1. An international collaborative investigation of beginning seventh grade students' understandings of scientific inquiry: Establishing a baseline
- Author
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Fangbing Wei, Juan E. Jiménez, Shereen Aly, Renee S. Schwartz, Jakob Gyllenpalm, Cathy Buntting, Mariana Aparecida Bologna Soares de Andrade, Qiaoxue Zhou, Judith S. Lederman, Huang Xiao, Kerstin Kremer, Frauke Voitle, Soraya Hamed Al-Lal, Cheng Liu, Arvi Tapani Hakanen, Selina Bartels, Ahmed ElZorkani, Yaozhen Pan, Heba EL-Deghaidy, Pi Chu Kuo, Zhifeng Wu, Cigdem Han-Tosunoglu, Ana Rivero García, Christine V. McDonald, David Santibáñez-Gómez, Mustafa Çakir, Jari Lavonen, Shiang Yao Liu, Ron Blonder, Carl-Johan Rundgren, Shu Fen Lin, Bin Lv, Serhat Irez, Mark Akubo, Anne Hume, Norman G. Lederman, Kathy Saunders, Enshan Liu, Rachel Mamlok-Naaman, Estelle Blanquet, Jocelyn Wishart, Estelle Gaigher, Gillian Kay, Shuchen Guo, Ozgur Kivilcan Dogan, Annemarie Hattingh, Irene Neumann, Yalcin Yalaki, Chengcheng Bao, Eric Picholle, Universidad de Valladolid [Valladolid] (UVa), Laboratoire Cultures, Éducation, Sociétés (LACES), Université de Bordeaux (UB), Institut de Physique de Nice (INPHYNI), Université Nice Sophia Antipolis (... - 2019) (UNS), COMUE Université Côte d'Azur (2015-2019) (COMUE UCA)-COMUE Université Côte d'Azur (2015-2019) (COMUE UCA)-Université Côte d'Azur (UCA)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Graduate School of Education, University of Bristol [Bristol], VASI collaboration, Lederman, Judith, Lederman, Norman, Bartels, Selina, Jimenez, Juan, Akubo, Mark, Aly, Shereen, Bao, Chengcheng, Blanquet, Estelle, Blonder, Ron, Soares de Andrade, Mariana Bologna, Buntting, Catherine, Cakir, Mustafa, EL-Deghaidy, Heba, ElZorkani, Ahmed, Gaigher, Estelle, Guo, Shuchen, Hakanen, Arvi, Hamed Al-Lal, Soraya, Han-Tosunoglu, Cigdem, Hattingh, Annemarie, Hume, Anne, Irez, Serhat, Kay, Gillian, Kivilcan Dogan, Ozgur, Kremer, Kerstin, Kuo, Pi-Chu, Lavonen, Jari, Lin, Shu-Fen, Liu, Cheng, Liu, Enshan, Liu, Shiang-Yao, Lv, Bin, Mamlok-Naaman, Rachel, McDonald, Christine, Neumann, Irene, Pan, Yaozhen, Picholle, Eric, Rivero Garcia, Ana, Rundgren, Carl-Johan, Santibanez-Gomez, David, Saunders, Kathy, Schwartz, Renee, Voitle, Frauke, von Gyllenpalm, Jakob, Wei, Fangbing, Wishart, Jocelyn, Wu, Zhifeng, Xiao, Huang, Yalaki, Yalcin, Zhou, Qiaoxue, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université Côte d'Azur (UCA)-Université Nice Sophia Antipolis (... - 2019) (UNS), and COMUE Université Côte d'Azur (2015-2019) (COMUE UCA)-COMUE Université Côte d'Azur (2015-2019) (COMUE UCA)
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Mainland China ,Démarche d'investigation ,media_common.quotation_subject ,Teaching method ,[SHS.EDU]Humanities and Social Sciences/Education ,SAY ,Primary education ,literacy ,Nature de la science NoS ,Literacy ,Education ,[SHS.HISPHILSO]Humanities and Social Sciences/History, Philosophy and Sociology of Sciences ,Cultural diversity ,Pedagogy ,scientific inquiry ,Science education reform ,0501 psychology and cognitive sciences ,Sociology ,Baseline (configuration management) ,ComputingMilieux_MISCELLANEOUS ,media_common ,HORSES MOUTH ,4. Education ,Knowledge level ,05 social sciences ,050301 education ,VIEWS ,SCIENCE ,international ,didactique comparée ,0503 education ,050104 developmental & child psychology - Abstract
Although understandings of scientific inquiry (as opposed to conducting inquiry) are included in science education reform documents around the world, little is known about what students have learned about inquiry during their elementary school years. This is partially due to the lack of any assessment instrument to measure understandings about scientific inquiry. However, a valid and reliable assessment has recently been developed and published, Views About Scientific Inquiry (VASI; Lederman et al. [2014], Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 51, 65–83). The purpose of this large-scale international project was to collect the first baseline data on what beginning middle school students have learned about scientific inquiry during their elementary school years. Eighteen countries/regions spanning six continents including 2,634 students participated in the study. The participating countries/regions were: Australia, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, England, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, Mainland China, New Zealand, Nigeria, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Turkey, and the United States. In many countries, science is not formally taught until middle school, which is the rationale for choosing seventh grade students for this investigation. This baseline data will simultaneously provide information on what, if anything, students learn about inquiry in elementary school, as well as their beginning knowledge as they enter secondary school. It is important to note that collecting data from all of the approximately 200 countries globally was not humanly possible, and it was also not possible to collect data from every region of each country. The results overwhelmingly show that students around the world at the beginning of grade seven have very little understandings about scientific inquiry. Some countries do show reasonable understandings in certain aspects but the overall picture of understandings of scientific inquiry is not what is hoped for after completing 6 years of elementary education in any country.
- Published
- 2019
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