TEACHING NATURE OF SCIENCE THROUGH CONCEPTUAL CHANGE APPROACH: CONCEPTUAL CHANGE TEXTS AND CONCEPT CARTOONS

Abstract

The study investigated the influence of conceptual change approach on elementary students' views of certain aspects of nature of science (NOS). In this study, conditions of conceptual change were provided through the use of conceptual change texts and concept cartoons. In addition, this study compared the influence of the conceptual change approach to that of the explicit reflective inquiry-oriented and implicit instructional approaches in the teaching of NOS. The research was conducted with seventh-grade students (aged 12-13 years) at a school in Turkey's Aegean region. A total of 69 students participated in the study. The students' views of NOS were assessed using a questionnaire, (the Views of Nature of Science Elementary Level Scale) as pre-test and post-test in conjunction with data from semi-structured interviews. This study reveals that the best way to remedy the naive views of students on NOS is a conceptual change framework.