• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.266-283
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• 2013

The goal of this study is to explore the characteristics of perceptual change among students majoring in arts on the nature of science and apply the results to science education. According to the study, it is important to consider the results of interaction between learners' aptitude and teaching method. Teaching the nature of science to first grade students explicitly, experimental inquiry strategy was applied to fine arts students, and teaching strategy of scientific history to music students. To find out which elements of the nature of science have come into view on modern philosophy of science, pre and post tests on the nature of science (VNOS-C) were conducted on the students. To find out specifically why views on the nature of science have changed, a case study was conducted focusing on students who showed changes in their views on the elements of the nature of science. In conclusion, this study suggests that by using experimental inquiry strategy and strategy of scientific history properly, it is possible to change students' viewpoints on the elements of the nature of science and on modern philosophy of science. Through explicit instruction, we were able to find some positive conceptual changes on the nature of science and the modern philosophy of science in terms of both quantity and quality. This shows that the students studying arts are experiencing a constructivist conceptual change on the nature of science, and that conceptual ecology and learning strategy are involved in this process. Therefore, it is thought that this study offers an important implication in organizing science education on the nature of science.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to analyze elementary school students' class contents and activities between the invention class for the gifted under the local education office by the 'Gifted Education Promotion Act' and that under the invention classroom by the 'Invention Promotion Act'. For this study, the survey was conducted to 1,788 elementary school students who attended the invention class for the gifted both under the local education office and under the invention classroom. The analysis of the survey showed that the students of the invention class for the gifted under the local education office had higher motivation and participation rate in class, higher interest in invention, and stronger significantly in a future oriented will than those under the invention classroom. The parents of the invention class for the gifted under the local education office showed more enthusiastic attitude to support their students, and had significantly stronger recognition that the participation of the students in the invention education for the gifted helped enter an advanced school than those under the invention classroom. However, the class contents of the invention class for the gifted under the local education office such as 'understanding the influence of the invention history and products on society', 'scientific inquiry skills for problem solving', 'technological and engineering abilities for creating an invention', 'developing knowledge and abilities about business and management by using a new invention' were not different from those under the invention classroom. In addition, discussion and presentation were not active in the class activities of the invention class for the gifted under the local education office. Therefore, the researchers should compensate and develop a program which can apply strategically differentiated class contents and class activities to the students who participate in the invention class for the gifted under the local education office by the 'Gifted Education Promotion Act'.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.32 no.7
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• pp.881-901
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• 2011

The science museum in the past satisfied visitors only by interacting them with simple objects and exhibition, while one in modern times was requested to meet the need of visitors in their engagement in educational programs. To meet the visitors' need, the science museum made efforts to train, educate, and assign docents so that they can interact with visitors and serve the educational purpose of visitation. In this study, we analyzed the strengths and weakness of docent training programs from science museums/science centers nationally and internationally, to make implication on how to design a docent training and professional program. Programs from four national and four international science centers/museums were selected as a sample for analysis. Their docent training programs were compared with the data of surveys and interviews and emails from docents and docent managers/evaluators. Artifacts and documents of the docent training programs were also collected and used to construct the validity in analyzing the data, resulting in the well-developed docent training program as the critical one for enriching science museum education. The results included; First, we need to recruit and train docents who interact visitors directly but they need to be differentiated from regular volunteers for promoting science museum education for the purpose of popularization of science. Additionally, Second, we need to develop and run docent training program where docents can experience 'informal learning' exhibition interpreting strategies through the real field from mentoring from the experienced/senior docents beyond 'formal learning' exhibition content. Third, we need to equip docents with skills to make scientific literacy possible at science museum-such as experiencing scientific ethics through scientific inquiry-which happens limited at school education.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.136-147
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• 2024

It has recently be emphasized in science education that lessons that can develop "scientific participation and action" should be implemented to scientifically recognize various problems and respond to them as well as risks that occur in real life. This study aims to analyze the characteristics of scientific participation and action lessons as perceived by the preservice primary school teachers. To do that, the researchers collected and analyzed the lesson plans designed by the preservice teachers based on the achievement standard related to noise for grades 3-4 in 2022 revised science curriculum. Focusing on the stages of "problem recognition," "data collection and analysis," and "implementation and sharing," the results identity the four main characteristics as problem-solving activity, inquiry activity, investigative activity, and activity that encourages practical actions. The two or three features were found to be combinated in a lesson depending on its context. In some cases, only one feature was seen in a lesson. Based on the results, educational implications were discussed in terms of the teaching and learning methods and teacher education for implementing scientific participation and action.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.415-427
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• 2020

This study aims to understand science education conducted in North Korea by analyzing the PCK components shown in two science teacher's guidebooks: (1) Guidebook for 1^st grade elementary school and (2) Guidebook for 1^st grade middle school. These were published after 2013, when "the first 12-year Universal Compulsory Curriculum" was implemented in North Korea. The analysis shows that both elementary and middle school guidebooks had the highest percentage of content in "Knowledge of Subject Matter", followed by "Knowledge of Instructional Strategies in Science" and "Knowledge of Science Curriculum". On the other hand, "Knowledge of Assessment in Science" and "Knowledge of Students" were significantly low in content. Within the "Knowledge of Subject Matter", both elementary and middle schools had the highest proportion of content in "Concepts and Theories", along with "Experiments and Inquiries" that was also significantly higher than other PCK components. Science teacher's guidebooks in North Korea advocates constructivist teaching style by using "discussions" as the main activity when conveying scientific concepts and theories to students or conducting scientific inquiry classes. Furthermore, "Knowledge of Instructional Strategies in Science" was mainly focused on guiding the "Instruction sequence and method" from the "Topic-specific Strategies", while only a small part of the "Subject-specific Strategies" was being presented. Also, Science teacher's guide books in North Korea included only a few theoretical elements of science education in both the general outline and the particular sections of guidebooks. "Knowledge of Science Curriculum" was mainly composed of "Lesson Objectives" with some inclusion of "Vertical Articulation" and "Horizontal Articulation". "Knowledge of Assessment in Science" and "Knowledge of Students" accounted for a small portion compared to the science teacher's guidebooks in South Korea.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.267-282
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• 2022

This study aims to analyze the continuity and sequence between the intelligent life curriculum for grades 1-2 and the science curriculum for grades 3-4 with a focus on knowledge and inquiry process skills. The results demonstrate that contents related to science in the intelligent life curriculum consisted of only 10 out of 32 elements. Five elements were related to the science curriculum for grades 3-4 and limited to the 'life sciences' area. Particularly, the intelligent life curriculum did not address topics related to 'matter' and 'motion and energy'. Developmental connection was established in the 'life sciences' area and dramatic changes were noted for the topics related to 'earth and space' area. In terms of inquiry process skills, the levels of observation, measurement, inference, and communication naturally increased, whereas a developmental connection was noted between the intelligent life and science curricula. Classification can be viewed as a developmental link; however, viewing the classification as scientific from the epistemic perspectives was insufficient. In the case of expectation, a gap was observed in both curricula due to the absence of expectation activities in the intelligent life curricula. The study discussed the implications for securing the connection between the intelligent life and science curricula on the basis of these results.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.217-229
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• 2015

In this study, we explored the development of scientific model through the social-construction process on "combustion." Students were 8th graders from one middle school class. Each student engaged in small group discussions three times and made a group model on combustion. Discourses between peers and teacher were videotaped, audiotaped, and transcribed. The results show that the small groups constructed an initial concept: 'Conditions of combustion', which they then evaluated and revised the initial concept through combustion experiment. Following the discussions, some small groups evaluated their model and made a revised model. Then, the small groups compared various models and constructed a scientific model through consensus within the small group and as a whole class. Finally, students kept revising their model to 'Burning needs oxygen.' This tells us that the social construction process of scientific model made a meaningful role to build scientific model through diverse discussion between the students and their teacher, although they have had some difficult process to reach the final consensus. The data also showed some group features: the members were open to other's ideas. They analyzed the differences between their own ideas from others and revised their model after the whole class discussion. Lastly, they showed the tendency to make a good use of teacher's guidance. This study implies the importance of having social interaction process for students to understand the scientific model and learn the nature of scientific inquiry in class.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.78-98
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to analyze elementary school students' interpretation of data characteristics by cognitive style. Participants were elementary students in sixth grade who can use integrated inquiry process skills. The students were divided into two groups, analytic cognitive style and wholistic cognitive style according to their response to Cognitive Style Analysis. They performed scientific interpretation of data activity. To collect data for this study, participants recorded the result on scientific interpretation of data activity paper and researcher recorded the situation on videotape and interviewed with participants after the end of interpretation of data to get additional data. And the findings of this study were as follows: First, the study analyzed interpretation of data characteristics by the operator regarding different situations of interpreting data according to cognitive style. For example, in the intermediate state, analytic-cognitive style students showed high achievement in identifying variables, and wholistic-cognitive style students were active in using prior knowledge to interpret data. Second, the result of analysis on the direction of interpreting data and preference for data types in interpreting data activities according to cognitive style are as follows: Wholistic-cognitive style students showed relatively high perception of information through the top-down approach. On the other hand, analytic-cognitive style students usually used the bottom-up approach gradually expanding detailed information to the scientific question-related answer and showed a preference data of the table type. Through the result, this study aimed to help establish a data interpretation strategy for learners to solve problems based on understanding of interpretation of data characteristics according to learners' cognitive style, and purposed the instruction design suggesting the data requiring various data interpretation strategies to develop learners' data interpretation ability.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.299-309
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• 2022

The purpose of this study is to categorize specific factors and characteristics of positive science experience by qualitatively analyzing the positive science experience cases in the memories of pre-service elementary school teachers. For this purpose, 101 essays written by pre-service teachers on the theme of 'my enjoyable science class experience' were analyzed. The collected data were analyzed using an inductive analysis method, and as a result, the characteristics of positive science experience cases in the memories of pre-service teachers were categorized into 4 categories and 12 topic groups. Specifically, 'experience of exploratory activities using special materials', such as long-term raising and observation of animals and plants, experiments using edible materials, and using special experimental tools had a positive effect on scientific experience. In addition, 'experience of activities emphasizing scientific inquiry' such as emphasizing observation activities, experiments accompanied by clear experimental results, making activities, and using various materials also had a positive effect on science experience. In addition, 'student-centered activity experience' such as strengthening student autonomy, emphasizing collaboration between students, and performing science activities outside of the curriculum also had a positive influence on the science experience. Lastly, 'positive influence of teachers', such as teachers' encouragement and enthusiasm, helped to positively recognize science.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.201-207
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• 1997

This study was performed to survey the achievements in problem solving by the inquiring experiment, which was done by the superior group in the traditional cocepts-centered written tests. The purpose of this study was to identify characteristics of inquiring experimental assessment by analyzing differences between concepts-centered written and inquiring experimental tests. The subjects of this study was 211 applicants. They are the superior group of the 9th grade students, and score in the top 1% of total achievements percentage in school. They also have passed the primary entrance examination. The inquiring experimental test was developed according to the curriculum in school, and is composed of 5 subcategories: problem-perception and formulating hypothesis, designing an experiment, carring out an experiment, recording data and drawing conculsion, and generalizing conculsions and communicaton. The checklists of each subcategory were made and testing methods were divided into observation and report. The major results of this study are as follows: 1. The achievements in each subcategory of inquiring experimental performance were very low in the superior group who took the concepts-centered written tests. 2. The results of factor and correlation analyses in this study confirmed the abilities measured by inquiring experimental assessment differed from abilities measured by existing tests. These results indicated that even students who achieved high in scientific knowledge, these abilities were not automatically transformed inquiry process which many other abilities were integrated into. Therefore, problem solving ability requires integrated abilities which are fostered by inquiring experimental tasks. This suggests that new instrument for assessment must be developed to measure integrating ability especially where scientifically gifted students are selected, or where entrance examinations to the science schools are administered.