building democracy in Korea.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.100-120
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• 1993

Middle school students' conceptual changes on physics, chemistry, biology and earth science concepts which were intentionally selected by researchers had been investigated through traditional teaching and learning by paper and pencil tests and P.O.E. The weak points had been studied by individual interviews about the problems of traditional science classroom teaching after students' testing and learning about science concepts. As results, students' conceptual changes could be hardly found through traditional teaching and learning except several concepts in biology, The weak points of traditional science classroom teaching and learning were as follows: 1) Teachers teach science as finding answers. 2) The conventional science test is not performed to find students' concepts out but to recall simple knowledge or calculus. 3) Students hesitate to ask teacher Questions in science class because of their colleagues' or teachers' blame. These mean that science teachers need specially designed teaching methods on the students' concepts and reseachers had to study about science classroom socialogy, what happened in science classrooms.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.68-78
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• 2009

The purpose of this study was to investigate teaching anxiety and the professional development of beginning secondary science teachers. For this study, a survey was conducted among beginning science teachers (N=83) with under five years of experience, and in-depth interviews with these five teachers were carried out. The survey tackled beginning secondary science teachers' anxiety levels by asking about their difficulties in teaching science classes, and results showed that the teachers' levels of teaching anxiety marked high. Levels of teaching anxiety in physics among subjects and in chemistry among experiments marked highest. To overcome teaching anxiety, teachers searched for information on the Internet or received help from their colleagues and veteran teachers. They revealed that plans for professional development as science teachers included receiving in-service training and joining teacher communities. In addition, the best type of required training program for professional development appeared to be lectures about teaching know-how from veteran teachers.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.263-271
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationships between the ability of students' raising creative problems and academic achievement, science inquiry skills and creative personality of high school students. In order to evaluate the originality of problems, the present study used three methods: evaluation by frequency, teacher, and student. The results in this study turned out to be as follows: First, there was not much difference in the three methods. But familiar problems had the possibility of receiving higher marks. Second, the ability of students' raising creative problems was significantly correlated with academic achievement and creative personality, but there was no correlation with science inquiry skills. The subjects were divided into 2 groups by students' originality score. In the higher score group, the ability of students' raising creative problems was significantly correlated with creative personality, but in the lower score group, it was significantly correlated with academic achievement. Third, as for science inquiry skills and creative personality between two groups, there was no significant difference, whereas as for academic achievement(physics I, chemistry I), there was significant difference.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.532-543
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• 2004

The teacher appointment examination is consisted of a written test, an interview, a demonstration of teaching practices, one's academic record etc. The primary written test(full credit of 100) consists of multiple-choice test of general pedagogy(30%) and constructed response test of science(70%). The science test consists of science education($20{\sim}30%$) and science content($70{\sim}80%$). Five science exams were implemented for appointing general science, physics, chemistry, biology and earth science teachers in 2002 and 2003. The credits alloted to science education domain decreased from $25.7{\sim}30%$ in 2002 to $24.3{\sim}25.7%$ in 2003. The percentage of correct answer was similar between science education and science content domain in 2002, but the percentage of correct answer in science education domain(70.2%) was 29.8% higher than that of science content domain in 2003. Earth science exam almost reached the target mean score of 60 but the other four exams showed the mean scores ranging from 45.0 to 52.7 in 2002 and from 40.1 to 49.6 in 2003. The percentage of high difficulty items(p<40%) was 41.2% in physics and chemistry in 2002, 50% in physics and chemistry, and 45% in biology in 2003. Seventy eight percent of the items showed fairly high discrimination index(r>.30). In addition, the reliabilities of 5 tests were from .79 to .88. In conclusion, it is recommended that the credits alloted to science education domain should be increased up to 30%, and exam difficulties should be lowered to a proper level by making science content items easier.

• Journal of Gifted/Talented Education
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.801-828
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• 2011

In this study, we analyzed the characteristics of Pedagogical Content knowledge(PCK)'s components through actual course of teachers of science gifted students in the middle school. For this study, four middle school science teachers of gifted students belonging to the gifted education professional organizations in a metropolis were selected, each of them was physics, chemistry, biology, and earth science teacher. Two of them were full-time teachers to teach only gifted students and two were part-time teachers who had taught general students in ordinary time and specially had taught the gifted students once a week. Qualitative data were collected through classroom observations, interviews, and documents. As a result, some unique characteristics of PCK's components were identified. The teachers' orientations to teaching science were closely correlated with PCK's components. The teachers' knowledges of science curriculum were different individually. But the decisions about type of teaching(acceleration or enrichment) were connected with the objectives of gifted education and lesson objectives. Also, the teachers' knowledges of science curriculum were influenced by the knowledge of students' understanding. Teachers used different instructional strategies according to the knowledge of science curriculum and the knowledge of students' understanding. We found that PCK's components were so closely connected and could show the direction of relationships among those PCK's components. We suggested teachers' PCK model which was named "Tetrahedron Model of PCK", to explain the characteristics and relationships of PCK's components.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.62 no.4
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• pp.288-298
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• 2018

In this study, we surveyed pre- and post-perceptions of fourteen science teachers related to the atmosphere composition of molecules with different masses by the developed test. As a result of the test, the teachers were classified into two types of thoughts; One of them is considered the atmosphere to be a homogeneous solution, and the other is a thought that the composition ratio of the atmosphere was not homogeneous considering the different weights of particles. The two types were reclassified into three categories; one of them is considering large gravity effect, another is considering small gravity effect, and the other is considering medium scale gravity effect. Total six types of thoughts were found from the pre-test. After introducing crosscutting concepts which are related to the composition of atmosphere. The teachers discussed the phenomena with the molecular motion by weights of atoms and temperature, the homogeneity of the solution of air in chemistry domain. They also discussed with the relationship between mass and gravity and distance in physics domain. And the discussion included distribution of the atmosphere, convection phenomena, etc. After the discussion, the teachers changed their pre-conceptions to post-concoctions considering combined perspectives of gravity, mass, temperature, altitude etc. Through these changes, we are able to confirm the importance of crosscutting concepts covered in various disciplines. In the integrated science, we should help teachers to provide students with these types of thinking in order to form a coherent world-view and to carry out inquiry thinking as an intellectual tool.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.15-25
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• 2015

This study examined pre-service secondary physics teachers' epistemological beliefs about scientific knowledge, science learning, and science teaching in two different science content topics, Lamarckism and the impetus theory. Two sets of open-ended questionnaires, for each of the topics respectively, were developed in the same format. The pre-service teachers completed the questionnaires at one month intervals. The beliefs were analyzed in two dimensions, knowledge justification and knowledge change for each belief area. The findings show that the majority of pre-service teachers held sophisticated epistemological beliefs about scientific knowledge regardless of content topics. On the other hand, more pre-service teachers exhibited sophisticated beliefs about science learning in the context impetus theory than Lamarckism. In the area of science teaching, the majority of pre-service teachers demonstrated a sophisticated view in knowledge justification but a naive view in knowledge change. When consistency across science topics and belief areas were examined, few pre-service teachers held consistent epistemological beliefs across all topics and areas. The difference in the levels of sophistication in belief areas showed that the pre-service teachers did not connect their epistemological beliefs about science knowledge to their ideas about science teaching and learning. This disconnection seems to make the consistency across topics and areas complicated. The difference in epistemological beliefs about science learning and teaching between two science topics need further inquiry. Implications for teacher education are offered.