Effects of Islamic Scientist History on Seventh Graders' Understandings of Nature of Science in a Thai Islamic Private School

Abstract

Societies and cultures influence students' understandings of the nature of science (NOS). An approach to promote an accurate understanding of the nature of science is to manage the learning based on students' contexts through the integration of their social, cultural, and religious stories. Hence, this study investigated the pedagogical effects of Islamic scientist history on seventh graders' understandings of the nature of science in an Islamic private school, Yala Province, Thailand. Through a mixed-methods convergent design, data were collected from 30 seventh graders in an Islamic private school of Yala who were selected through a convenience sampling. The instruments were 1) a NOS questionnaire and 2) a semi-structured interview on the understanding of the nature of science. The quantitative data were statistically analyzed using mean, standard deviation, and a dependent t-test. The qualitative data were analyzed through content analysis and categorized into three groups based on the views of the nature of science: informed views (IV), transitional views (TV), and naive views (NV). Results revealed that the students who learned from the history of Islamic scientists had gained higher mean scores on the understanding of the nature of science at the .05 significance level and transformed their views from transitional (TV) and naive (NV) to informed (IV) in every aspect of the nature of science. This can be summarized that applying the history of Islamic scientists with the explicit reflective NOS teaching is practical in Islamic private school. To make this change happen in the unique school context, science teachers must devote time to analyzing the NOS hidden in the history of Islamic scientists. In addition, another Islamic context, such as local Islamic wisdom, could also promote the understanding of the NOS for students in private Islamic schools.

A Comparison of High School Students' Knowledge and Satisfactions Regarding Basic Science and Halal Science Literacy Training Course

“…This was consistent with the research on the integrated science education of high school students in the province of Pattani (Hajeekhadae, 2017). While content that was in line with what students were learning led to improving learning effectiveness which was consistent with the research on how integrating religious instruction with Islamic history improved learning effectiveness (Safkolam, Khumwong, & Pruekpramool 2021). However, enhancing the teaching and learning process to encourage students' creative expression would have an impact on their attitudes and behaviors.…”

Development of A Floating Market-Based BioPhy Magazine to Train the Religious Characters of Pre-Service Science Teachers

“…More than that, this integration is part of efforts to prevent the dichotomy of science (S. Anwar & Elfiah, 2019;Diani & Hartati, 2018;Muslimin et al, 2020;Pahrudin et al, 2019) and reduce the religion-science conflict (Haryandi et al, 2021;Safkolam et al, 2021) because Islam and science are closely related (Pahrudin et al, 2019). Al-Qur'an is a way of life for humans that also contains some facts and scientific explanations related to science so that Islam science can be linked to each other (Haryandi et al, 2021).…”

“…Al-Qur'an is a way of life for humans that also contains some facts and scientific explanations related to science so that Islam science can be linked to each other (Haryandi et al, 2021). Integrating Islamic values with science is primarily aimed at developing character and knowledge of ethics (Fahyuni et al, 2020) and introducing science from an Islamic perspective (Muslimin et al, 2020;Safkolam et al, 2021).…”

“…Lecturers must guide their students so that they are not only human beings who are intellectual but also have religious character (C. Anwar et al, 2018;Fahyuni et al, 2020;Kasdi et al, 2020;Usman et al, 2021). Moreover, in areas where Islam significantly influences people's lives, science learning must be linked to religion (Safkolam et al, 2021). Therefore, each learning component is very good for containing religious values (Usman et al, 2021).…”

“…Therefore, each learning component is very good for containing religious values (Usman et al, 2021). The benefits of integrating religious values in learning include increasing faith and piety (Mastuang et al, 2019); developing knowledge and instilling character (Fahyuni et al, 2020); improve learning outcomes (Fahyuni et al, 2020;Haviz et al, 2020;Mastuang et al, 2019); help understand the material (Muslimin et al, 2020), make learning interesting (Mastuang et al, 2019;Muslimin et al, 2020;Sukino & Failasufah, 2019); and make learning more meaningful (Huda et al, 2019;Safkolam et al, 2021).…”