An analysis of question asking on scientific texts explaining natural phenomena

Developing the Critical Thinking Skills of Astrobiology Students through Creative and Scientific Inquiry

“…There have been several studies that have examined social influences on students' willingness to share their questions in a group setting, as students are often concerned with potential disapproval of their ideas or questions by their peers or professors (Karabenick, 1996;Pedrosade-Jesus et al, 2004). It is often only when one student expresses her or his confusion or questions regarding a subject that other students feel comfortable to discuss their own concerns (Costa et al, 2000). Interestingly, studies on the academic status of students that pose questions in a group setting have shown that average achievers often ask a higher frequency of questions compared to high academic achievers, suggesting that these higher achievers may be more sensitive to potential disapproval of their ideas or questions (Good et al, 1987).…”

“…S cientific inquiry is the process by which individuals make observations, formulate questions, and generate data, ultimately improving the state of knowledge of the natural world (National Research Council, 1996, 2000. Training astrobiology students in scientific inquiry is critical, as it not only enables them to acquire a fundamental understanding of current scientifically accepted ideas but also endows the students with the critical thinking skills to improve their scientific learning process in a multidisciplinary field such as astrobiology (Zion and Sadeh, 2007).…”

Ignorancia consciente en el aprendizaje de las ciencias I: componentes de la incomprensión de un texto científico

“…La generación de explicaciones es frecuente también en el caso de textos expositivos. La comprensión de relaciones explicativas causales, por ejemplo, es importante en esta clase de textos (Coté, Goldman y Saul, 1998), y la consiguiente necesidad de explicaciones se pone de manifiesto en la preponderancia de preguntas causales que los alumnos efectúan sobre textos de ciencias (Costa et al, 2000;Otero, Caldeira y Gomes, 2004).…”

“…Desde luego, la investigación muestra que las inferencias predictivas son poco frecuentes cuando se leen textos de ciencias como los que estamos considerando (Millis y Graesser, 1994). En consonancia con esto, Costa et al (2000) encontraron que solamente el 2,3% de las preguntas efectuadas por alumnos de 14, 16 y 18 años que leían textos breves de ciencias correspondían a la categoría que Graesser, Person y Huber (1992) llaman de «Consecuencia causal», es decir, sobre consecuencias de un cierto acontecimiento o estado. Pero en principio es posible que los lectores sean conscientes de esta clase de ENSEÑANZA DE LAS CIENCIAS, NÚM.…”

Promoting Pre‐experimental Activities in High‐school Chemistry: Focusing on the role of students’ epistemic questions

“…Moreover they enable self-regulated and explanation-centered learning by the students (Graesser et al, 2005). Costa, Caldeira, Gallástegui and Otero (2000) assume that deep-reasoning questions of this kind contribute in creating links among otherwise non-related units of knowledge and thus improve memorization. Acquiring interrelated and elaborated knowledge structures is a focus of Neber's (2004) approach to fostering epistemic questioning as well.…”