An Analysis of Pre-service Primary Teachers’ Drawings of the Digestive System

Year 2017, Volume: 7 Issue: 2, 762 - 776, 30.06.2017

Yılmaz Çakıcı

https://doi.org/10.24315/trkefd.326744

Abstract

This
study explores pre-service primary teachers’ drawings of the digestive system.
The research data was collected through the use of drawing method with 102
third grade pre-service primary teachers studying in the Faculty of Education
at Trakya University during 2016-2017 academic year. The findings revealed that
primary teacher candidates’ drawings of the digestive system were quite far
from the scientifically acceptable ones. A small percentage of students (12.7
percent) produced a relatively scientific representation of the digestive
system, including all the digestive organs. Although a great majority of the
students depicted the mouth, gullet, stomach and intestines in their drawings
of the digestive organs, they mostly omitted the pharynx, liver and pancreas.
They commonly had lack of knowledge about the digestive system organs, and size
of them in the human body. These results also reveal that, in teaching and
learning process, drawings are an important tool in revealing knowledge
shortages or misconceptions, and may be used more commonly in improving
students understanding of some scientific phenomena.

Keywords

Drawings, digestive system

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