Science and Mathematics Education Commons^™

Public Understanding Of Science As Seen By The Scientific Community: Do We Need To Re-Conceptualize The Challenge And To Re-Examine Our Own Assumptions?, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

My task is to address the question of how the scientific community views the public understanding of science and whether there needs to be a re-conceptualization of the challenge to foster the public understanding of science, and also whether there is a need to re-examine assumptions. I am compelled to begin by acknowledging a debt to an important book, Inarticulate Science, written by Edgar Jenkins and his colleagues at Leeds. Inarticulate Science is an outstanding contribution on the concept of the public understanding of science and I think of my contribution today on this topic as a footnote. My …

Traditional Culture And Science Education In Africa: Merely Language Games?, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

I want to begin today with two short personal remarks. My field of research at home is the cultural study of science education. In other words, I am interested in what is commonly called the culture of science and how that becomes interpreted in science education by teacher and curriculum. I am interested in the variation of culture among American students, cultural variations grounded in family and community and brought to the classroom. I am interested in the cultural interactions that are precipitated by the meeting of cultures in the science classroom. In my current work I use worldview concepts …

Constructivism And Non-Western Science Education Research, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

In this paper, I argue that science education research and curriculum development efforts in Nonwestern countries can benefit by adopting a constructivist view of science and science learning. The past efforts at transferring curricula from the West, and local development projects that result in curricula only marginally different from Western curricula, stem from an acultural view of science. These efforts also ground science learning in concepts of logical thinking rather than understanding. The resulting level of science learning, however, has not met expectations. Constructivism offers a very different view of science and science learning. It assumes that logical thinking is …

Leaving Elementary School With A Sense Of Order In Nature, William W. Cobern, Adrienne T. Gibson, Scott A. Underwood

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

Ninth graders in Arizona high schools have just left their elementary, general science education and are at the start of more specialized secondary science education. They are beginning a course of study that will form the foundation for tertiary education and employment after high school graduation. The research asked, Who are these kids entering high school science courses? The researchers noted that one of the key objectives of elementary education is to foster in children the concept that nature is inherently orderly and thus amenable to scientific investigation. Since the concept of order or disorder is fundamental in one’s perception …

The Different Worlds Of High School Biology And Physical Science Teachers, William W. Cobern, Adrienne T. Gibson, Scott A. Underwood

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

A science teacher not only presents scientific concepts, but tacitly creates a context in which scientific concepts are presented to the class. This context can be strongly influenced by teacher beliefs or worldview. In the current research, teacher worldviews with respect to the essence of nature were examined. Two biology and two physical science teachers individually sat for qualitative interviews. The same interview protocols were used in a concurrent study involving ninth graders at their high school. The analysis led to three assertions: (1) When compared with their students, the science teachers had a much more focused and less diverse …

Constructivism For Science Teachers, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

Constructivism is a concept that in recent years has garnered considerable attention among science education researchers. Essentially, it is a model or metaphor of how learning takes place. prominent science educators have called it a most promising model and a theoretical shift that may lead to a coalescing of current thought as well as the simulation of new ideas. I do not believe this is hyperbole. The potential significance of constructivism has already extended beyond research and into the science classroom. References to constructivism appear ever more frequently in the literature, however, often with little or only trivial discussion of …

The Teachers' And Principals' Perceptions Of The Impact Of Operation Physics On The Teaching Of Elementary Science In Michigan Schools, Brenda Prater Earhart

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine the impact of Michigan Operation Physics (MOP) on the teaching and learning of basic physics concepts in the elementary classroom as perceived by both the teachers and principals of those teachers. In addition, the study sought to identify the teachers' and principals' perceptions of the principal's role in promoting science at the elementary level.

The method used for this study was survey research. Questionnaires were mailed to Michigan Operation Physics participants, non- Michigan Operation Physics participants, and the principals of those teachers in southwestern Michigan.

Findings of this study were that teachers' …

Worldview--Reality As Viewed By Students: Additional Methodologies, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

We are basically asking 1) to what extent people see themselves as a natural part of nature; 2) whether or not people are perceived as being qualitatively different from other aspects of nature; 3) to what extent, if any, control over nature by people is appropriate. The interview description given for the first interview sequence applies here as well.

An interview begins with the grand tour question, "If there is any kind of order in the world, where do people fit in that order?" The informant's response is followed with three elicitation devices.

World View, Culture, And Science Education, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

In the last few years many science education policy documents, including those from Project 2000+, have noted the need for further knowledge and understanding of how people individually and as members of social and cultural groups learn and teach science. To this end science educators have studied cognitive development and mental capacity. They have explored the effectiveness of various instructional strategies. Among other things they have investigated the errors students make. However, what students believe about the physical world, belief rooted and nurtured in students' socio-cultural environments, has received far less attention. In a non-Western economically developing nation one speaks …

Behavioral Contracting: The Effects Of Metacontingency Contracting On Math Performance Of At-Risk Students, Vernard V. J. Jones

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study is to determine the effectiveness of behavioral contracting in providing parents with a means of assisting their child with homework from school. Following the baseline condition, the subjects were introduced to the intervention [behavioral contracting including parent(s)] one at a time to provide a concurrent check between baseline and treatment conditions.

Six students from the Kentwood Public School District served as participants in the study. All participants were between eleven and thirteen years of age. Each participant was identified by the teacher as "at-risk" based on their sustained academic performance.

Four out of six participants …

Conceptualizations Of Nature And Scientific Literacy, Part I: Research Methodology, William W. Cobern, Adrienne T. Gibson

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

If we may paraphrase and adapt from feminist scholars, there are voices of people that need to be heard if scholars intend to have a valid understanding of people and their behavior. The feminist scholars were of course seeking ways of making women’s voices heard but the importance of their work exceeds gender issues. It is important for restoring the image of people as persons rather than as objects of research. As we have undertaken it, the foundational perspective of worldview research is that one must hear from students and science teachers about themselves. We thus suggest it is important …

Cultural Constructivist Approach To The Teaching Of Evolution, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

Educators typically think that one teaches evolution to develop students' conceptual understanding of evolution. It is assumed that if students understand evolution they will believe it. From a constructivist perspective it can be argued that understanding and belief, though related, are distinct concepts each of which is a potential goal for instruction. Though there are good reasons why belief should not be an instructional goal, achieving conceptual understanding requires that issues of belief be addressed. The point is that students are not likely to gain much understanding of something that they dismiss outright as unbelievable. What counts as believable for …

Alternative Constructions Of Science And Science Education, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

I want to begin today with two short personal remarks. My field of research at home is the cultural study of science education. In other words, I am interested in what is commonly called the culture of science and how that becomes interpreted in science education by teacher and curriculum. I am interested in the variation of culture among American students, cultural variations grounded in family and community and brought to the classroom. I am interested in the cultural interactions that are precipitated by the meeting of cultures in the science classroom. In my current work I use worldview concepts …

Worldview Theory And Conceptual Change In Science Education, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

Once again science education finds itself in the midst of reform. Reform documents are too numerous to mention by name but they all share the same view that Americans know far too little science. Durant (1990) noted that even the well educated often know little science. Of course every reform document by its very nature offers a solution. Many in the science education research community "see conceptual change as the emerging focus of science teaching" (Wandersee, 1993, p. 319) and thus focus their research interests here as well. To borrow warfare metaphors, conceptual change activities are tactical devices used to …

Using American Sign Language With A Direct Instruction Mathematics Program To Affect The Mathematics Achievement Of Deaf Students, Annette J. Bass

Masters Theses

The effectiveness of supplemental instruction using a scripted direct instruction program, Connecting Math Concepts (Englemann & Carnine, 1992), with four lower elementary deaf students was compared to the effectiveness of supplemental instruction in their traditional math curriculum, Mathematics Today (Abbott, 1985). A two-phase multiple baseline design across students was used. During the first phase, the students' achievement on curricula-based math probes was assessed while using the Mathematics Today as a supplement. During the second phase, the students' achievement was assessed while using Connecting Math Concepts as a supplement. The teacher presentation scripts in this program were translated into American Sign …

A Comparison Of The Hutchings’ Low-Stress, Factor Analysis, Hand-Held Calculator, And Conventional Addition Algorithms For Speed, Accuracy, And Preference With Regular Education Students, John C. Hampel

Masters Theses

Three repeated measures experiments were conducted to determine the efficiency with which medium and low math-achieving, fourth- and fifth-grade students computed two sizes of addition problems using each of four different algorithms. The experimenter selected the conventional algorithm and the hand-held calculator because they are currently in popular use. The experimenter selected the Hutchings' low-stress and factor analysis algorithms because of their demonstrated performance enhancing characteristics and unique design features. The three written algorithms represented a design continuum that facilitated a powerful deductive analysis.

In all conditions the Hutchings' low-stress algorithm produced incrementally superior performance consistent with its unique features. …

World View, Metaphysics, And Epistemology, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

It has been argued from world view theory that fundamental beliefs about the world exert a powerful influence on how sense is made of events in the world. However, the nature of that influence has remained enigmatic. Hannah Arendt's distinction between thinking and comprehension, and knowing and apprehension provides a clarification. Thinking is the epistemological path to conceptual comprehension. Knowing is the metaphysical path to apprehension - to the acceptance of a concept as true or valid. Comprehension does not necessitate apprehension. One may reject a fully understood concept. The recent discussion in science education about world view is essentially …

Contextual Constructivism: The Impact Of Culture On The Learning And Teaching Of Science, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

Though rooted in Piagetian research, constructivism1 is an avenue of research pertaining to teaching and learning that departed from the neo-Piagetian2 mainstream twenty years ago and has continued on a distinct path of development. The departure was evident by the late seventies, clearly marked by two publications, Novak (1977) and Driver & Easley (1978). For constructivists, learning is not knowledge written on, or transplanted to, a person's mind as if the mind were a blank slate waiting to be written on or an empty gallery waiting to be filled. Constructivists use the metaphor of construction because it aptly summarizes the …

Science Education And The External Perspective On Science, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

In Kuhnian terms, science education has been a process of inducting students into the reigning paradigms of science. While it may never have been explicit, the goals of science education clearly have been to persuade students that science provides a fairly constant, highly justified, and sufficient understanding of physical phenomena. In 1984, Duschl noted that science education had not kept pace with developments in the history and philosophy of science. Positivism was dethroned years ago and it turns out that factors surrounding discovery are at least as important as the justification of knowledge. Indeed, the entire concept of justification has …

Chaos And Order, Mystery And Knowledge, The Beautiful And Mundane: College Student Conceptualizations Of Nature, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

What do students believe about the world around them? Hawkins (1983) suggested that young students can have a difficult time understanding heliocentrism because their personal experience is literally geocentric. What this illustrates is that meaningful learning in the science classroom presupposes students who enter with beliefs about the world compatible with science as it is taught in the classroom. The study of student beliefs (or for that matter, teacher beliefs) at fundamental levels is the study of worldview (Cobern, 1991a). The research reported here was an interpretive study of beliefs about nature, a delimitation of worldview, held by women college …

Different Perspectives On The Natural World: Biology Professors And Their Students, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

The science classroom is the location of complex interactions between students, teacher, curriculum, and environment. These interactions can lead to conflict where the various factors pertaining to students, teacher, curriculum, and environment are at odds. Interest in these types of conflicts has led to numerous studies of classroom processes including those concerned with gender, ethnicity, religion, and language (e.g., Fraser, 1989). Worldview is a factor of more recent interest to researchers and is at an early stage of methodological development and nascent investigation (Cobern, 1991c). Pertaining to the classroom, worldview research focuses on the fundamental beliefs held by teachers and …

A Comparison Of Science And Mathematics Achievement, Attitudes, Curricular Experiences, And Career Interest Resulting From Magnet And Traditional High School Programs, Rozana Abdul Razak

Dissertations

The growth of specialized schools that emphasize science and mathematics has raised questions about their efficacy in improving performance in various parameters in mathematics and science. In this study, four different components were compared. A science and mathematics experiences questionnaire determined the type and extent of student experiences in science and mathematics during high school, and student interest in science and mathematics careers. The American College Testing Program (ACT) (ACT Registration) sub-scores assessed scholastic achievement, while the determination of student attitudes towards science used the Scientific Attitude Inventory (SAI) (Moore & Sutman, 1970).

Subjects in the study consisted of three …

World View Theory And Science Education Research, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

This monograph is timely for the membership of NARST. As science educators probe teaching and learning in an endeavor to make sense of learning in classrooms, there is a need for theoretical frameworks to enable new questions to be posed and a correspondingly fresh set of responses to be obtained. World view is a framework that can be applied to research on teaching and learning science and fits well with the trend towards studies that are interpretive in nature. The number of science education researchers using ethnographic techniques in science education research is increasing steadily and theories and methods that …

Education Research Will Not Profit From Radical Constructivism, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

There are moments when philosophy captures the educator's attention. Such an occasion was the opening night of the 1990 annual meeting of the National Association for Research in Science Teaching. Ernst von Glasersfeld gave a highly stimulating lecture on "radical constructivism." Radical constructivism is an epistemological philosophy that divorces knowing from any notion that reality is the referent of knowledge. Radical constructivists argue that adopting this view, rather than realist views, will help teachers improve science instruction. This, however, would mean a dramatic shift away from critical realism which has deep historical roots in Western thought, and which arguably was …

A Logico-Structural, Worldview Analysis Of The Interrelationship Between Science Interest, Gender, And Concept Of Nature, William W. Cobern, Jane E. Ellington, Daniel M. Schores

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

A few years ago I was speaking with a distinguished professor of science explaining to him my concern for the low level of science interest among school level students. I remarked that in my view a major contributor to this lack of interest was the methodology used to teach science. Students forsake science because their own orientation to the world does not allow them to appreciate science as it is typically taught (Cobern, 1989a). The professor immediately added to my sentence "and believed by the vast majority of qualified practitioners." He went on to say that this dropping away of …

Computer Assisted Drill And Practice: An Instructional Aid To Increasing Rate Of Acquisition Of Addition Math Facts, Paula G. Frandsen

Masters Theses

This study supplemented existing math instruction and drill and practice (flash cards and worksheets) with computer assisted drill and practice (CADP) to facilitate addition math fact attainment of first grade students. The six students selected were introduced to (CADP) on an individual basis using a multiple baseline across subjects research design. Timed tests were used to select subjects, as baseline measures, and as probes throughout the study to measure the students' rate correct per minute (the dependent variable).

All subjects showed an increase in their individual rate correct per minute after the introduction of CADP. This rate increase is important …

Comparisons Of Learnings From Structured And Nonstructured Visits To A Science Exhibit, Rosario Canizales De Andrade

Dissertations

The primary purpose of this study was to determine whether the use of an activity worksheet during a museum visit to a science exhibit might help students achieve the objectives proposed for the visit. Two types of museum visits were identified: structured and nonstructured. During the structured visit students used the activity worksheet that focused their attention on concepts, displays, and activities presented in the exhibit. During the nonstructured visit, students did not use any attention-focusing device; instead, they interacted with the exhibit according to their own interests and preferences.

Secondary goals of the study were to determine if gender-related …

A Content Comparison Of Nontechnical Curricula For Engineers, Bryan Lynn Lundgren

Dissertations

The purpose of the study was to compare and critique the nontechnical curricula content of three Bachelor of Science in Engineering (BSE) degree program model curricula. Curricula content areas that are similar were critiqued by employers of engineers. Model curricula importance and first year BSE nontechnical skill performance were rated by engineering supervisors. The main postulate is that differences among actual, model, and employer-desired nontechnical curricula are factors that may influence curricula change in engineering education. A secondary purpose was to investigate whether the proportion of nontechnical courses to total required courses in BSE college degree programs changed between 1975 …

Worldview Theory And Science Education Research: Fundamental Epistemological Structure As A Critical Factor In Science Learning And Attitude Development, William W. Cobern

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

This research paper war originally presented at the annual meeting of the National Association for Research in Science Teaching, San Francisco, March 1989. This research was funded by a grant from the Sid Richardson Endowment at Austin College.

Some of the most interesting work currently being done in science education research is with scientifically misconceived ideas about the causes and mechanisms of natural phenomena, or as it is more simply referred to, misconception research. This type of research can be dated as early as the sixties (see Kuethe, 1963; Boyd, 1966); but it came into its own with the 1983 …

Educational Developmentalism In Nigeria: Education For The Masses Or Just Mass-Education?, William W. Cobern, Mohammad I. Junaid

Scientific Literacy and Cultural Studies Project

In 1983 there was an impressive amount of education news in the media. The western papers and especially the American ones carried numerous articles on the strengths of educational programmes in various countries. There were often articles about strident, high-pressure schooling in Japan; and one read about the Soviet's extreme emphasis on science and, mathematics education. It was the start of the run-up year to elections in the United States and suddenly there was a deluge of campaign rhetoric about education. Both the Democrats and the Republicans deplored the sorry state of American education vis-à-vis the educational strength of America's …