Improving Preservice Primary Teachers' Understanding of the Nature of Methods of Science through Reflective Reading of News Articles

Autor/in	García-Carmona, Antonio
Titel	Improving Preservice Primary Teachers' Understanding of the Nature of Methods of Science through Reflective Reading of News Articles
Quelle	In: Science & Education, 32 (2023) 6, S.1847-1867 (21 Seiten)Infoseite zur Zeitschrift PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Zusatzinformation	ORCID (García-Carmona, Antonio)
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0926-7220
DOI	10.1007/s11191-022-00338-y
Schlagwörter	Preservice Teachers; Scientific Literacy; Knowledge Level; Scientific Methodology; Reflection; News Reporting; Journal Articles; Newspapers; Science Education + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? Wissensbasis; News report; Reportage; Journal article; Zeitschriftenaufsatz; Newspaper; Zeitung; Naturwissenschaftliche Bildung
Abstract	A study is presented that analyzed the pedagogical efficacy of reading opinion articles about methods of science, published in the media, in order to improve the meta-scientific understanding of 52 preservice primary teachers (PPTs) with regard to the topic. To this end, an activity was designed taking an explicit and reflective approach. The design of the activity required a short teaching intervention when being implemented in class in order to facilitate its integration into the program of the subject of science teaching. Before doing the activity, the PPTs' prior conceptions about the nature of methods of science were diagnosed using the "Opinions about Science, Technology and Society Questionnaire" (COCTS, in its Spanish acronym). The activity consisted of reading the articles, and then responding in small work groups to a series of questions for reflection and debate on the topic. The groups' responses were then shared and discussed in class. Once the activity had finished, the PPTs responded to the questionnaire again (post-test) in order to evaluate how their conceptions had progressed. There was an improvement in their understanding of various aspects of the nature of methods of science (e.g., scientists use a variety of methods in their research depending on the object of study, the context, and the resources available, or that "the scientific method" is an idealized, simplistic, and therefore poor representation of how scientists do research). These results show that the activity was effective in getting the PPTs to reflect and learn about the topic. Finally, the limitations of the study are discussed (e.g., the limited time frame to implement the activity and evaluate results), and some future research perspectives are given to improve the understanding of PPTs about the nature of methods of science. (As Provided).
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Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2024/1/01