Elementary School Students' Science Learning Characteristics in the Affective Domain and It's Relationship to the Levels of Inquiry Requirement in Science Experiment Instruction

초등과학 실험 수업에서 탐구 요구 수준에 따른 초등학교 학생의 정의적 영역 학습의 특성

In this study, elementary school students' science learning characteristics together with the levels of inquiry requirement in elementary school science experiment instruction were investigated in terms of the affective domain. We divided seventy-three students of the fifth ade into two groups according to the levels of inquiry requirement. After each instruction had been implemented, the characteristics of the students' learning in terms of the affective domain were compared and analyzed within the context of the levels of inquiry requirement. There were no significant differences between Level 1(LL) and Level 2(HL) groups in terms of the affective characteristics. These results may be caused by the burden imposed by the difficulty in thinking through and setting up the experimental methods. However, the HL group students' levels of interest in science experiments was higher than that of the LL group. In conclusion, the HL instruction contributed little to the improvement of affective characteristics. Some possible reasons might be that students felt difficulties with the somewhat unfamiliar instructions which required them to design and perform experiments. Higher levels of interest in science experiments amongst HL students' implies that well-organized and continuous exercises involving the design and performance of experiments could improve students' scientific affective characteristics.