• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.43-56
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• 2011

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of small group inquiry skills on improving science process skills and attitudes toward science in elementary school science. The research questions of this study were as follows. First, effects of small group inquiry skills on improving science process skills in elementary school science. Second, effects of small group inquiry skills on improving attitudes toward science in elementary school science. The subjects of this study is two classes from 6th grade elementary classes in Busan. The experiment class practiced small group inquiry skills, while the control class practiced self inquiry. To verify the effect of the experiment, ANOVA was conducted. The main findings of this study are as follows. First, the small group inquiry skills gave a significant influence on increasing the science process skills, including the basic science process skills and the integrated science process skills, of students. Especially, among subordinate factors of science process skills between groups, it was effective to increase abilities of observing, reasoning, interpreting data, formulating hypothesis. It is necessary for teachers to make an effort to teach according to steps of the small group inquiry skills and to support inquiry activities, in order to increasing the science process skills. However, frequency of additional lessons have a little influence on increasing the science process skills. Second, there is meaningful change in the attitudes toward science for those who studied the small group inquiry skills. Also, they affected subordinate factors of the attitudes toward science, like the attitudes toward science inquiry, the happiness about science class. This study shows that the small group inquiry skills give a positive influence on the science process skills and attitudes toward science in elementary school science.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.323-336
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to evaluate students' written arguments embedded in scientific inquiry investigations using the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH) approach. Argument components defined in this study are questions, claims, questions-claims relationship, evidence, claims-evidence relationship, multiple modal representations, and reflection. A set of criteria for evaluating each argument component was developed to evaluate writing samples of students from college freshman general chemistry laboratory classes. Results indicate that students produced, on average, moderate to powerful questions, claims, and evidence. They also constructed reasonable questions-claims relationship and claims-evidence relationship. Compared to other component scores, the average score for reflection was relatively low. Overall, the average Total Argument score was 21.4 out of a possible 36, that is, the quality of the written arguments using the SWH approach during a series of inquiry-based chemistry laboratory investigations was moderate to powerful. The findings of this study suggest that students, on average, developed reasonable scientific arguments generated as part of scientific inquiry. In other words, students are capable of putting together reasonable arguments as they participate in inquiry-based laboratory classrooms.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.29 no.6
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• pp.487-494
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• 2008

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of MBL experiment instruction on the 7th graders' scientific inquiry skills and graph construction and interpretation ability in the unit "Elements and movement of sea water". Results are as follows: First, this study analyzed the influence on students' scientific inquiry skill after having six MBL instructional classes. The result showed a significant difference in the scientific inquiry skills between the experimental group and the control group, which implies that the instruction using MBL was an effective way to improve students' scientific inquiry skills. Second, this study also analyzed the influence on students' abilities to construct and interpret graphs. The result did not show any significant differences between the experimental group and the control group in the ability to construct graphs. But it showed significant differences in the ability to interpretgraphs, which means that instruction using MBL was an effective way to improve students' ability to interpret graphs.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.441-450
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the level of elementary gifted students' argumentation and examine the special features of argumentation founded in scientific inquiry. 28 students were selected in the special education center for the gifted in K National University. They were organized 8 groups of 3~4 students and engaged in scientific inquiry activity. The researcher wasn't involved in students' inquiry activity and argumentation except for the guiding and introducing their activity. In the first session, each group carried out the experiment 'Putting a heated can in the water' and then, the students discussed to probe their experimental results and build their explanation. In the second session, each group presented their experiment results and evidence from their experiment justifying their claims, and had questions from other groups. The protocol data during 8 groups' argumentations were analyzed using 'Rubric for Scientific Argumentation Assessment' (Yang et al., 2009) in three domains- the form, content and attitude. As a result, in form domain, almost groups were rated 2 points due to their argument without rebuttal on the subcategory of 'composition', but they got a good grade above 3 points in subcategory such as 'claim', 'ground', and 'conclusion'. In content domain, almost groups got points above 3 points. In attitude domain, there were some striking contrast between each groups. Six groups got good score more than 4 points on the subcategory of openness, but two groups, they alleged and got score below 3 point. While the 6 groups of all got 4 points in the aspect of participation, 3 groups got 3 points lower than because they only just asserted and not interact with other groups. Throughout the argumentation, two features were found that; as time goes by, arguments were refined; Students tended to use their prior to knowledge rather than evidence such as experimental data in making claims and conclusions.

• Journal of Science Education
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.303-312
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• 2012

This study was to find science high school students' perception about composing laboratory reports by grade. The instrument to survey the perception of them consisted of the perception about making a lab report, and the effect of compositing laboratory reports on the scientific concept understanding and the scientific inquiry ability. Subjects were 260 students of four science high schools in Seoul metropolitan city and Kyounggi province. Most of science high school students had a little positive perception about compositing lab reports, but they had very positive perception about the effects of it on the scientific concept understanding and scientific inquiry ability. There was the significant difference between grades, because the 10th grade students showed more positive perception toward compositing lab reports than the 11th graders(p<.05). The results suggested that different educational approaches and teaching strategies be needed for science high school students considering grades.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.148-157
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of small group inquiry activities using IIM on the science process skills and scientific attitudes of students in higher elementary grades. To verify research problems, the subjects of this study were fifth-grade students selected from two classes of an elementary school located in Busan : the research group was composed of thirty students who participated in small group inquiry activities using IIM teaching model situation, and the other was composed of thirty students(comparative group) who participated in a teacher map- based learning situation. For six weeks, the small group inquiry activities using IIM were executed in the research group, while the teacher-map based instruction was conducted in the comparative group Test showed the following results: First, the research group showed a significant improvement in their science process skills compared to the comparative group. Second, the research group did not show a significant improvement in their scientific attitudes compared to the comparative group. In conclusion, small group inquiry activities using the IIM teaching model was more effective than the teacher map-based teaching model on science process skills. However, since the study has a limit on the object of the study and the applied curriculum, the additional studies need to be conducted with an extended comparative group and curriculum.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.155-166
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• 2024

This study investigated and compared orientations toward scientific inquiry learning among general and science-gifted elementary students. It also investigated and compared the relationship between their orientations toward scientific inquiry learning and their coping strategies for anomalous situations. To realize this, 61 general elementary students and 53 science-gifted elementary students in Seoul were selected, and questionnaires were administered to investigate their orientations toward scientific inquiry learning and coping strategies for anomalous situations. In addition, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted individually with some of the general and science-gifted students. The results showed that among orientations toward scientific inquiry learning, regardless of grade level, the general students were most likely to possess 'concept understanding' and second most likely to exhibit 'scientific practice'. On the other hand, the science-gifted students demonstrated the highest frequency of 'scientific practice', with 'concept understanding' and 'complexity' also being relatively common. 'Activity driven' was found only among some of the general students and 'engineering practice' was found only among some of the science-gifted students. 'Process skills' were not found. No clear relationships between orientations toward scientific inquiry learning and coping strategies for anomalous situations were found. However, some differences in the choice of coping strategies for anomalous situations between the general and science-gifted students were discovered, even when they had the same orientations toward scientific inquiry learning. The educational implications of these findings were discussed.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.75-82
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• 2008

The purpose of this study was to examine the consistency and balance of learning objectives of units and instructional units according to grades and educational domains. Educational domains were cognitive(scientific knowledge), scientific inquiry(inquiry process skills), affective(scientific attitude), and science-technology-society(STS). Learning objectives of life field of the 7th elementary science curricular teaching guidebooks were analysed. Scientific inquiry process skill objectives(43.5%) were most dominant in units, but cognitive objectives(53.9%) were most dominant in instructional units. STS objectives were most recessive in both units and instructional units. Especially, objectives of units and instructional units were shown no consistency by grade. The results of this study suggested that the textbooks and teaching guidebooks should be developed consistently by considering learning activities and contents on the basis of background and properties of science curriculum.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.304-312
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• 2009

We have investigated the effects of participation in science fairs on perception, science related attitudes and science inquiry process skill of thirteen fifth-grade elementary school children in the science subjects. Questionnaires were prepared to find out student's reactions to the participation in science fairs. All participated children responded that the activities at the fairs were interesting and helpful to learning scientific knowledge and inquiring scientific questions. From the analysis of the responses we have found that the participation process including preparatory ones during the fairs may help children to enhance their science related attitudes and science inquiry process skill and can be considered as a useful science curriculum.

• Hwankyungkyoyuk
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• v.19 no.2 s.30
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• pp.96-107
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• 2006

Inquiry has great value in environmental education(EE). Being able to see the world environmentally through 'inquiry-based environmental education' can be an important value and goal of EE. In this study, we intended to develop an EE program of measuring activity of dissolved oxygen(DO), based on the theory of 'inquiry-based EE'. Especially, we recognized the potential that DO meter can be used in 'inquiry-based EE', and we tried to develop a model of inquiry-based EE using DO meter. As a result of this research, we present specific models of inquiry-based EE about how to perform measuring activity of DO and how to use the DO meter in laboratories and streams from the perspective of inquiry of water environment. In the process of program development, we considered organization of the inquiry process, use of concept and knowledge, scientific inquiry and insightful inquiry, integration, sustain-ability, content components of 'Environmental Studies for EE', developmental level and in-forest of students. The developed EE model is a scientific inquiry model, pursuing 'explanation' based on data collection. Through this model, we tried to make students see water environment more deeply. The developed program can be applied to various water environments, like laboratories, streams, ponds, etc. It can be more effective inquiry activity if we perform measuring activities simultaneously with PH, electrical conductivity, and turbidity meters.