Title
Students' guided inquiry with simulation and its relation to school science achievement and scientific literacy.
Abstract
The study investigates the effect of an interactive simulation with embedded inquiry support, which was seamlessly embedded within the simulation, on students' scientific literacy and school science achievement, and explores the relationships among prior school science achievement, inquiry processes and scientific literacy. A total of 49 eighth-grade students at a public junior high school in northern Taiwan participated. Data collected include the students' pre- and post-scores for school science achievement, logging data that indicate their inquiry processes, and pretest, posttest, and delayed-test data that measure their scientific literacy. The results provide evidence that the designed simulation and inquiry support had a long-term effect on the students' scientific literacy. Replacing conventional teaching with inquiry activities did not harm the students' school science achievement performances. Moreover, compared to school science achievement, students' scientific literacy seems a better predictor of their inquiry behavior, especially in the aspect of making conclusions. Analyses of the students’ inquiry processes indicate that the so-called low science achieving students conducted more data analyses than the other students, and demonstrated adequate inquiry engagement. The students with middle level school science achievement demonstrated the most active engagement in inquiry and showed good gains of scientific literacy after the learning. These results indicate that a guided inquiry learning environment can support students with different levels of school science achievement to highly engage in science inquiry. Implications and future studies are discussed.
Year
DOI
Venue
2020
10.1016/j.compedu.2020.103830
Computers & Education
Keywords
Field
DocType
Applications in subject areas,Simulations,Pedagogical issues,Improving classroom teaching,Secondary education,Inquiry,Scientific literacy
Computer science,Middle level,Harm,Interactive simulation,Mathematics education,Pedagogy,Learning environment,Future studies,Scientific literacy,Active engagement
Journal
Volume
ISSN
Citations 
149
0360-1315
0
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.34
0
8
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Cai-Ting Wen142.22
Chen-Chung Liu249253.96
Hsin-Yi Chang315312.67
Chia-Jung Chang416722.53
Ming-Hua Chang542.22
Shih-Hsun Fan Chiang642.22
Chih-Wei Yang700.68
Fu-Kwun Hwang8305.42