• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.69-85
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to develop criteria for evaluating final reports of free inquiry activity and to apply developed evaluation criteria to free inquiry activity reports. 323 inquiry reports submitted to internal contests in the elementary schools as well as 189 award-winning ones from the inquiry competition for students in Seoul were collected. Nine categories and 18 sub-categories of evaluation criteria were derived by collecting reports analysis, literature reviews and interviews with 15 elementary school teachers. Criteria for each sub-category were organized into three steps and 12 elementary school teachers assigned scores for each sub-category, which were averaged. 132 including both award-winning and general reports were evaluated based on the developed evaluation criteria. The content validity and the reliability across scorers were significant. Furthermore, award-winning and general reports were significantly distinguished by the developed criteria in terms of all sub-category scores. The developed evaluation criteria will be an effective tool to asses student's free inquiry activity.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.285-297
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• 2013

The purpose of this research is to find the effect of the lesson using open-inquiry report Lubric on open-inquiry standard and science process skill; to find the change of cognition on open-inquiry for elementary school 5th grade students. Two classes (elementary school 5th grade) were selected which located in a small and medium-sized city for this research and they were separated as an experimental group and a comparative group. Open-inquiry lesson was done by referring teaching method which introduced through the curriculum. The procedure was understanding about open-inquiry, making open-inquiry subject, planning, and performing inquiry, mid-term, performing inquiry, making a report, presentation, and evaluation. Open-inquiry report Lubric which developed by Sook-Kyung Kim et al. (2010) was provided to the experimental group. Comparative group was instructed by using open-inquiry report which introduced to the elementary school 5th grade science text book. Interview paper was developed in order to check out the effect of the research by using a test paper of science process skill. The following could be found out through the research. After open-inquiry lesson, 10 open-inquiry reports(5 reports from experimental group, 5 reports from comparative group) have been drawn at random as samples from the total 62 sets (30 reports from experimental group, 32 reports from comparative group) and evaluated by a researcher and two elementary school teachers who have master degree. The reliability of the 3 scorers was 0.923 of mean correlation coefficient. And then the researcher evaluated all open-inquiry reports. The average score of open-inquiry report was 66.78 for experimental group, 54.27 for comparative group, respectively. And there was a significant difference at p<0.05 level as a result of the t-test. The experimental group rated high at p<0.05 level according to the analysis of post-science process skill test. According to the result of survey, both experimental group and comparative group had understood open-inquiry activity. It was especially rated high for experimental group on understanding scientific inquiry process, interest and satisfaction in open-inquiry and re-participation rate. By interviewing experimental group, it is recognized that the students utilized Lubric very well through the overall process. Finally, self-evaluation was done during open-inquiry activity and it was reported that the students gained more knowledge about science and changed to positive about science. As a result, the lesson using open-inquiry report Lubric was effective for students to improve writing skill of an open-inquiry report and science process skill and finally changed the cognition to positive about open-inquiry lesson.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.1075-1083
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• 2015

The purpose of this study is to develop a checklist for helping students write scientific inquiry reports after conducting open inquiry. To do this, eight scientifically gifted middle school students' worksheets for open inquiry, inquiry activities during conducting open inquiry, and final scientific inquiry reports were analyzed. Parts that were considered unsuitable in the writing inquiry reports as well as good parts were identified, and using this result, a checklist for helping students write good inquiry reports was developed. The checklist consisted of five categories and 46 items. The checklist was applied to inquiry reports written by seven other gifted students. Analyzing agreement rates of the checklists with two evaluators, high reliability could be obtained. Finally, recommendations for more effective use of the developed checklist were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.56 no.3
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• pp.371-377
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• 2012

In this study, open inquiry reports of 165 eighth graders in Daegu were analyzed in terms of content area, the types of inquiry hypothesis, and the types of inquiry variables. Before summer vacation, students learned about inquiry process and explored their own inquiry topic for two class hours. During summer vacation, students performed open inquiry including problem selection, designing and performing experiment, data collection, data analysis, and writing report. After the vacation, students submitted their reports, and answered to additional survey regarding the source of inquiry idea, the definition of hypothesis, and the most difficult step of inquiry process. As a result, chemistry was the most dominant content area of the reports and biology and life science were the next. 130 out of 165 reports included inquiry hypotheses, and most of them were predictive hypotheses. In many reports, dependent and independent variables could not be identified because of their ambiguity. However, inquiry variables described in experimental design, which were mostly categorical variables, were clearer than those described in inquiry subject and inquiry hypothesis. The most difficult step of inquiry process for students was to generate an idea for open inquiry.

• Hwankyungkyoyuk
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.75-86
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• 2000

The purpose of this study is to analyze the content of environmental inquiry activities and values of elementary school students written in their reports of the Energy Environment Inquiry Activity Contest which is a unit contest of the Youth Science Festival held annually in Korea and get some ideas for the valuable way of Korean environmental education. 10 teams' reports were gathered and the locality, class study area, inquiry theme, inquiry method and values were analyzed and introduced as case studies to get some insights to teach elementary school students environmental values through inquiry activities of science subject approach. Each teams set various inquiry themes in the content domain of energy resources and earth environment conservation focusing on each team's geographical characteristics and occurring environmental problems in their local areas. There were 16 sentences representing technocentrism and 12 sentences representing ecocentrism. 5 of 10 teams showed both of technocentrism and ecocentrism in their reports. But their was only scientific knowledge without any environmental values in one team's report. Inquiry activity is a good teaching-learning method to develop environmental literacy. There should be environmental values involved as far as it is the environmental inquiry activities using environmental subject matter. The result of this study proposes that environmental educators should actively intervene for inquirers to set a stage in the whole process to search for an alternative to solve environmental problems involved in their project activities. The reason is because the environmental education in the elementary school is established to operate by the infusion way into various subjects already existed in the Korean curriculum.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.404-414
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• 2009

The revised curriculum in 2007 includes open inquiry approach to increase students' interest in science and to build up creativity. So teachers and pre-service teachers should be equipped with the ability of open inquiry performance. In order to investigate pre-service teachers' readiness to perform open inquiry tasks, we analyzed reports written as homework by a group of 71 juniors in a national university of education. The investigation tool was composed of four domains: topic selection, the inquiry process, the conclusion, and reporting. Each domain had three or four sub-domains. By using the framework, four raters scored the students' inquiry reports. The findings reveal that the pre-service elementary school teachers have difficulty in the domain of 'topic selection' and the 'conclusion' compared with the other domains. Under the topic selection domain, they showed weaknesses in 'creativity' and 'scientific topic' and under the conclusion domain, they had difficulty in 'recognizing limits' and 'value of conclusion'. The finding suggests that pre-service teaching program should provide with opportunities to perform open inquiry continually.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.642-649
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• 2005

Argumentative discussion is one of the important components of an educational program, which allows students not only to learn the process of social negotiation through discussions, but also to improve students' overall research abilities. The purpose of this study was to examine a) the changes between inquiry of before-argumentative discussion and inquiry of after-argumentative discussion, and b) the connections between the inquiry changes and online argumentative discussion. This study analysed 726 messages in an online argumentative discussion, as well as in first research reports and second research reports. The results of the study indicate that science-gifted students' research abilities were improved through on-line argumentative discussion that provided them with feedback based on interactive discussions, and encouraged them to re-examine hypotheses and experiment processes. The science-gifted students showed knowledge and abilities for identifying simple errors in research processes and arguing problems in the flow of the whole logic of research.

• Journal of Korean Elementary Science Education
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.262-276
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to investigate and analyze the elementary teachers' views and students' views about the difficulties in teaching and learning on open inquiry activities of elementary school science. Semi-structured interviews were conducted individually with three elementary teachers who have serviced more than three years, and with twenty four elementary students attending schools located in Cheongju City. And their anecdotes were collected and analyzed. The interview questions were developed through Seidman's steps to acquire the reliability in the interview data. From the interviews and anecdotes, we found that elementary teachers' views about the difficulties of teaching open inquiry activities: the difficulties of teaching in finding inquiry problem and planning inquiry, the difficulties of managing group activities, the difficulties of managing class hours for inquiry, the lack of the students' inquiry abilities, and problems on students' affective characteristics. And the students have the views about the difficulties in doing open inquiry activities: the difficulties of finding inquiry problem and planning inquiry, being unaccustomed to write reports, the troubles with investigating, problems on affective characteristics, the difficulties of joining in a group, and the lack of inquiry abilities. The teachers give suggestions for effective application of the open inquiry activities: first, the teachers must encourage students' emotion and will in doing open inquiry activities, second, there must be the steady inquiry teaching and learning in ordinary elementary science classes. Based on the results, this study suggested that elementary teachers should concern specially about students' being unaccustomed to write reports and the troubles in doing scientific investigation.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.65 no.3
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• pp.209-218
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• 2021

This study investigated the condition of chemistry teacher's student competency assessment based on the inquiry report. To this end, an inquiry report was collected for chemistry teachers who took the training at two universities that conducted the 2020 first-class chemistry teacher training. The science subject competencies presented in NAEA analysis framework was used to analyze what kind of competencies teachers assess students through inquiry reports. A total of 63 chemistry teachers submitted inquiry reports, which were analyzed by competency, sub-element of each competency, and detail element to analyze the actual situation. As a result of the study, most chemistry teachers reflected their 'scientific inquiry and problem-solving ability' in their evaluation through inquiry reports. 'Ability to understand and apply scientific principles', which is mainly evaluated through paper-based evaluation, was partially used as confirmation of prerequisite learning at the beginning of the inquiry and the weight of evaluating 'scientific communication skill' was not large. In 'scientific inquiry and problem-solving ability' through inquiry report, 'design and conduct explorations', 'data analysis and interpretation' and 'drawing conclusion and suggesting solution' were mainly assessed. However, 'discover and recognize problems' and 'development and use of model' were hardly assessed.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.67 no.2
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• pp.106-115
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• 2023

The purpose of this study was to investigate the errors in science inquiry research reports written by students who won the encouragement award at the National Science Fair, and analyze the frequency of error types by school levels. The framework for analysis was constructed based on the table of contents of the students' science inquiry research reports, and the reports were analyzed for errors in six stages: Research question/hypothesis, prior research, experimental procedure, results, conclusions, and references. The study identified several types of errors at each stage, such as unreasonable research questions and wrong hypotheses in the research question/hypothesis stage, and limited considerations under certain conditions and selection of inappropriate experimental instruments in the experimental procedure stage. The study found that the frequency ratio of experimental procedure error was the highest across all school levels, and the order of errors varied by school level. Frequency ratio of error types of school level was: in the elementary school students' reports, errors were analyzed in the order of experimental procedure (36.88%), prior research (17.02%), conclusions (16.31%), research question/hypothesis (13.48%); In the middle school students' reports, experimental procedure (42.86%), conclusions (20.00%), prior research (14.28%), results (11.43%), research question/hypothesis (10.01%); In the high school students' reports, experimental procedure (45.16%), research question/ hypothesis (16.13%), conclusions (16.13%), and prior research (11.83%). The findings could be used to guide teachers in helping students conduct scientific inquiry research or write reports.