• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.25 no.7
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• pp.507-518
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• 2004

The purpose of this study was to develop and validate an instrument for analysing secondary school science laboratory classroom. Three classroom of novice teachers were observed and administered Dana's (2001) situated laboratory activity instrument. Dana's situated laboratory activity instrument consists of eight categories. Each category includes four levels. Three doctoral students and two science education specialists participated in modification of the through 15 science education graduate students. To achieve reliability, the researcher and two raters observed and analyzed three videotaped classrooms through discussion. The finalized instrument was employed in four novice teacher' classes and result indicated the instrument to be useful in identifying the inquiry level of a secondary laboratory classroom. The inquiry level of four novice teachers was confirmation or observation.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.37-49
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to classify the logical forms of scientific explanations provided by teachers in secondary earth science classrooms, to examine the characteristics of the scientific explanations in different forms, and to identify the roles of the teacher and students in discursive practices for scientific explanations. Data came from the earth science teachers who participated in overseas teacher in-service programs in the years 2003 and 2004. A total of 18 video-taped lessons and their verbatim transcriptions were analyzed. The result showed that deductive-nomological explanations occurred most frequently in earth science classrooms and that the deductive-nomological model was well-suited to those problems for which there existed firmly established scientific laws or principles to construct scientific explanations. However, abductive explanations were presented when the classes dealt with retrodictive tasks of earth science. The statistical-probabilistic and statistical-relevance models were also employed in explaining weather proverbs and unusual changes of weather, respectively. Most of the scientific explanations were completed through the teachers' monologic utterances, and students assumed passive roles in discursive practices for developing scientific explanations. Implications for science lessons and science education research were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.175-188
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• 2008

The purposes of this study were to develop an Earth systems-based earth science module and to investigate the effects of field application. The module was applied to two classrooms of a total of 76 second-year high schoolers, in order to investigate the effectiveness of the developed module. Data was collected from observations in earth science classrooms, interviews, and questionnaires. The findings were as follows. First, the Earth systems-based earth science module was designed to be associated with the aims of the national Earth Science Curriculum and to improve students' Earth science literacy. The module was composed of two sections for a total of seven instructional hours for high schoolers. The former sections included the understanding of the Earth system through the understanding of each individual component of the system, its characteristics, properties and structure. The latter section of the module, consisting of 4 instructional hours, dealt with earth environmental problems, the understanding of subsystems changing through natural processes and cycles, and human interactions and their effects upon Earth systems. Second, the module was helpful in learning about the importance of understanding the interactions between water, rock, air, and life when it comes to understanding the Earth system, its components, characteristics, and properties. The Earth systems-based earth science module is a valuable and helpful instructional material which can enhance students' understanding of Earth systems and earth science literacy.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.17 no.9
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• pp.1005-1013
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• 2008

In this study, in order to analyze the air quality of the indoor environments of schools, we measured the indoor, outdoor and personal exposure concentration level of $PM_{10}$ for 40 classrooms(20 old, 20 new) in chungnam area from June 22 to July 19 and from November 21 to December 30, 2003. 1. Old classrooms contained more dust than new classrooms; the average of respirable dust is $43.27\;{\mu}g/m^3$ for new classrooms while $53.38\;{\mu}g/m^3$ for old one. The exposure concentration level of respirable dust in new classrooms were in summer higher outdoors than indoors. The values were indoors $46.71\;{\mu}g/m^3$, outdoors $50.46\;{\mu}g/m^3$, and personal $41.62\;{\mu}g/m^3$. Meanwhile in winter indoors had a higher concentration level than outdoors, the values being indoors $39.11\;{\mu}g/m^3$, outdoors $34.86\;{\mu}g/m^3$, and personal $49.01\;{\mu}g/m^3$. 2. Cr concentration level within dust was slightly higher in summer indoors ($101.50{\pm}32.10\;ng/m^3$) and outdoors ($100.89{\pm}35.18\;ng/m^3$) than winter indoors ($85.80{\pm}48.95\;ng/m^3$) and outdoors ($74.43{\pm}38.93\;ng/m^3$), but in personal concentration level, winter was higher. The results of this research show insufficient understanding of health risks from indoor air pollution, and shows possible health problems to students from school indoor air pollution. As such, a logical and systematic education program for students about the importance of indoor air quality should be carried out. Also the results of $PM_{10}$ concentration level measurements emphasize the need for regular measurements of indoor / outdoor and personal concentration level. New classrooms in particular needs to be used after measuring pollutants and safety, and requires installation of a ventilation device in all classrooms to improve air quality.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Earth Science Education
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.276-285
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• 2014

The purpose of this study is to investigate the pattern and characteristics of elementary school teaching and learning processes in science based classes. The study participants' class was recorded in video and instructional conversation transcription. The pattern of the observed class was analyzed using the classification frame suggested by Mogan &Saxton(2006). In result, the questioning for elicit information was most frequent and questioning for shape understanding and the questioning for press for reflection in its priority. In result, the presence of elicited questioning for the attainment of knowledge and understanding is more prominent in science-based classrooms. It was revealed that the participating teachers used the questioning sentence pattern more frequently and the self-sustained inquiry that accelerates creative thinking of the student was lacking. It was discovered that teaching elicited questioning, which accelerates creative thinking, as well as fact confirmation pattern is a necessary element of training for teachers.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.36 no.4
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• pp.390-403
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• 2015

The purpose of this study was to explore discursive-epistemic mechanisms in high school earth science lessons. A total of 11 video recordings of earth science lessons were collected from three inservice high school teachers. The video recordings were all transcribed and analyzed by employing the discourse analysis framework used in relevant previous studies. In analysis, we identified discursive-epistemic mechanisms as functional assemblies for fulfilling particular epistemic functions in the earth science lessons. The characteristics of these mechanisms were described according to their epistemic functions. The findings of the study were compared with those of previous studies to highlight the characteristics of discursive-epistemic mechanisms in the earth science classrooms. Analyses of middle school science lessons and of science lessons in alternative forms, as well as studies using extended research methods such as indepth interviews with teachers, were suggested as implications for future research.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.268-277
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• 2001

This study was to investigate the preconception and phases of children's conceptual change about season through an instruction on the concept. Participants in the study were seventy-eight fifth graders in two classrooms of an elementary school located in Incheon city. Children's preconception was examined using a questionnaire, consisted of a drawing and literal explanation. The questionnaire also was used at the midterm-test, post-test, and one-week delayed-test. The results shows several findings as follows: some children (a) change their synthetic conceptions to form another synthetic conceptions through the instruction; (b) exhibit that their conceptions are unstable; and (c) are mainly influenced by distance and heating effect on the seasonal spatial distribution between the Earth and the Sun, and by the Earth's rotation on the seasonal change of constellations in acquiring the scientific concepts.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.269-278
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• 2006

In this study, we used Virtual Reality (VR) materials on an introductory earth science course consisted of thirty six pre-service science teacher program students. Before and after class an instrument of Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES) was administered. The main focus of the CLES was to evaluate how the classroom was prepared for student centered learning environment. The pre and post tests of student perceptions regarding their learning environment were compared in six domains: personal relevance, critical voice, shared control, student negotiation, scientific uncertainty, and attitude. Questionnaire regarding the general perception of the VR materials was administered as well. How future science teachers valued the use of VR materials in their classrooms was found from this study. Based on these results, we intend to contribute for a more complete understanding of the potential of VR materials in achieving better learner-centered classroom environment.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.25 no.5
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• pp.610-623
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• 2005

This was a theoretical study of which the goal was to provide a foundation for developing and implementing earth science inquiry activities based on abduction as a scientific inquiry method. Through a review of relevant literature, the study examined the nature of earth science in terms of the goals of earth science inquiry and the characteristics of what is investigated in earth science. It also explored the forms and meanings of abduction, thinking strategies used in the abductive inference, and the abductive inquiry model. Abduction is the process of inferring certain rules (e.g., scientific facts, principles, laws) and providing explanatory statements or hypotheses in order to explain some phenomena. This method was found to be well-suited to the earth science inquiry which studies the causes and processes of natural phenomena in the earth and space environment. Abduction has the nature of ampliative, selective, evaluative, and creative inference, and several thinking strategies, including reconstruction of data, heuristic generalization, analogy, existential, conceptual combination, and elimination strategies, are employed for inferring rules and suggesting hypotheses. This study found the abductive inquiry model to be adaptable to earth science classrooms, and it is therefore suggested that earth science instructions should be based on the abductive method and that research work concerning the abductive inquiry in the classroom should follow.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.36 no.5
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• pp.484-499
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• 2015

This study explores the impact of a STEM integration teacher professional development program focusing on teachers' perception of engineering and their attitudes toward integrating engineering into teaching. A total of sixty-eight teachers from ten schools participated in the program for five days. Data are collected from three main sources including (1) pre and post concept maps probing teachers' perceptions about the engineering discipline, (2) a pre and post survey measuring teachers' self-efficacy of teaching science/mathematics within the engineering context, and (3) engineering integrated science and (or) mathematics lesson plans and teaching reflections. This study utilizes both qualitative and quantitative research methods depending on the data we have collected. The results show that both science and math teachers thought that integrating engineering into teaching provided valuable outcomes, i.e., promoting students' learning about engineering and improving their interest in science or math through real-world problem solving exercises. Participants also felt more comfortable about integrating engineering in their teaching after the program. The results also imply that the teachers' understandings of engineering become more concrete after the program. This study also provides an overview of the challenges and advantages of teaching engineering in K-12 science and mathematics classrooms.