Turkish grade 10 students' and science teachers' conceptions of nature of science: A national study

Abstract

This study aimed to assess grade 10 Turkish students' and science teachers' conceptions of nature of science (NOS) and whether these conceptions were related to selected variables. These variables included participants' gender, geographical region, and the socioeconomic status (SES) of their city and region; teacher disciplinary background, years of teaching experience, graduate degree, and type of teacher training program; and student household SES and parents' educational level. A stratified sampling approach was used to generate a representative national sample comprising 2,087 students and 378 science teachers. After establishing their validity in the Turkish context, participants were administered a questionnaire comprising 14 modified ''Views on Science-Technology-Society'' (VOSTS) items to assess their views of certain aspects of NOS. A total of 2,020 students (97%) and 362 teachers (96%) completed the questionnaire. Participant responses were categorized as ''naïve,'' ''have merit,'' or ''informed,'' and the frequency distributions for these responses were compared for various groupings of participants. The majority of participants held naïve views of a majority of the target NOS aspects. Teacher views were mostly similar to those of their students. Teacher and student views of some NOS aspects were related to some of the target variables. These included teacher graduate degree and geographical region, and student household SES, parent education, and SES of their city and geographical region. The relationship between student NOS views and enhanced economic and educational capitals of their households, as well as the SES status of their cities and geographical regions point to significant cultural (specifically Western) and intellectual underpinnings of understandings about NOS. ß

Pre-service Primary Teachers' Scientific Knowledge and Attitudes towards Science Learning and Their Influence on the Understanding of the Nature of Science / Znanje budućih nastavnika o znanosti, njihovi stavovi o učenju o znanosti i njihov utjecaj na raz

“…their fallibility due to their "human made" nature. Our findings in relation to conceptions about scientific modelling differ from those obtained by Dogan and Abd-El-Khalick (2008). In their study, most science teachers believed that scientific models are copies of reality rather than human inventions because scientists say they are true or because a lot of scientific observations and/or research has shown them to be true.…”

Middle School Science and Mathematics Teachers’ Conceptions of the Nature of Science: A One-Year Study on the Effects of Explicit and Reflective Online Instruction

“…This aligns with the work of academics in the field that have found preservice and in-service teachers both hold naive views of NOS (e.g. ; Akerson, et al, 2006;Dogan & Abd-El-Khalick, 2008;Pomeroy, 1993). It is surprising that the level of NOS conceptions was indistinguishable between science and mathematics teachers on both the pre and post assessments.…”

“…It is imperative that teachers have an accurate view of NOS in order to include NOS in the science classroom and to lay the foundation for future learning and understanding of the disciplines of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Although teachers need developed conceptions of NOS, studies have consistently found that preservice and practicing teachers possess naive and incoherent understandings of NOS (Akerson, Morrison, & McDuffie, 2006;Dogan & Abd-El-Khalick, 2008;Firestone, Wong, Luft & Fay, 2012). This is exacerbated by the fact that science teaching practices and materials often do not specifically address NOS, and tend to emphasize science content over the processes and development of scientific knowledge ).…”

Examination of Secondary School Students’ Views towards Scientific Knowledge

“…Therefore, the current findings are partly supported by previous findings given above. However the studies carried out by Conley, Pintrich, Vekiri and Harrison (2004), Doğan and Abd-El-Khalick (2008), Küçük andKüçük (2011), Yalvaç, Öztürk andSarıkaya (2010), Yankayış, Güven and Türkoğuz (2014), Saydam (2010) andYiğit et. al.…”