Teaching For Conceptual Understanding In Science

Teaching for Conceptual Understanding in Science

Models of Teaching for Conceptual Understanding and the Effects on Learning Science Concepts

Teaching science concepts for conceptual understanding has its challenges. Promoting conceptual change in the science classroom can be difficult because most concepts are complicated and counter-intuitive. This dissertation research aimed to determine the effect of teaching for conceptual understanding models on pre-service teachers’ conceptual understanding and grade 8 science students in five different countries. The analysis revealed a statistically significant correlation between the conceptual change model and the conceptual understanding of the pre-service teacher participants. The results supported the effectiveness of the conceptual change model, CCM, in addressing misconceptions and promoting conceptual understanding of forces and motion among the pre-service teacher participants that volunteered for this research. The second study investigated the effectiveness of the CCM in addressing pre-service elementary teachers’ misconceptions and promoting conceptual understanding of electrostatics. The results showed that the CCM moderately correlated with participants’ conceptual understanding of electrostatics. The third study examined the usage of teaching for conceptual understanding practices and its effects on students' science achievement scores across five industrialized countries. TIMSS 2015 and 2019 data were used to investigate eighth-grade science teachers’ use of teaching for conceptual understanding practices. However, the statistical analysis showed that teaching for conceptual understanding had a negative effect on students' science achievement in most of the countries used in the study. This research contributes to the literature on the effect of the conceptual change model and teaching for conceptual understanding on learning science concepts.

Contemporary Science Teaching Approaches

Contemporary science teaching approaches focus on fostering students to construct new scientific knowledge as a process of inquiry rather than having them act as passive learners memorizing stated scientific facts. Although this perspective of teaching science is clearly emphasized in the National Research Council’s National Science Education Standards (NRC, 1996), it is however challenging to achieve in the classroom. Science teaching approaches should enhance students’ conceptual understanding of scientific concepts which can be later utilized by students in deeper recognition of real world (Marsak & Janouskova, 2007). This book identifies and describes several different contemporary science teaching approaches and presents recent applications of these approaches in promoting interest among students. It promotes conceptual understanding of science concepts among them as well. This book identifies pertinent issues related to strategies of teaching science and describes best practice The chapters in this book are culmination of years of extensive research and development efforts to understand more about how to teach science by the distinguished scholars and practicing teachers.