Iztok Devetak

The Influence of 16‐year‐old Students’ Gender, Mental Abilities, and Motivation on their Reading and Drawing Submicrorepresentations Achievements

Submicrorepresentations (SMRs) are a powerful tool for identifying misconceptions of chemical concepts and for generating proper mental models of chemical phenomena in students’ long‐term memory during chemical education. The main purpose of the study was to determine which independent variables (gender, formal reasoning abilities, visualization abilities, and intrinsic motivation for learning chemistry) have the maximum influence on students’ reading and drawing SMRs. A total of 386 secondary school students (aged 16.3 years) participated in the study. The instruments used in the study were: test of Chemical Knowledge, Test of Logical Thinking, two tests of visualization abilities Patterns and Rotations, and questionnaire on Intrinsic Motivation for Learning Science. The results show moderate, but statistically significant correlations between students’ intrinsic motivation, formal reasoning abilities and chemical knowledge at submicroscopic level based on reading and drawing SMRs. Visualization abilities are not statistically significantly correlated with students’ success on items that comprise reading or drawing SMRs. It can be also concluded that there is a statistically significant difference between male and female students in solving problems that include reading or drawing SMRs. Based on these statistical results and content analysis of the sample problems, several educational strategies can be implemented for students to develop adequate mental models of chemical concepts on all three levels of representations.

Comparing Slovenian year 8 and year 9 elementary school pupils’ knowledge of electrolyte chemistry and their intrinsic motivation

This study explored the differences between eight-year elementary school pupils (before the curriculum reform) and nine-year elementary school pupils (soon after the curriculum reform) in Slovenia, as regards specific chemistry knowledge and motivation to learn chemistry. Altogether, 191 elementary school pupils participated in the study. The results show that pupils of nine-year elementary school are not significantly better at chemistry knowledge test scores than eight-year elementary school pupils. Similar results were obtained when comparing intrinsic motivation. The results also show that those students who exhibit a higher level of intrinsic motivation to learn chemistry do not perform better at the test as a whole, but the correlation is low, although statistically significant, between motivation and pupils’ performance at solving selected problems presented in this paper. Results show that students develop different misconceptions of selected chemical concepts. Based on the results of this study, some guidelines for teachers are suggested.

The Criteria for Evaluating the Quality of the Science Textbooks

Textbooks are important sources from which students obtain knowledge. The inadequate and inconsistent scientific knowledge presented in science textbooks can negatively affect students’ conceptions. Different learning theories should be applied when preparing educational material, especially textbooks. Research shows that an adequate combination of both, visual and verbal, aspects of presenting science concepts is ideal. Visual-verbal learning allows students to reconcile the two modes and compare carefully the information available in the picture with the explanation in the text. Research also shows that around 90 % of students learn science using some form of text, but important conclusions are that science texts do not significantly contribute to quality learning in science education. Science textbooks demand that the learner integrates quite complicated science concepts, together with language abilities (scientific vocabulary and syntax and also capability of reading, writing and oral communicating), visualisation materials (different images, symbols, comic-strip style, etc.) and format in the science text. This chapter also focuses on the analysis of the data gathering techniques and instruments which are used in the qualitative research, especially the text analyse, which is the basis for the in-depth science textbook content analysis. A special emphasis of this chapter is also to present the criteria which serve the purpose of finding out the quality of teaching material.

Educational Models and Differences between Groups of 16-year-old Students in Gender, Motivation, and Achievements in Chemistry

The previous chapter is somehow continued to this chapter entitled “Educational models and differences between groups of 16-year-old students in gender, motivation and achievements in chemistry” by Devetak and Glažar who described other aspects of students’ characteristics using statistical analysis of numerous variables regarding triple nature of chemical concepts presentations. Students can be differentiated into groups during classroom activities also according to their abilities, academic achievements, and interests. On the basis of these classifications students can be engaged in specific learning tasks. Different models can be formed according to students’ academic achievements, motivation for a specific subject, gender, and also other variables that can influence classroom dynamics. Three predictive educational models developed by discriminant analysis are presented. This rather complicated statistical analysis can show that teachers should be aware that girls need more attention in chemistry learning than boys. Teachers should extrinsically motivate using macroscopic level of chemical concepts and put those concepts into the context for those students who are low achievers in physics and have low intrinsic motivation for learning chemistry.