Measuring the Effect of Argument-Driven Inquiry on High School Chemistry Students’ Process-Oriented Motivation Utilizing the Newly Developed Process-Oriented Motivation Instrument

This study uncovers how secondary high school chemistry process-oriented motivation is altered after implementation of Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI). ADI is a laboratory instructional model that utilizes four Science and Engineering Practices (SEPs) in a student-centered lab experience. The SEPs are embedded to the current curriculum to help motivate students to learn chemistry (NRC, 2012). This study utilized eleven total chemistry classes, five on-level chemistry and six honors chemistry, with a total of 243 students participating in some facet of the study. Data sources included were View About Scientific Inquiry (VASI), the newly developed Process-Oriented Motivation Instrument (POMI), and student lab reports (achievement). Two goals were necessary to examine student-process-oriented motivation for the control and experimental group. Based on current science education literature, a valid and reliable POMI does not currently exist. Thus, Goal 1 purpose was to create an instrument, POMI, while generating valid and reliable data. A Confirmatory Factor Analysis along with other forms of validity and reliability were completed to find the most valid and reliable model, the revised POMI model. Thus, Goal 2 utilized this revised POMI model to find the effect ADI had on student-process oriented motivation for both groups. The control group, honors chemistry students, utilized a traditional lab. However, the experimental group, on-level chemistry students, participated in the ADI lab to determine if the type of lab implementation caused a significant difference in process-oriented motivation among the groups. Normalized gain scores were used to compare if there was significant difference between the control and experimental groups. Finally, mediation path analysis discovered if process-oriented motivation factors influence how the experimental group or control performed on their lab report. Two conclusions were drawn as a result of Goal 2: (1) after ADI implementation both groups experienced statistically similar changes in each POMI motivation factor and (2) no POMI factor possessed a significant influence on the lab report scores of either group