Effectiveness of the Nature of Science Activities Developed for 5th Grades
Abstract
Within the context of new findings about nature of science,
literature has been reviewed and it was seen that the activities to
develop nature of science understanding were not adequate. For
this reason, new activities were developed as a part of 5th grade
‘Matter and Change’ unit and their effectiveness was tested. The
research was conducted with 5th grade students from two
classrooms, who were attending to a middle school in a village of
city of Tokat. Activities developed about the unit; ‘Thermoscope to
Thermometer’, ‘Bingo Game’ and ‘Science Wheel’ activity from
the literature were applied to experimental group with textbook
content, as for control group the nature of science concepts were
integrated with textbook content. VNOS-E questionnaire was
conducted both for pretest and posttest to experimental and control
group, the questionnaires were coded by three researchers and the
coefficient of consistency was calculated as 0,78. Results indicated
that, experimental group’s view of nature of science in all
dimensions was changed in a positive way, a significant difference
was found between the posttests of two groups in experimental
group’s favor. The activities were effective in developing students’
views about the nature of science. The regular curriculum was not
effective in nurturing nature of science views as a consequence
because the theoretical basis regarding the nature of science in the
renewed science curriculum is not supported with appropriate
activities, methods and classroom resources. As a result, essential
and applicable suggestions were made for those who concerned.
Keywords
Nature of Science,‘Matter and Change’ unit,5th grade activities,VNOS-E Questionnaire
Thanks
The initial version of this article was presented as an abstract in 2014 ICEMST in Konya
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