• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.31 no.6
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• pp.942-957
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• 2011

The purpose of this research was to examine the concept of elementary school teachers of combustion. The participants were selected from the elementary school teachers who had various career experiences, 6th grade science teaching experiences, and academic backgrounds on science. For the purpose of this study, 12 elementary school teachers took the concept-test formed five questions on combustion and were interviewed. The concept-test was composed with 'The definition of combustion', 'The reason that the candle was blown out when glass was closed.', 'The existence of oxygen and carbon dioxide of before and after combustion in glass', 'Combustion of iron', 'Combustion products'. And the collected data by semi-structured interviews based on responses to the concept-test. During the analysis of the data, additional interviews by phone, e-mail and Internet messenger were conducted if necessary. The answers to each question were classified into three levels: (Scientific-concept(S), Partial-concept(P), Misconcept(M)). The research results showed that all teachers had misconceptions or partial-concept of more than 50 percent of each question. Teachers who had the 6th grade science teaching experience acquired scientific concepts of the combustion more than teachers who did not have the 6th grade science teaching experience. We should develop visualization materials about the change of gases during combustion and use these materials for implementation of the scientific concept.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.33 no.6
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• pp.1219-1236
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• 2013

The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between subject matter knowledge (SMK) and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) for science teachers. To this end, a total of 26 secondary Earth science teachers participated in this study and a concept diagnostic questionnaire and a lesson planning task of atmospheric pressure were devised to give an indication of participating teachers' SMK and PCK, respectively. The results of this study are summarized as follows: First, participating teachers showed a variety of SMK levels about atmospheric pressure. Second, teachers at high level of SMK focused on 'supplementary' and 'fundamental' curriculum contents for in-depth conceptual understanding, but teachers at low level of SMK, on the contrary, stressed 'applicative' curriculum contents. Third, teachers at high level of SMK grasped students' misconceptions and difficulties in learning atmospheric pressure far more concretely than teachers at low level of SMK. Lastly, teachers at high level of SMK showed a tendency to use learner-centered instructional strategy by utilizing students' prior knowledge, but teachers at low level of SMK were inclined toward teacher-directed concept explanation. Based on this study, some implications for effective science teacher preparation programs were also discussed.

• Child Health Nursing Research
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• v.5 no.2
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• pp.211-234
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• 1999

The purpose of this article was to get hold of adolescent's needs for sex knowledge and to reveal their understanding of sex. These results may be applied to the sex education and counselling for adolescent. The participants of study were 267 students (females, 144 ; males, 123) who were the first and second grade form 1 middle and 2 high schools. They were asked to describe 3 questions that they wanted to know or to learn about sex. Their questions about sex were total 779(girls, subtotal 456, mean 3.2, boys, subtotal 323, mean, 2.6). These questions categorized to 9 items by content analysis. The items were ‘sexual drive, behavior and tendency(229, 29.4%)’ , ‘anatomy and physiology of reproductive system(140, 18.0%)’, ‘reproduction(131, 16.8%)’, ‘concept of sex(31, 4.0%)’, ‘acquaintance between the other sexes(17, 2.2%)’, and ‘the others(9, 1.2%)’ in order of frequency. The most frequent item that the student want to know or team about sex was ‘sexual drive, behavior and tendency’ except girls of sophomore in middle school. There were several features in participants' needs for sex knowledge as respects of the understanding of sex- biological sex, gender, and sexuality. The prominent feature in knowledge need of bio logical sex was that the participants had the interests according to their biological sex. They had the negative attitude to the phenomenons (ex, menstruation and pregnancy, phimosiectomy, etc) that they experienced or would experience due to their biological sex. A part of them asked the questions based the misconceptions and used the slangs or ‘××’, ect. to name the male or female genitalia. The male students wanted to know the female genitalia. The participants' understanding of gender reflected the sexism of our society, but they didn't accept and had doubts about the dual, hierarchical structure of that. The students, especially female seemed to be powerless to the harms of the sexual violence. Girls had much interest in their appearances and complained to our sexual culture that women comforted and served men. The participants had the dual perspective that the sexuality as respects of physiologic phenomenon was considered as natural but that as related to heterosexuals was as negative. And they deemed that men's sexual drive was stronger than women's and was difficult or was not able to be inhibited. They had much interests in homosexuality but reflected the negative attitude to that in our society. Adolescent felt wonder why the expressions of sexuality of adult were permitted but theirs were not. Lastly, a part of boys substituted querying the sexuality of animals for asking that of human. Maybe it was because of the embarrassment to talk about human's sexuality directly. The teenaged participants understood that the sex had not only the biological meanings but also the sociocultural meanings. They regarded the sex as natural and wanted to know it, but they had conceptions that it was difficult and embarrass to talk about it openly and directly.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.55 no.6
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• pp.1030-1041
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• 2011

We investigated the understanding of pre-service science teacher about the chemistry concept of middle school curriculum using some items in National Assessment of Educational Achievement and analyzed the result according to background variables of pre-service science teacher. The result was that there were some pre-service science teachers who select incorrect answer at all items, pre-service science teachers don't fully understand the concept needed to solve item. And the percentage of correct answer at some items was low regardless of selection of chemistry as an elective subject at CSAT(College Scholastic Ability Test). We found some facts through the depth interviews to find the cause of the result. First, the misconception acquired in middle school days is tend not to change until college student. Second, the formation of misconception is affected by the study habit with which solve problem by simple calculation and memory without essential understanding. Third, the study habit with which solve problem by simple calculation and memory without essential understanding could not replace misconceptions acquired in middle school days with scientific concept regardless of selection of chemistry as an elective subject at CSAT.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.62 no.3
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• pp.243-252
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• 2018

In this study, we compared 8th graders' macroscopic and microscopic conceptions related to the properties of substances. A test for the basic particle concept and a test for the macroscopic and microscopic concepts of melting point, solubility, and density were developed and administered to 371 students. Their responses were classified into 4 categories on the bases of their understanding of the macroscopic and microscopic concepts. The proportions and characteristics of each category were also analyzed. The analyses of the results revealed that the students who understood the macroscopic concepts had various misconceptions at the microscopic level. Many students had difficulty in understanding not only microscopic concepts but macroscopic concepts. The microscopic responses of the students who did not understand the macroscopic concepts hardly corresponded with their macroscopic level responses. The students who responded correctly to the test for the basic particle concept also had difficulty in understanding the concept of the properties of substances. When they understood the macroscopic concepts, the proportions of the students who understood the microscopic concepts were high. On the bases of the results, educational implications for effective teaching and learning of concepts related to the properties of substances and for improving the future national curricular are discussed.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.80-93
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• 2010

The scope of this study is: (1) to review or summarize the theoretical explanations of diffusion; (2) to investigate the preservice teachers' understanding of diffusion utilizing the inquiry experiment of diffusion that was developed in this study. The data was collected through questionnaires given to 41 preservice teachers in 3 universities and interviews with 20 subjects from this population, who conducted the inquiry experiment. During the experiment, the data was collected from the students' reports and 3 small groups' audio/video recordings. To understand preservice teachers' conceptions, reports, audio/video recordings, questionnaires and interviews were analyzed and discussed with co-workers. The results follow: (1) The differences between effusion and diffusion as well as equal-pressure experiment and equal-flux one on diffusion were discussed; (2) Most preservice teachers understood effusion and diffusion connected to Graham's law of diffusion by rote and have misconceptions about the diffusion process; (3) They observed two kinds of diffusion experiments (equal-pressure and equal-flux) by inquiry experiment, but the majority of them failed to find conceptual differences between these experiments. After the inquiry experiment, about 40% of the samples modified their conceptions about diffusion.

• Communications of Mathematical Education
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.145-174
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• 2009

Based on the thinking that people can understand more clearly when the problem is related with their prior knowledge, the Purpose of this study was to analysis students' informal knowledge, which is constructed through their mathematical experience in the context of real-world situations. According to this purpose, the following research questions were. 1) What is the characteristics of students' informal knowledge about fraction before formal fraction instruction in school? 2) What is the difference of informal knowledge of fraction according to reasoning ability and grade. To investigate these questions, 18 children of first, second and third grade(6 children per each grade) in C elementary school were selected. Among the various concept of fraction, part-whole fraction, quotient fraction, ratio fraction and measure fraction were selected for the interview. I recorded the interview on digital camera, drew up a protocol about interview contents, and analyzed and discussed them after numbering and comment. The conclusions are as follows: First, students already constructed informal knowledge before they learned formal knowledge about fraction. Among students' informal knowledge they knew correct concepts based on formal knowledge, but they also have ideas that would lead to misconceptions. Second, the informal knowledge constructed by children were different according to grade. This is because the informal knowledge is influenced by various experience on learning and everyday life. And the students having higher reasoning ability represented higher levels of knowledge. Third, because children are using informal knowledge from everyday life to learn formal knowledge, we should use these informal knowledge to instruct more efficiently.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.561-571
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• 2016

Purpose: This study reviewed the innovative educational strategies that have been implemented successfully in US baccalaureate nursing education programs to facilitate appropriate attitudes about caring for older adults. Methods: The data were collected through a search of PubMed and CINAHL using the key words, gerontological or geriatric, attitudes about aging or older people, baccalaureate or undergraduate nursing education or curriculum. Results: The successful strategies are categorized as follows: 1) a multidisciplinary approach integrating aging issues and gerontological contents into diverse nursing courses, 2) active participation of community-dwelling healthy older individuals as an educational mentor, 3) use of audiovisual materials to investigate the misconceptions and attitudes about aging, and 4) discussion through critical thinking and self-reflection toward aging. Implications: For the interdisciplinary approach within nursing courses, it is essential to derive the key contents for gerontological nursing applicable to integration into diverse nursing courses. In addition, it is necessary to provide administrative support for implementing innovative strategies and constructing consistent partnerships with the community for active participation of the elderly as a mentor. Lastly, recognizing the significance of educational strategies for enhancing desirable attitudes toward gerontological nursing and supporting the development of educational capability of a faculty are key issues.

• Journal of Science Education
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.116-130
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to investigate the difficulties of science classes experienced by newly appointed elementary school teachers in terms of science content knowledge and teaching method, and to suggest some implications for their effective adaptation. We recorded science lessons conducted by 3 beginning elementary school teachers with less than 5 years experience and also analyzed their classes and interview materials. The results were as follows. First, difficulties that they experienced in science content knowledge was the possession of scientific errors or misconceptions, the lack of awareness and confidence in scientific concepts and principles, and the possession of negative concept about learning materials. Second, difficulties that they experienced in teaching method was the absence of reorganization of the textbook contents, using closed questions, one-sided instructions and explanations by teacher, the application of incomplete analogy, and the lack of understanding about experiment activities. The implication from this study is that beginning teachers need to be provided with curriculum oriented in experiment at teachers college and to participate in various types of educational opportunities.

• School Mathematics
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.301-322
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• 2016

Even though measurement is an important strand of elementary mathematics education, there has been lack of research in this field. This study analyzed topics related to length and time in a series of mathematics textbooks aligned to 2007 or 2009 revised mathematics curriculum. The analysis was focused on three aspects: (a) overall instructional components of measurement, (b) instructional components specific to the topics of measurement, and (c) key competencies in mathematics. The results of this study showed that many topics dealing with length and time were represented with relation to real-life contexts or other subjects. The meanings of measurement terms and the necessity of calculation were well explained but other aspects still had room for improvement when it comes to the necessity of measurement units, appropriate choice of units, and use of students' common misconceptions. Another noticeable result was that problem solving, communication, and reasoning among key competencies in mathematics have been emphasized in the mathematics textbooks. Based on these results, this study provides textbook writers with implications on what to further consider in dealing with length and time.