The Effects of Constructivist Instruction on Science Inquiry Skills and Science-Related Attitudes of Elementary School Students

구성주의적 수업이 초등학생의 탐구능력 및 과학에 관련된 태도에 미치는 효과

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of constructivist instruction on science inquiry skills and science-related attitudes, and to investigate the students' responses to the lesson using constructivist instruction. In this study, 108 students of sixth graders from four classes were intentionally selected from two elementary schools located in Gyungsan city, Kyungsangbukdo. Two classes of 54 students were used by the constructivist teaching program and the other two classes were handled by the traditional teaching program. Two teachers who have twenty years' careers guided the program prepared by researcher to the students and this examination was conducted for 8 weeks (total 20 class hours). In pretest and posttest, both groups were tested in the science inquiry skills and science-related attitudes. An interview and questionnaire for the students analyzed the responses about the constructivist instruction. The major results of this study are as follows: First, in science inquiry skills test, there was no statistical significance between the score of the experimental group and that of the comparative group(p>.05). The ability of formulating problem in the experimental group was significantly higher than that in the comparative group at 0.05 level. In pretest and posttest, the experimental group was statistically significant on classifying, formulating problem, interpreting data, while the comparative group was not significant on those. Second, we can find that the experimental group has more positive effect on forming the desirable science-related attitudes than the comparative group(p<.05). Especially, experimental group is significantly higher the attitudes about the science curriculum than the comparative group at 0.05 level Third, constructivist instruction has more affirmative tendency of the students' learning activity. Constructivist instruction generated much interest and curiosity about science for the students, and this method prompted students' expression and discussion.