The Effect of Science Teaching Outside Traditional Classroom Environment on Elementary School Students' Science Process Skills and Attitudes toward Science

Author(s):

Nurcan Cansiz(presenting / submitting)

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

27. Didactics - Learning and Teaching

Format:

Paper

Session Information

27 SES 03 B, Primary School Curriculum and Learning

Paper Session

Time:

2017-08-22

17:15-18:45

Room:

K3.05

Chair:

Isabelle Mili

Contribution

In today's world, educating students as scientific literate is vital due to the fact that the development in science and technology is so rapid. As Abd-El-Khalick and BouJaoude'nin (1997) emphasized, scientifically literate individuals have an adequate understanding of science concepts and can easily grasp the link between science-technology-society. Being aware of this issue, science educaters, researchers and governments including Turkey revised their science curricula and considered scientific literacy as one of the main goals of science education (BouJaoude, 2002; Milli Egitim Bakanligi [MEB], 2006; Zembylas, 2002).There is a substantial number of international reform movements to improve sicence education in terms of scientific literacy (e.g Project 2000+, 1993; Project 2061, 1990; Science Literacy Project, 1999, 2005). the elements of scientific literacy include science process skills, understanding science concepts, attitudes toward science, understanding nature of science. In this study two of them were aimed to be improved through experiential learning.

One of the challenges students face in science education is that they cannot transfer the knowledge they learned in school to the new situations outside of the classroom. That is they cannot link the science concepts to the events in daily life. For example, they learn solubility in school and practice about it. However a substantial amount of students has difficulties in transferring this concept to the daily life. More soecifically, they cannot recognize solubility in sugar and tea. Such examples show that students fail to transfer the knowledge they gained in school to the daily life.

Method

The aim of this study is to provide elementary school students with opportunities to learn science outside of traditional science classrooms. We would like those students realize that science is not limited to school. In fact science is everywhere, in streets, kids' parks. For this purpose thirty middle schools students in Artvin city center will carry out science activities outside of traditional classrooms with the guide of four experts in science education. Students will discover science concepts with the help of these activities on their own. They will either design materials related to specific science topics (e.g. paths to discover friction force, mixer forenergy transformation)or they will go outside of schools to discover science in streets or kids' park. They will have a chance to observe nature. We expect that by the help of these activities, students will develop science process skills and favorable attitudes toward science. Students' attitudes toward science will be measured by an instrument developed by Pell and Jarvis (2001) and adapted into Turkish by Buluş-Kırıkkaya (2011). Students' science process skills will be measured by an instrument developed by Smith ve Welliver (1990) and adapted into Turkish by Başdağ (2006). As a result the effect of science teaching outside traditional classroom environment on middle school students' science process skills and attitudes toward science will be explored.

Expected Outcomes

This study is not completed yet. Data collection will last at the end of this month. After data vill be analyzed. However we expect that students' science process skills and attitudes will be improved after participating in activities.

References

Abd-El-Khalick, F. & BouJaoude, S. (1997). An exploratory study of the knowledge base for science teaching, Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 34(7), 673-699. Basdag, G. (2006). 2000 yılı fen bilgisi dersi ve 2004 yılı fen ve teknoloji dersi öğretim programlarının bilimsel süreç becerileri yönünden karşılaştırılması. Unpublished master thesis. Gazi University, Turkey. BouJaoude, S. (2002). Balance of scientific literacy themes in science curricula: The case of Lebanon. International Journal of Science Education, 24(2), 139-156 Bulus-Kirikkaya, E. (2011). Grade 4 to 8 primary school students’ attitudes towards science: Science enthusiasm. Educational Research and Reviews, 6(4), 374-382 Ministry of National Education. (2006). Elementary science and technology course curriculum. Ankara, Turkey: Ministry of Education. Pell, T., & Jarvis, T. (2001). Developing attitude to science scales for use with children of ages from five to eleven years, International Journal of Science Education, 23(8), 847–862. Smith, K. A., & Welliver, P. W. (1990). The develıopment of a science process assessment for fourth-grade students. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 27(8), 727-738. Zembylas, M. (2002). The global, the local, and the science curriculum: A struggle for balance in Cyprus. International Journal of Science Education, 24(5), 499- 520.

Author Information

Nurcan Cansiz (presenting / submitting)

Artvin Coruh University, Turkey

Search the ECER Programme

Search for keywords and phrases in "Text Search"
Restrict in which part of the abstracts to search in "Where to search"
Search for authors and in the respective field.
For planning your conference attendance you may want to use the conference app, which will be issued some weeks before the conference
If you are a session chair, best look up your chairing duties in the conference system (Conftool) or the app.