• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.63 no.3
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• pp.166-182
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• 2019

This study examined teachers' difficulties that they encountered free semester science assessment and their problem solutions. Fifteen science teachers who had experiences of free semester teaching and assessment were selected by convenience sampling in this study. The participant teachers mentioned difficulties of accurate scoring in student self/peer assessment and suggested solutions of providing studetns with detailed assessment criteria and opportunities to practice assessment. The participant teachers mentioned a lack of objective assessment criteria for affective domain and suggested solutions of providing criteria prior to assessment and developing assessment framework. The participant teachers mentioned a lack of assessment tools and references for perforamnce assesement. The participant teachers mentioned difficulties of a large teacherstudent ratio for providng feedbacks to students and suggested solutions of decreasing teacher-student ratio and teaching load. The participant teachers mentioned difficulties of identifying student characteristics for assessment reporting and suggested solutions of decreaing teacher work load. The participant teachers mentioned a lack of teacher understanding of process based assessment and inactive attitude to performance assessment and suggested solutions of professional learning community and improving teacher perceptions on performance assessment. The participant teachers mentioned difficulties of a large teacher-student ratio and a lack of time for implementing assessment methods that they learned from professional development programs. With both teacher self-efforts and systematic support, these problems would be solved and success of free semester assessment would be achieved.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.63 no.5
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• pp.360-375
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• 2019

The purpose of this study was to investigate beginning science teachers' perceptions of inquiry-based science instruction using open-ended questionnaire and semi-structured interview. Participants of this study voluntarily set up a goal of inquiry-based science instruction, planned inquiry-based science lessons, and shared and reflected their teaching experiences in their professional learning community for more than a year. Participant teachers recognized students' construction of core scientific concepts through performing scientific inquiry as a goal of science inquiry instruction. Participant teachers indicated that goals of science education such as 'learning scientific core concepts', 'improving students' interest of science', 'improving scientific thinking', and 'understanding the nature of science' can be achieved through students' active engagement in scientific inquiry. Participant teachers recognized not only the importance of teachers' role, but also what roles science teachers should play in order to enable students to perform scientific inquiry. Participant teachers emphasized teachers' roles such as 'identifying core concepts', 'reorganizing science curriculum', 'considering student ability', 'asking questions and providing feedbacks to students', 'explaining scientific concepts', and 'leading students' argumentation.'

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.51 no.1
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• pp.73-81
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• 2007

The purpose of this study was to find out chemistry teachers' perceptions on the aims and characteristics of the chemistry I course from the 7th national curriculum by means of investigating how frequently particular learning contents were selected and what the teachers' teaching styles were in order to find out how effectively teachers were working with the 7th national curriculum in teaching. For this study, data was collected by means of questionnaires, which was answered by 44 chemistry teachers in 40 different high schools. Results from this study are as follows: As for the perception on the aim and characteristics of chemistry I course, many chemistry teachers have already perceived that the aim of the course was to promote democratic citizens with the knowledge of chemistry. And the most appropriate way of teaching chemistry I course was inquiry-centered teaching such as experiment-practice and inquiry-discussion. However, these perceptions were not reflected when they actually taught students in the classroom. Instead, most of the class was concepts learning and there were a lot of differences in selecting learning contents among chemistry teachers. Furthermore, although chemistry I course was considered a good subject to make students have interest and curiosity in chemistry, it was not appropriate to make students understand the concepts of chemistry. Therefore, learning contents in chemistry I course need to improve. In conclusion, as the goal of 7th national curriculum of chemistry I course was to emphasize inquiry teaching, inquiry based teaching should be practiced in the class. Moreover, sufficient teacher training should be accompanied and alternative additional teaching contents should be developed. Finally teachers' experiences should be reflected in the national curriculum when it is revised.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.42 no.4
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• pp.439-448
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• 2022

The goal of this study is to develop a protocol that can be used for the purpose of developing inquiry class expertise in science teacher PLC, and to explore the possibility of field application of the developed protocol through test application with in-service teachers. PLC protocol for science inquiry class, consisting of five stages, was developed and applied sequentially to six participating teachers. In order to check the applicability of the protocol, the participating teachers wrote a reflection journal for each stage, and after the completion of the five-stage protocol, the participants' perceptions of the protocol were investigated through a group interview. The results are as follows: first, a protocol for enhancing science teachers' professionalism of inquiry classes was composed and developed in five stages such as (1) Revealing ideas about science inquiry classes, (2) Sharing science inquiry class experiences, (3) Looking together at students' scientific inquiry results, (4) Building literacy for science inquiry teaching, and (5) making science inquiry lesson plans. Second, the possibility of extensive application of the PLC protocol developed in this study was confirmed through the reflection journal and post-interview analysis results of the participants. According to the participating teachers, the protocol helped the systematic operation of PLC and teachers' participation. In addition, by experiencing the five-stage protocol, the teachers had an opportunity to reflect on their inquiry classes and ponder for improvement, and gained confidence in inquiry classes. Based on the research results, ways to develop and utilize the PLC protocol for science teachers were suggested.

• Journal of Korean Library and Information Science Society
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• v.54 no.3
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• pp.249-270
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• 2023

The purpose of this study is to identify the characteristics of school library services using the RGT (repertory grid technique), and to examine whether there are differences in the perceptions and internal experiences of school library services between human resources (librarian teachers, subject teachers, and librarians). I used indicators such as element intensity, construct extremity, discrepant constructs, and implicative dilemmas to analyze the characteristics of school library services. The elements of the repertory grid were set to 9, and 14 constructs were set through focus group interviews with 3 librarian-teachers. The GRIDCOR 6.0, which can be accessed online, was used to complete the repertory grid for 30 graduate students of the College of Education, and 6 of them were selected and analyzed, considering the demographic characteristics. From the perspective of element intensity, it was found that the following school library services are important and influential: resource management, teacher-librarian collaboration, and reading and information counseling services. The clarity of one's role, the actual performance, and self-regulatory ability were ranked high from the perspective of constructs intensity.

• Journal of Gifted/Talented Education
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.175-200
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• 2008

The study aims to assess needs of administrative and financial support for effective performance of teacher professionalism of gifted. For this end, practicing teachers of gifted education were nationwide selected for survey questionnaires. The first survey of five-scale Likert item was conducted in July 2005 with 236 teachers and the second survey of open-ended item was done in November 2005 with 123 teachers. All the respondents provided their perceptions to current status of administrative and financial support for gifted education and needs for their effective performance of professionalism. Suggestions for improving conditions of administration and finance in terms of effective performance of teacher professionalism in gifted education were as follows: First, teachers should be assigned as full-time for gifted education. Otherwise, their teaching hours and other related jobs should be, reduced Second, the financial support for gifted education should be increased, in particular, more in provincial areas than metropolitan cities. Third, appropriate grouping and counseling according to diverse differences of students should be done. Fourth, understanding of principals and teachers in general education as well as parents and general public toward gifted education should be improved through inservice education program and other education programs. Further, teachers of gifted education should be provided with more frequent opportunities for participating inservice programs in quality, share knowledge and experiences among teachers through network systems, and be given appropriate incentives for better performance of professionalism.

• Journal of Music and Human Behavior
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.89-117
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• 2019

The purpose of this study was to explore and better understand special education music teachers' perceptions of their music curriculum. For this purpose, we conducted a focus group interview with seven special education music teachers. During the interview, four major themes and 14 sub-themes were identified. The main themes were the following: (a) types of applied activities and the goals of music classes (e.g., activities to be applied in various ways depending on the characteristics of the disability and intended outcome), (b) difficulty in implementing the music curriculum (e.g., lack of fit between textbook and students' chronological ages, lack of time and focus, self-evaluation of performance as a music teacher, (c) therapeutic experiences during music classes (e.g., expectation for positive effects through music therapy, joy of witnessing changes in students, and sense of togetherness), and (d) obstacles to the therapeutic approach of music classes and need for support (e.g., lack of professional knowledge regarding therapeutic approaches and problems with administrators and school environment). Based on these results, problems in implementing the music therapy approach as part of the music curriculum in special education schools are discussed and practical solutions for educators are offered.

• Education of Primary School Mathematics
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.141-162
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• 2023

Recently, in school mathematics, classes using mathematical modeling are attracting attention to improve students' mathematical problem-solving skills. However, existing preceding studies have been conducted mainly on elementary, middle, and high school or in-service teachers, so it may be limited to apply the contents and results of the research as it is to pre-service teachers, who are future professors. Therefore, this study examined the school days' experiences of mathematical modeling for pre-service elementary school teachers. In addition, in order to provide a positive experience for mathematical modeling, mathematical modeling problem creation activities were conducted through group activities, and the results and their perceptions were examined. As a result of the study, elementary school preservice teachers had very little experience with mathematical modeling activities during their elementary, middle, and high school days. It was found that there is a deficiency in creating an appropriate mathematical modeling problem suitable for the level of elementary school students. In addition, it was found that they had a positive perception of mathematical modeling after participating in the study. Based on these results, implications for the training process for preservice teachers were suggested.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.659-667
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• 2004

The purposes of this study were to examine the middle school science textbooks published according to the 7th curriculum by analyzing overall structure of the books and STS contents, and to diagnose the current status of STS education in science classroom through interviews with teachers and students of the middle schools. It was found that STS approaches were of increasing importance in the science textbooks, however, they were not popular in the science classes. STS topics in the middle school textbooks were related mostly to 'applications of science' and 'social problems and issues', and few of the topics were related to 'cooperative work on real problems', 'multiple dimensions of science' and 'practice with decision making strategies'. Major barriers of STS education implementation in middle school science classroom were identified as follows; difficulties of assessment, teachers' insufficient cognitions and experiences regarding STS education, perceptions of students and parents that prefer didactic lecture methods and working on exercises. Desirable directions for the improvement of present status of STS education in middle school science classes were proposed.

• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.33-42
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• 2014

There are complex interactions between personal and contextual features in teaching in a science museum. In order to analyze two teachers' holding classes in a science museum, the CHAT (cultural historical activity theory) was used as an analysis tool in a case study. The analyses of the results revealed that both teachers had difficulties teaching in a science museum due to the contradictions among the factors of subject, rules, community, and division of labor in the activity system. Although both teachers had trouble with similar contradictions, there appeared to be different sets of internalization and externalization of such conflicts depending on the difference in the teacher's perceptions and experiences about teaching in a science museum, the passion and the motivation of the teachers. These suggested that efforts should be preceded to foster the activity system providing both emotional and social supports to teachers in order to activate teaching in a science museum. Taking a teacher training course on teaching in a science museum was also found to fail to function as mediating artifacts. The course should provide not only the experience of executing proper teaching strategies for teaching in a science museum and the feedback on their teaching, but also the guidance on how to lead to optimal expansion of the factors in the activity system.