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Scissors, paper, stone: How students' deal with conceptual conflicts in an inquiry-based activity
Citation
Paper presented at the Conference of Asian Science Education 2008, National Kaosiung Normal University, Kaohsiung, Taiwan, 2008
Abstract
One of the goals of inquiry-based teaching and learning of science is for students to learn the processes of inquiry and to apply these processes in new situations to construct new knowledge for themselves. Very often, students who are exposed to inquiry
activities encounter conceptual conflicts that do not align with their pre-conceived ideas. How these conflicts are resolved provide different types of learning experiences for the learners. Interaction talk during hands-on science inquiry activities provides a good source of information on how students deal with conceptual conflicts and, in particular, how they apply inquiry skills to resolve these conflicts. The analysis of talk in interaction amongst a group of six grade five students in a Singapore school has surfaced at least three ways whereby students construct and shape their learning in an inquiry-based science activity through the ways they deal with conceptual conflicts: (a) domineering voices in a group
can prematurely curtail alternative ideas and concepts in dealing with a conceptual
conflict; (b) a peer expert in a group can scaffold learning for a student facing a conceptual conflict; and (c) learners draw on inquiry skills to resolve cognitive conflicts arising from anomalous results or behaviours during hands-on investigations.
Date Issued
February 2008
Project
CRP 9/07 TAL