The representation of scientific research in the national curriculum and secondary school pupils’ perceptions of research, its function, usefulness and value to their lives

Abstract

Young people's views on research, how it's conducted and whether it's important, influences the decisions they make about their further studies and career choices. We investigate how research is represented within the English national curriculum and the examination boards because we recognise that what is being taught influences secondary pupil views on research. We use questionnaire data to focus particularly on pupil perceptions of research in the sciences and the scientific method. The questionnaire was a 25-item Likert Scale (1-5) distributed to seven collaborating schools. We received 2634 returns from pupils across key stages 3, 4 and 5. We also asked teachers to complete the questionnaire to reflect how they thought their pupils would respond. We received 54 teacher responses. Statistically significant differences in the responses were identified through a chi-square test on SPSS and the interpretive part of our analysis considers how the term 'research' appears in the national curriculum for England and Wales and the three main English exam boards. The main theoretical construct that informs our analysis is Angela Brew's 4-tier descriptor of perceptions of research (domino, trading, layer, journey). We use this framework to map the national curriculum for Science in England to establish the when, what and how research is presented to school pupils in England and Wales. We highlight and discuss certain pupil views on: research as involving the identification of a research question; research as a means to confirm one's own opinion; research as involving the generation of new knowledge and the collection of new data, such as interviews and questionnaires as well as laboratory work, field trips and library searches. We also discuss pupils' statements of confidence in their ability to do research, school experiences of research, perceptions of difficulty and importance of research to future career choice.

Validity Evidence for the Perceptions of Secondary School Students of ‘What Research is’ Scale and Measurement Invariance

“…In this section we briefly present concepts used by Yeoman et al (2016) to develop the 'what research is' scale -who does research?, the value of research, the process of research and myself and research.…”

“…It is therefore important that year of study and discipline are not overlooked. There are very few studies that have explored the perceptions of research of secondary school pupils and the value they place on research for their future careers (Yeoman et al, 2016). Grever et al (2008) conducted a study in the Netherlands and England with 400 young people concerning students' views on history at school and identity.…”

“…These include students' attitudes to science at school and parental attitudes (DeWitt & Archer, 2015;Toma & Greca, 2018). There are few studies which examine whether young students have sufficient knowledge about what research is and why people do research (Yeoman et al, 2016;Yeoman et al, 2017). Furthermore, there is little clarity on whether there is a relationship between students' perceptions about what the research is and the education level they are at (Griffioen, 2019).…”

“…Therefore, students' perceptions of, and attitudes towards, research at this early stage (secondary school), influence their future career choices (Yeoman et al, 2017). The present study aims to validate a measurement instrument developed by Yeoman et al (2016) on research attitudes and research integration that can be used with secondary school students. In this study, the researchers attempt to prove the psychometric properties of students' perception of the 'what research is' scale quantitatively.…”

“…Although researchers have given particular attention to student perceptions about what research is in a higher education context, little attention has been given to secondary school students' perceptions about this issue. To fill this gap, Yeoman et al (2016) qualitatively developed an instrument measuring secondary school students' perceptions of what research is. The present study quantitatively validates this scale using the dataset originally used to qualitatively validate it.…”