• Journal of Educational Research in Mathematics
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.213-228
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• 2002

We know that curriculum is, first of all, related to teaching materials, namely, contents. Therefore, when we think of mathematics curriculum, we must take account of characteristic of mathematics. Vygotsky has studied the development of scientific concepts and everyday concepts. According to Vygotsky, scientific concepts grow down through spontaneous concepts; spontaneous concepts grow upward through scientific concepts. And mathematics is a representative of subjects dealing with scientific or theoretical concept. Therefore, his study provides scientific basis for mathematics curriculum design. In this context, Davydov notes that everyday concepts are developed through empirical abstraction, while scientific concepts require a theoretical abstraction. And Davydov constructed the curriculum materials for the teaching of number concept. Davydov's curriculum is an example of reflecting Vygotsky' theoretical view and his view about the types of abstraction. In particular, it represents mathematical characteristic of a 'science' by introducing number concept through quantitative relationship and use of signs. In conclusion, stance mathematical concepts have scientific characteristic, mathematics curriculum reflects this characteristic.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.161-177
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• 2009

This study aims to explore how teachers construct scientific explanation during instructional practices to help students' scientific inquiry. Before investigating teachers' classroom practices, elementary school science curriculum was examined to identify scientific concepts, particularly in earth science. Then, a total of six teachers' scientific explanation in actual teaching practices was analysed focusing on a) explanation of scientific concepts; b) rationale for scientific explanation; c) connection between scientific explanation and everyday explanation. The findings are as follows. First, the science curriculum provides $1{\sim}2$ main scientific concepts per unit, which are mostly appeared in the unit title. Those concepts and sub-concepts are not explicitly described but embedded in students' inquiry activities. Second, the teachers explain scientific concepts and discuss the rationale behind the scientific explanation, but rarely connect scientific explanation to everyday explanation. Also, the level of scientific explanations is low remaining level 1 or 2, not reaching 3, the highest level. Based on the results, the study suggests a) teachers need to provide explicit and clear explanations about scientific concepts; b) teachers are required to connect scientific explanation and everyday explanation; c) the level of teachers scientific explanation should be elevated by using an evidence, reasoning and claim, the components of scientific explanation as well as introducing new scientific concepts and inquiry activities.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.101-109
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• 2004

The purpose of this research is to provide useful data in forming sound scientific concepts by investigating elementary students' non-scientific concepts related to their concepts of biological adaptation, and by analyzing the general inclinations and causes of some misconceptions. Twenty-four objective questions were designed to be given to 5th and 6th grade elementary students in order to investigate their concepts of biological adaptation. According to the test results, they formed scientific concepts in most questions. But they appeared to have many misconceptions in some parts which should be guided by the teacher's additional explanations rather than by the education curricula's focus. There are some cases where the 6th grade students had more misconceptions than the 5th grade students who were not systemically taught the concepts of biological adaptation, for the reasons of strengthening or maintaining the misconceptions by confusing the contents of learning. Male and female students have different scientific concepts of different questions according to their interest and attention. Therefore, it is necessary to develop various teaching-learning data which can help the teachers' additional explanations about the concepts of biological adaptation and invoke students' interest and attention, and to seek appropriate measures to form sound scientific concepts among teachers as well as students.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.1 no.1
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• pp.35-44
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• 1978

In this study, concept centered approach and process centered approach in developing integrated science curriculum were compared and compromised between two approaches. It seems that two approaches are in antagonistic relations. The superficial conflictions getween two approaches are not because they are antagonistic in their nature, but because their interesting points are different. The concept centered approahc is interest in fundamental scientific concepts and the process centered approach is interested in scientific enquiry. If science is the composition of enquiry processes and concepts produced by enquiry processes, scientific enquiry process and scientific concept must not be inconsistant. Although concepts are not unchangeable, new concepts and advanced concepts are based on the old concepts. Enquiry activity which is not based on concepts also cannot be significant enquiry. Although fundamental concepts in science is very important, in order to apply concepts to varios phenomena, and to understand concepts more deeply the student should understand concept through the process by which the concepts are derived. As we have discussed above, only the concept centered approach or the process centered approach itself is not complete. Comparing these two uncomplete approaches to integrated science curriculum, we can find out that two approaches are in complementary relations. Because integrated science is based on the idea that natural phenomena should not be understood in fragments, but should be understood as mutually related system' the integrated science curriculum includes both the fundamental scientific concepts and scientific enquiry processes.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.650-663
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• 2013

Multidimensional scaling can be used to identify relationships among concepts, revealing the structure of the cognitive framework by measuring distances within perceptual maps. The current study sought to examine the relationships among concepts related to photosynthesis in 2,844 $3^{rd}-11^{th}$ grade science students. The questionnaire included items on 'location,' 'products,' 'reactants,' and 'environmental factors', presenting images related to each theme. Students provided responses corresponding to particular topics, and reported the extent to which the concept was related to the topic on a scale from 1 to 30. The survey results were as follows: first, students were not able to clearly distinguish between or understand the four main topics. Second, students organized their cognitive structures by closely associating related concepts after learning. Third, the presented concepts revealed a mixture of scientific and non-scientific concepts, suggesting that students needed to clearly distinguish the preconceptions through which they organized concepts, so that they are suitable for cognitive structures based on learning. Furthermore, non-scientific concepts within perceptions were consistently maintained throughout learning, affecting the proximity of scientific concepts.

• Korean Journal of Child Studies
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.131-148
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• 2012

This study examines the scientific concept development of young children in terms of the day-night cycle. The subjects consisted of 180 three-, four-, and five-year-old children from two kindergartens and one children's center located in Seoul and Jeju. Individual interviews were conducted to collect verbal and pictorial responses on the day-night cycle. The scientific concepts on the day-night cycle are classified five stages including : no recognition, egocentric concept, initial mental models, synthetic mental models, and scientific mental models. Using two-way ANOVA, scores for the types of concept on the day-night cycles were then analyzed according to both the ages and genders of the children. The results reveal the existence of significant differences in terms of the types of concept of young children according to age. Most three-year-olds children had no recognition. Most three, four, and five-year-old children revealed egocentric concepts. Four-year-old children revealed that were in the initial stages of experiencing the mental models and synthetic mental models of the day-night cycle. Five-year-old children revealed that they were in the early stages of experiencing the initial, synthetic, scientific mental models of the day-night cycle. The results suggest appropriate ways of science education for young children based on the development of scientific concepts of the day-night cycle.

• Korean Journal of Child Studies
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• v.31 no.5
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• pp.167-191
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• 2010

The purpose of this study is to examine how science activities using nonfiction literature affectspreschool children's scientific process skills, attitudes and concepts. For the purposes of this study, two classes, consisting of four and five-year-old children in a kindergarten located in D city were selected. One class was designated as the experimental group and the other as the control group. The experimental group performed science activities using nonfiction literature, while the control group did not. Thisexperimental study was conducted over the course of 8 weeks. Analysis of data was performed by ANCOVA. The results of the posttest indicated that the experimental group which performed science activities using nonfiction literature showed an improvement in their process skills, scientific attitudes and scientific concepts compared with the control group.

• Journal of Gifted/Talented Education
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• v.14 no.4
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• pp.113-123
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• 2004

The concern with scientific mode1s has been growing in science education, and schematic models are frequently used to teach science concepts in secondary schools. The aim of this study is to investigate how well the scientifically gifted students understand scientific concepts through activities of modifying scientific models which we developed. Thirty 8th-grade students participated in the study, 15 in a control group and 15 in an experimental group. For the students in the experimental group, teaching material with activities of modifying models, while for the students in the control group, the teaching material with traditional activities such as explanation, problem solving, and reading. The teaching contents in physics for both groups were linear momentum. We used multiple-choice test and essay-type test to evaluate students' achievements after lessons, and then compared their achievements of both groups. Through the research, we could find a clue that model-modifying activities are helpful for the gifted students to enhance their understanding of physics concepts, although the statistics does not show meaningful difference between experimental and control groups.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.15-24
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• 1991

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of Learning Cycle approach to change the concept of density. The results of the study were as follows : 1) Students already had various types of preconception related to density before formal learning. These preconceptions mostly differ from scientific concepts. 2) Male students were much better than female ones in the development of scientific concepts before formal learning. These differences were found statistically significant(P<0.01). 3) The higher the cognitive level of the students, the better the development of scientific concepts. 4) In the change of preconceptions to scientific concepts by treatment, there was significant difference between control group and experimental group at the 0.05 level. It was found that Learning Cycle approaches were more effective than traditional approaches in acquiring the concept of density. 5) It was found that there was no significant difference On the retention level of the concept of density between control group and experimental group.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.77-86
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• 1996

The purpose of this study was to review the studies related to concept learning forcusing on the meanings, kinds, and characteristics of concepts. Then the characteristics of the concepts were analyzed in the three positions: metaphysics, epistemology, and psychology. It was identified that the word 'concept' were confused with the other words such as conception, construct, idea, notion, identity. It was also found that researchers defined the concepts by the use of various meanings. The instructional strategies for scientific concepts were also analyzed in this study. The study found that the instructional strategies for concept learning were developed according to the views about the nature of concepts. Described on the paper are three types of instructional models for science concepts suggested by constructivists as follows: concept formation, concept differentiation, and exchange. They developed the models based on the current research on the misconceptions of major scientific concepts.