2018 Volume 58 Issue 4 Pages 403-410
The main purpose of this study is to evaluate whether 2nd grade (before learning) and 3rd grade elementary school students (after learning) have acquired scientific knowledge about the morphology of insects by using free writing and drawing methods as evaluation tools. The main findings of this study were as follows; 1) none of the 2nd grade students and about 30% of the 3rd grade students explained insect morphology scientifically; 2) about 95% of the 2nd grade students explained morphology of insects from particular insects’ or other creatures’ examples unscientifically because they lacked knowledge about intension and extension of the insect’s concept; 3) in 3rd grade students’ case, about 40% of pupils’ scientific explanations were based on proposition A (a body of insects makes up head, thoracic, and abdomen), whereas only 1% of their scientific explanations were based on proposition B (insects’ thoracic has six legs); and 4) in both 2nd and 3rd grade students, a small percent explained insect morphology by contrasting their differences with human bodies. Based on these results, we suggested some perspectives to consider in order to reconstruct current teaching and learning methodology with regard to insect morphology.
