• Journal of Science Education
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• v.45 no.1
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• pp.69-89
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• 2021

The purpose of this study is to examine personal characteristics of two elementary students who developed individual interest in science. 201 students of two elementary schools in Seoul participated in questionnaire survey engaged in to investigate students' interest in science, engagements and preference in science-related-activities three times a year. This case study was conducted with seven students who showed typical types of interest in science. Students wrote a photo-journal for 12 weeks. They were interviewed every other week by a researcher. We analyzed two students who developed individual interest. It turns out that RF participated in doing experiments at home, and disassembling and assembling things. Participation of activities was a process of solving curiosity. When he was unable to solve problems, he searches the internet or books. Sometimes he would ask for help from his teacher. JW engaged in activities: drawing, doing experiments at home, and going to informal education center. She communicated with others by using online-offline media. Curious questions were solved by herself. The two students have a tendency to solve problems by themselves. Also, positive science-related activities were going on at home and in school. This study not only give insights and understanding of students who developed individual interest in science but also provide implication for educators to examine personal characteristics of students.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.497-512
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• 2023

While scientific explanation is a fundamental component of science, teachers often lack familiarity with the formal structure of scientific explanations and the criteria for assessing their quality. Consequently, this study aims to clarify the concept of scientific explanation and proposes a tool for constructing scientific explanations. The primary objective is to explore the tool's impact on enhancing the explanatory skills of pre-service teachers when it comes to the phenomenon of condensation. The research findings indicate that many pre-service teachers initially operated at a description level during the pre-test. However, the implementation of the tool enabled them to advance their explanatory skills beyond the associative level. Notably, the tool was analyzed for its ability to provide pre-service teachers with a conceptual framework for explaining phenomena and guiding logical explanations and micro-level interpretations. This study holds significance in demonstrating that pre-service teachers can comprehend the formalities and criteria of scientific explanations and apply them to enhance their own explanatory abilities. Moving forward, efforts should be made to enhance the scientific explanation level among pre-service teachers across various topics and subject areas. Furthermore, pre-service teachers need classroom experiences that foster the construction of scientific explanations in authentic contexts.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.107-134
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• 2012

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of two teaching methods of word problems, one based on mathematical modeling learning(ML) and the other on traditional learning(TL). Additionally, the influence of mathematical modeling learning in word problem solving behavior, application ability of real world experiences in word problem solving and the beliefs of word problem solving will be examined. The results of this study were as follows: First, as to word problem solving behavior, there was a significant difference between the two groups. This mean that the ML was effective for word problem solving behavior. Second, all of the students in the ML group and the TL group had a strong tendency to exclude real world knowledge and sense-making when solving word problems during the pre-test. but A significant difference appeared between the two groups during post-test. classroom culture improvement efforts. Third, mathematical modeling learning(ML) was effective for improvement of traditional beliefs about word problems. Fourth, mathematical modeling learning(ML) exerted more influence on mathematically strong and average students and a positive effect to mathematically weak students. High and average-level students tended to benefit from mathematical modeling learning(ML) more than their low-level peers. This difference was caused by less involvement from low-level students in group assignments and whole-class discussions. While using the mathematical modeling learning method, elementary students were able to build various models about problem situations, justify, and elaborate models by discussions and comparisons from each other. This proves that elementary students could participate in mathematical modeling activities via word problems, it results form the use of more authentic tasks, small group activities and whole-class discussions, exclusion of teacher's direct intervention, and classroom culture improvement efforts. The conclusions drawn from the results obtained in this study are as follows: First, mathematical modeling learning(ML) can become an effective method, guiding word problem solving behavior from the direct translation approach(DTA) based on numbers and key words without understanding about problem situations to the meaningful based approach(MBA) building rich models for problem situations. Second, mathematical modeling learning(ML) will contribute attitudes considering real world situations in solving word problems. Mathematical modeling activities for word problems can help elementary students to understand relations between word problems and the real world. It will be also help them to develop the ability to look at the real world mathematically. Third, mathematical modeling learning(ML) will contribute to the development of positive beliefs for mathematics and word problem solving. Word problem teaching focused on just mathematical operations can't develop proper beliefs for mathematics and word problem solving. Mathematical modeling learning(ML) for word problems provide elementary students the opportunity to understand the real world mathematically, and it increases students' modeling abilities. Futhermore, it is a very useful method of reforming the current problems of word problem teaching and learning. Therefore, word problems in school mathematics should be replaced by more authentic ones and modeling activities should be introduced early in elementary school eduction, which would help change the perceptions about word problem teaching.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.532-543
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• 2004

The teacher appointment examination is consisted of a written test, an interview, a demonstration of teaching practices, one's academic record etc. The primary written test(full credit of 100) consists of multiple-choice test of general pedagogy(30%) and constructed response test of science(70%). The science test consists of science education($20{\sim}30%$) and science content($70{\sim}80%$). Five science exams were implemented for appointing general science, physics, chemistry, biology and earth science teachers in 2002 and 2003. The credits alloted to science education domain decreased from $25.7{\sim}30%$ in 2002 to $24.3{\sim}25.7%$ in 2003. The percentage of correct answer was similar between science education and science content domain in 2002, but the percentage of correct answer in science education domain(70.2%) was 29.8% higher than that of science content domain in 2003. Earth science exam almost reached the target mean score of 60 but the other four exams showed the mean scores ranging from 45.0 to 52.7 in 2002 and from 40.1 to 49.6 in 2003. The percentage of high difficulty items(p<40%) was 41.2% in physics and chemistry in 2002, 50% in physics and chemistry, and 45% in biology in 2003. Seventy eight percent of the items showed fairly high discrimination index(r>.30). In addition, the reliabilities of 5 tests were from .79 to .88. In conclusion, it is recommended that the credits alloted to science education domain should be increased up to 30%, and exam difficulties should be lowered to a proper level by making science content items easier.