An Action Research to Overcome Undergraduates’ Laboratory Anxiety

AbstractIn this study, it was aimed to determine and overcome undergraduates’ laboratory anxiety. For this purpose, Laboratory Anxiety Questionnaire (LAQ) was developed by researchers. LAQ was applied to 92 undergraduates as a pre-test and focus group interviews were performed to determine their laboratory anxiety. An action research was conducted by researchers. After instruction was accomplished in ten weeks, LAQ was applied as post-test. According to results, it was found that undergraduates’ laboratory anxiety related to working chemicals especially acids, using laboratory materials and equipments, laboratory accidents and making mistake, which were determined in the pre-test, were overcame in highly percentages

Comparison of inquiry-based instruction in real and virtual laboratory environments: Prospective science teachers’ attitudes

This research aimed to compare how prospective science teachers’ attitudes towards chemistry laboratory and chemistry lesson changed after participation in inquiry-based instructions that were conducted in real and virtual laboratories. Thirty-four freshman prospective science teachers from an education faculty participated in the research and participants were assigned as Group-1 (N=17) and Group-2 (N=17). While Group-1 was accomplished inquiry-based instruction in the real laboratory, Group-2 was conducted the same instruction in the virtual laboratory. As a data source, attitude towards chemistry lesson scale and attitude towards chemistry laboratory scale were used. The semi-constructed interview was also conducted with all participants. According to results, although all the prospective science teachers’ attitudes toward chemistry lesson and laboratory improved significantly in both real and virtual laboratory environments, improvement in the prospective science teachers’ scores in a real laboratory environment significantly higher than those in the virtual laboratory. In addition to these, semi-structured interview results cohered with the results of the scales

Öğrencilerin Sorgulama Becerilerine Yönelik Bir Karşılaştırma Araştırması: Takım-Oyun-Turnuva ve Birleştirme Teknikleri

DergiPark: 551112tredHormonlar konusu fen eğitiminde önemli bir yeresahiptir. Eğitimin her kademesinde yer alan bu konu soyut kavramlardan oluşmasısebebiyle öğrencileri ezbere yönlendirmekte ve öğrenme sürecinde becerilerinikullanmalarını kısıtlamaktadır. Bu sebeple hormonlar konusunun öğrenimindeöğrencilerin becerilerini kullanmalarına ve geliştirmelerine imkân sağlayanetkinlikler önem arz etmektedir. Sunulan çalışmada hormonlarkonusunda işbirlikli öğrenme yaklaşımın iki farklı tekniği olanTakım-Oyun-Turnuva ve Birleştirme tekniklerine dayalı gerçekleştirilenetkinliklerin üniversite öğrencilerinin sorgulama becerilerine etkisininkarşılaştırılması amaçlanmıştır. Bu amaçla öğrenciler Grup-1 (N=23) ve Grup-2(N=29) olmak üzere iki gruba ayrılmıştır. Grup-1’de Takım-Oyun-Turnuva,Grup-2’de ise Birleştirme tekniği kullanılmıştır. Uygulamalar 9 hafta sürmüş veveri toplama amacıyla uygulamalardan önce ve sonra olmak üzere SorgulamaBecerileri Ölçeği (Aldan-Karademir amp; Saracaloğlu, 2013) kullanılmıştır.Bulgulara göre, grupların ön test ve son test puanları arasında anlamlı gelişmebulunurken, son test puanları arasında anlamlı farklılık tespit edilmemiştir.Elde edilen sonuçlara göre her iki tekniğin de sorgulama becerilerinigeliştirdiği fakat aralarında anlamlı bir farklılığın olmadığı sonucunavarılmıştır.

Evaluation of students' scientific process skills through reflective worksheets in the inquiry-based learning environments

This study aimed to evaluate how 7th-grade students' scientific process skills changed in the inquiry-based learning environment through reflective worksheets. For this purpose, four inquiry-based activities related to electrical circuits were developed. Forty students enrolled in 7th grade in a public school in a mid-size city of Turkey located in the north-west region participated in the study, and they are randomly stratified into eight groups. While students carried out the activities, they used reflective worksheets, including two parts, for reflection of the development of their scientific process skills. Instructions were conducted for four weeks, and all the 32 reflective worksheets were evaluated by using the assessment rubric (for Part-I) and content analysis (for Part-II). The results obtained from both parts of the reflective worksheets showed that inquiry-based learning activities promoted students' scientific process skills such as defining the problem, formulating a hypothesis, observing and interpreting results during the inquiry-based learning process. Students also improved in terms of ability such as using scientific terms, drawing scientific and comprehensible figures, and making scientific explanations. In addition to these, it was found that students had more positive opinions about the learning process.WOS:0005187400000012-s2.0-8508127380

An activity based on an inquiry-driven creative drama: stray animals need some shade

This study aimed to develop, introduce, and conduct an inquiry-driven creative drama activity. The activity, for elementary students, related to the transmission of light and full shadow. In the activity, which consisted of a warm-up, dramatization, and evaluation stages, two inquiry-based experiments were added to the dramatization stage. Thus, the goal was for the students to discover and learn during the dramatization. In addition to the experiments, role-playing, role changing, and teacher in the role techniques were used in the dramatization stage. Stray animals were assigned as a subject to dramatize for the integration of values education into science education. The activity was applied with the participation of 23 fifth-grade students, and students kept a reflective journal at the end of the activity. Based on their journals, the students had very definite opinions about the activity and demonstrated that both a scientific objective (optimizing shadow size) and values objectives (empathy, social responsibility, animal rights and help for vulnerable animals) were achieved. This activity is practical and of value in the elementary science classroom.WOS:00059623010000

EVALUATING OF PRE-SERVICE SCIENCE TEACHERS' UNDERSTANDING OF GENERAL CHEMISTRY CONCEPTS BY USING TWO TIER DIAGNOSTIC TEST

This research aimed at evaluating pre-service science teachers' understanding of the subject matters such as "thermochemistry, chemical kinetics, chemical equilibrium, acids and bases and electrochemistry". For this purpose, a two-tier diagnostic test consisting of 44 items (alpha = 0.84) related to the aforementioned concepts was developed by the researchers. This test was applied on to the first, second, and third year pre-service science teachers in Hasan Ali Yucel Education Faculty, Istanbul University. The results showed that the pre-service science teachers had alternative conceptions about endothermic-exothermic reactions, conservation of energy, reaction enthalpy, calorimeters; rate of reaction, reaction rate constant, effects of some factors on reaction rate and reaction rate constant; effects of some factors on equilibrium, equilibrium dynamics, Le Chatelier Principle; equivalence point, end point, indicators, buffers, titrations, neutralization, strength and properties of acids and bases, pH; effects of concentrations on cell potential, metal electrodes, localization of anode and cathode, plating, galvanization

Undergraduates’ Awareness of Green Chemistry and Its Reflections in Ideas About Green Marketing

Sunulan çalışmada Meslek Yüksekokulu öğrencilerinin cinsiyet, sınıf, program, yaş, yaşanılan yer, aile mesleği, aile geliri ve öğrencinin aylık gelirine göre yeşil kimya ve yeşil pazarlama hakkındaki bilinçleri/düşüncelerinin nasıl olduğunun ve öğrencilerin yeşil kimya hakkındaki bilinçleri ve yeşil pazarlama hakkındaki düşünceleri aralarında bir ilişki olup olmadığının belirlenmesi amaçlanmıştır. Bu amaçla Sağlık Hizmetleri Meslek Yüksekokulu yaşlı bakımı, çocuk gelişimi, tıbbi dokümantasyon ve sekreterlik, tıbbi tanıtım ve pazarlama, sağlık kurumları işletmeciliği, tıbbi laboratuvar teknikleri programlarındaki 454 öğrencinin katılımıyla tanımlayıcı bir araştırma yürütülmüştür. Veri toplama araçları olarak; kişisel bilgi formu, Erökten (2006) tarafından geliştirilen Yeşil Kimya Bilinci Ölçeği ve Roberts ve Straughan (1999) tarafından geliştirilen ve Aslan (2007) tarafından yeniden düzenlenen Yeşil Pazarlama Ölçeği kullanılmıştır. Veriler SPSS-16 istatistik programı ile analiz edilmiştir. İlk olarak verilerin normallik varsayımını karşılayıp karşılamadığını belirlemek amacıyla Kolmogorov-Smirnov testi uygulanmış ve verilerin tüm değişkenler bakımından normal dağılım göstermediği tespit edilmiştir (p<0.05). Bu sebeple nonparametrik testler kullanılmıştır. Mann Whitney U testi sonuçlarına göre öğrencilerin yeşil kimya bilinçlerinde cinsiyetlerine göre kız öğrencilerin lehine anlamlı farklılık saptanmıştır (U=16279.00, p<0.05 ). Kruskal Wallis testi sonuçlarına göre öğrencilerin hem yeşil kimya bilinci hem de yeşil pazarlama düşüncelerinde programlarına göre; yeşil pazarlama düşüncelerinde ise öğrencinin aylık gelirine göre anlamlı bir farklılık belirlenmiştir (p<0,05). Ayrıca yapılan korelasyon analizi ile öğrencilerin yeşil kimya bilinçleri ve yeşil pazarlama düşünceleri arasında orta düzeyde, pozitif ve anlamlı bir korelasyon olduğu bulunmuştur (r=0.397, p<0.01).In this study, it was aimed to identify undergraduates' awareness of green chemistry and ideas about green marketing according to gender, grade, program, age, living place of them, job of family, earning of family and monthly earning of undergraduates and whether there is a correlation between awareness of green chemistry and ideas about green marketing. For this purpose, a descriptive research was conducted by participation of 454 undergraduates in elderly care, child development, medical documentation and secretarial, healthcare management, medical promoting and marketing and medical laboratory techniques departments. Personal information form, Green Chemistry Awareness Scale developed by Erökten (2006) and Green Marketing Scale developed by Roberts and Straughan (1999) and revised by Aslan (2007) were used for data collection. Data was analyzed by SPSS-16 statistical program. Firstly, Kolmogorov-Smirnov test was used for determination whether all data considered normal distribution and results showed that there was no normal distribution (p<0.05). For this reason nonparametric tests were used. According to Mann Whitney-U test result, there was significant difference between undergraduates green chemistry awareness scores in favour of girls (U=16279.00, p<0.05 ). Kruskal Wallis test results underlined that there was significant differences between both green chemistry awareness scores and green marketing scores according to their programs and only green marketing score according to undergraduates' monthly earning (p<0.05). Moreover it was found that there was a positive, significant and medium level correlation between awareness of green chemistry and ideas about green marketing (r=0.397, p<0.01)

An action research to overcome undergraduates' laboratory anxiety

In this study, it was aimed to determine and overcome undergraduates' laboratory anxiety. For this purpose, Laboratory Anxiety Questionnaire (LAQ) was developed by researchers. LAQ was applied to 92 undergraduates as a pre-test and focus group interviews were performed to determine their laboratory anxiety. An action research was conducted by researchers. After instruction was accomplished in ten weeks, LAQ was applied as post-test. According to results, it was found that undergraduates' laboratory anxiety related to working chemicals especially acids, using laboratory materials and equipments, laboratory accidents and making mistake, which were determined in the pre-test, were overcame in highly percentages. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd