Altering socio-cultural beliefs hindering the learning of science

Recent studies in educational productivity and effectiveness of schooling have shown that certain factors could be altered within the classroom to result in enhanced achievement and positive attitude towards the study of science. A learner who is not positively disposed to, or has a socio-cultural background that is indifferent to the learning of science would find it hard to learn science effectively. If, as suggested by recent research, the socio-cultural characteristics which children in non-western society bring into the classroom from their environment create a wedge between what they are taught and what they learn, it is plausible to hypothesise that school based alterations of the socio-cultural prior knowledge of the learner could result in school effectiveness. This study attempted to determine whether or not instruction based on a socio-cultural model could significantly alter students' attitudes towards the learning of and achievement in science. The sample consisted of 600 senior secondary year one students (442 boys, 156 girls) from 15 secondary schools in Nigeria. The Socio-Cultural Environment Scale (SCES) and the Biology Achievement Test (BAT) were used to measure the change in attitude and achievement of subjects respectively in a pretest — posttest situation after a six-week treatment. Evidence was found from the study to support the hypothesis that science instruction which deliberately involved the discussion of socio-cultural views about science concepts altered students' attitudes toward the study of science. The finding also indicated that some socio-cultural factors were amenable to alterations in such a way as to promote the subjects' positive attitudes towards the study of science.     

Secondary School Students' Attitudes Towards Science

Four hundred and fifty‐one students' attitudes towards science were investigated. Two types of instruments (questionnaire and Attitude Scale) were used to collect the data. The results show that the students in general hold a favourable attitude towards science; male students have more positive attitude towards science than female students; the type of school (science‐school, single‐sex school or general secondary school) attended have an effect on the students' attitudes to science. The low enrollment in science is not due to the lack of interest or negative attitudes to the subject but may be due to some other variables that need to be investigated.     

The effect of instruction on socio-cultural beliefs hindering the learning of science

Although recent studies have shown that the sociocultural characteristics which children in non-western society bring into the classroom from their environment create a wedge between what they are taught and what they learn, very little has been done to solve the problem. A learner who is not positively disposed to, or has a socio-cultural background that is indifferent to, learning science would find it hard to learn science effectively. This study investigated whether instruction through the use of the socio-cultural mode has any significant effect on students' attitude towards the learning of science. The sample consisted of 600 senior secondary year-one students (442 boys, 158 girls) from 15 secondary schools in Nigeria. The Socio-Cultural Environment Scale (SCES) and the Biology Achievement Test (BAT) were used to measure the change in attitude and achievement of subjects in a pretest-posttest situation after a six-week treatment. Evidence was found to support the hypothesis that science instruction which deliberately involves the discussion of socio-cultural views about science concepts engenders positive attitudes towards the study of science. The findings also indicate that anthropomorphic and mechanistic views can be presented in such a way as to promote positive attitudes towards the study of science in traditional cultures.     

Attitudes and achievement of Bruneian science students

The aim of this study was to evaluate attitudes towards and achievement in science of Form 3 students studying in single-sex and coeducational schools in Brunei. The results demonstrated significant differences in attitudes towards and achievement in science of male and female students in single-sex schools and students in coeducational schools. These differences were at moderate level. In single-sex schools, the girls achieved moderately better in science than the boys despite their attitudes were only marginally better than the boys. However, there were no gender differences in attitudes towards and achievement in science of students in coeducational schools. The attitudes towards and achievement in science of girls in single-sex schools were moderately better than those of girls in coeducational schools. Whereas the attitudes towards and achievement in science of boys in single-sex schools were only marginally better than the boys in coeducational schools. However, further research to investigate (a) if these differences are repeated at other levels as well as in other subjects, and (b) the extent to which school type contributed towards these differences is recommended.     

Students’ perceptions of teachers’ interpersonal behaviour across four different school subjects: control is good but affiliation is better

Many researchers have pointed out that teachers’ interpersonal behaviour relates to students’ positive attitudes towards schooling. However, only few studies have examined whether students’ perceptions of their teachers’ interpersonal behaviour relates to students’ subject-related attitudes across different school subjects. In this study, it was investigated to what extent the interpersonal behaviours of secondary school teachers are perceived differently by the students as a function of the school subject being taught and whether such perceptions coincide with students’ attitudes towards the subject matter, after controlling for students’ achievement. To address these research questions, 2305 adolescent students (47.1% males; M_age = 17.85; SD = 1.09) from grades 9 to 11 and their teachers (N = 42; 38.1% males; mean years of teaching = 14.2; SD = 1.25) from one urban high school in Turkey were surveyed. The students completed the Questionnaire on Teacher Interaction and attitude questions. Multilevel data analysis showed that Control related to positive attitudes among students in classes grouped under the science, and literature and language domains, but not in classes grouped under the arts and sports domain. Perceived Affiliation, on the other hand, was positively associated with all the four subject domains (science, social sciences, literature and language, and arts and sports). These results show the importance of taking a multidisciplinary perspective in in-service training programmes for secondary school science teachers as they emphasise the differential roles that control as an interpersonal behavioural style may play on students’ attitudes in certain subject matters.     

Grade Placement of High-School Biology

Abstract

Using 35 elementary schools (3,350 fourth and sixth grade students), 10 secondary schools (3,613 eight and eleventh grade students), and 1,145 teachers, this study presents data summarizing the relationships between student' perceptions of "verified" principal competencies and selected school climate indices and outcome variables. The results indicated that there is a general tendency for positive teacher attitudes towards various dimensions of the school and working environment and higher student standardized achievement test performance to be associated with students' reports of a low frequency of interaction with die principal. A student "independence factor" was hypothesized to account for these results, with the implication being that principal/student interaction is minimized in schools where teacher and student attitudes are positive and student achievement is high. In addition, effective principal performance in dealing with student misbehavior was highly and positively associated with school average daily attendance at the secondary level. Supplementary analyses indicated that teacher and student attitudes "mediating" the school environment were relatively independent for both elementary and secondary samples. General support was found for higher correlations between student assessments of principal competencies and school environment measures than with student performance measures.     

Ethnicity,test anxiety and science achievement in Nigerian students

Abstract

This study investigated ethnic and gender differences in test anxiety and achievement test performances of Nigerian junior secondary school students. The sample consisted of 100 Ibibio, 100 Yoruba and 100 Tiv students randomly drawn from four rural schools in each ethnic zone. Each sample consisted of 50 male and 50 female students, between the ages of 11 and 16. Two research instruments, a test anxiety scale and an integrated science multiple‐choice test, were used, Multivariate analysis of variance indicated that: (i) there were significant ethnic and gender effects on the test anxiety and achievement test performance of the students; (ii) there was significant negative correlation between test anxiety and achievement test performances for the ethnic and gender groups of the students, except for the Yoruba female students who had insignificant negative correlation for the two variables. The significant negative correlation remained when the effects of gender and ethnicity were statistically controlled; (iii) test anxiety was affected by the inter‐active effects of gender and ethnicity; (iv) achievement test performance was affected by gender, ethnicity and test anxiety, and their interactive effects.     

Attitudes towards science: A review of the literature and its implications

This article offers a review of the major literature about attitudes to science and its implications over the past 20 years. It argues that the continuing decline in numbers choosing to study science at the point of choice requires a research focus on students' attitudes to science if the nature of the problem is to be understood and remediated. Starting from a consideration of what is meant by attitudes to science, it considers the problems inherent to their measurement, what is known about students' attitudes towards science and the many factors of influence such as gender, teachers, curricula, cultural and other variables. The literature itself points to the crucial importance of gender and the quality of teaching. Given the importance of the latter we argue that there is a greater need for research to identify those aspects of science teaching that make school science engaging for pupils. In particular, a growing body of research on motivation offers important pointers to the kind of classroom environment and activities that might raise pupils' interest in studying school science and a focus for future research.     

Changing the attitudes of high school students towards intellectual disabilities: the contribution of a social coexistence programme

Students’ attitudes towards peers with intellectual disabilities are mostly negative, and negative attitudes appear more among secondary education students than any other age group. Social coexistence programmes are intervention programmes implemented by school psychologists to manage and change negative attitudes and enforce social interaction with students with disabilities. The research sample consisted of 193 public high school students in Greece who were given the Chedoke–McMaster Attitudes Toward Children with Handicaps (CATCH) Scale. The study aimed to explore whether there is a change in the attitudes of high school students towards peers with intellectual disabilities after participation in a social coexistence programme. The findings showed that students who participated in the programme had more positive attitudes towards people with intellectual disabilities after the completion of the programme. The above findings confirm the research on the possibility of changing attitudes of secondary school students towards peers with disabilities and reinforce the need for the systematic development of social coexistence programmes for the entire student population. Future research should focus on the benefits of students with disabilities from their participation in social coexistence programmes.     

Phantom and big-fish-little-pond-effects on academic self-concept and academic achievement: Evidence from English early primary schools

The Big-Fish-Little-Pond Effect (BFLPE) suggests that school-average achievement has a negative effect on academic self-concept (ASC); some research has also verified a negative effect on students' academic achievement. Our study evaluates the compositional effects of school-average achievement on both outcomes, using a longitudinal sample of English early primary school students in Year 1 and Year 4. We provide evidence for BFLPEs in children as young as six to nine years of age. Further, we show that the BFLPE is a potential mechanism in the negative compositional effect of school average achievement in Year 1 on students' achievement in Year 4. Once adjustments for measurement error are made, the negative effect of school-average achievement on students' self-concept, and on their subsequent achievement, becomes even more negative. Our findings question previous research suggesting that attending a school with higher average achievement necessarily advances students’ outcomes.     

The development of a questionnaire to measure students' motivation towards science learning

The purpose of this study was to develop a questionnaire that measures students' motivation toward science learning (SMTSL). Six scales were developed: self‐efficacy, active learning strategies, science learning value, performance goal, achievement goal, and learning environment stimulation. In total, 1407 junior high school students from central Taiwan, varying in grades, sex, and achievements, were selected by stratified random sampling to respond to the questionnaire. The Cronbach alpha for the entire questionnaire was 0.89; for each scale, alpha ranged from 0.70 to 0.89. There were significant correlations (p?<?0.01) of the SMTSL questionnaire with students' science attitudes (r?=?0.41), and with the science achievement test in previous and current semesters (r ^p?=?0.40 and r ^c?=?0.41). High motivators and low motivators showed a significant difference (p?<?0.01) on their SMTSL scores. Findings of the study confirmed the validity and reliability of the SMTSL questionnaire. Implications for using the SMTSL questionnaire in research and in class are discussed in the paper.     

Effect of women science career role models on early adolescents' attitudes toward scientists and women in science

In order to change the attitude of early adolescent female and male students toward scientists and women in science, students in the middle school/junior high grades were exposed over a two months' period to women science career role models as part of their science instruction. This treatment positively affected the students' attitude toward scientists and toward women in science. It is suggested that teachers of science in the middle school/junior high should periodically bring community resource people who use science in their careers to the classroom to act as role models and that women should be included among this group so that the attitudes of both male and female students toward scientists and women in science might be improved.     

The Effects of Dichotomous Attitudes toward Science on Interest and Conceptual Understanding in Physics

The literature on students' attitudinal constructs in science education asserts that students hold dichotomous attitudes toward science (AS). For instance, studies from the Relevance of Science Education project reveal that students possess negative attitudes in terms of their favourableness toward school science, preference toward scientific careers, and emotional states toward science (negative intrinsic AS), despite their positive perception that science is important for society (positive extrinsic AS). The issue demands in‐depth examination, since not enough science educators have studied the effects of the dichotomous AS on science education. Rather, they have attempted to improve the uncategorised AS for stimulating student achievement in science education. Hence, the aim of this study is to clarify how the dichotomous attitude (intrinsic AS and extrinsic AS) relates to the two educational products in science: interest inventory and conceptual understanding. One hundred and sixteen physics learners in Japan were sampled for fitting the structural equation model in this study. Our final model validated by LISREL suggests that intrinsic AS exclusively stimulate students' interest and conceptual understanding in physics, while extrinsic AS fail to play their expected role. Finally, features of the sampled 10th‐graders and their dichotomous AS are further interpreted with the prevalent concept of the hidden curriculum.     

The Relationship between Students' Connections to Out‐of‐School Experiences and Factors Associated with Science Learning

This study examined the relationship between students' out‐of‐school experiences and various factors associated with science learning. Participants were 1,014 students from two urban high schools (secondary schools). They completed a survey questionnaire and science assessment describing their science learning experiences across contexts and science understanding. Using multilevel statistical modelling, accounting for the multilevel structure of the data with students (Level 1) assigned to teachers (Level 2), the results indicated that controlling for student and classroom factors, students' ability to make connections between in‐school and out‐of‐school science experiences was associated with positive learning outcomes such as achievement, interest in science, careers in science, self‐efficacy, perseverance, and effort in learning science. Teacher practice connecting to students' out‐of‐school experiences was negatively associated with student achievement but has no association with other outcome measures. The mixed results found in this study alert us to issues and opportunities concerning the integration of students' out‐of‐school experiences to classroom instruction, and ultimately improving our understanding of science learning across contexts.     

The relationship between affect and achievement in science

The relationship between affect and achievement in science was examined in two stages. First, a model was developed and tested for science-related affect, the complex of students' attitudes toward, interests in, and perceptions about science at school. The LISREL approach to path analysis was used to demonstrate the fit of the model to data collected from grade 8 students in two different schools on two different occasions. In the second stage of the research, multiple linear regression was used to examine the direction of the relationship between science related affect and achievement and to apportion variance common between previous and subsequent achievement and the components of science-related affect. It was found that affect is related more strongly to previous than subsequent achievement and that much of the common variance can be attributed to students' perceptions of their competence in science.     

Differences in Motivation Towards Science Subjects Among Kibbutz and Urban High School Students

This paper study analyzes differences in motivation towards science subjects among kibbutz and urban high school students in Israel. Students' motivational traits in science were explored by a questionnaire whose items corresponded to four motivational patterns: achievement, curiosity, conscientiousness and sociability. The major findings of this study are that a) Kibbutz students were mostly sociability oriented in the learning of science, b) city students were mostly sociability and achievement oriented in the learning of science, c) city students were better achievers than kibbutz students in junior high school, while in senior high school the difference between them was nonsignificant, d) there was a significant increase in kibbutz students' achievement motivation in learning science when passing from junior to senior high school.     

Language and Student Performance in Junior Secondary Science Examinations: The Case of Second Language Learners in Botswana

Teaching and testing in science in junior secondary schools in Botswana, takes place in English which is a second language for the majority of Batswana (Citizens of Botswana are called Batswana [sing. Motswana] and the national language is Setswana.) students and a third language for many. The understanding of textual material in science has been shown to be problematic for first language speakers, which means that difficulties in comprehension are likely to be even greater for second language readers. This study set out to test the hypothesis that improving the readability of junior certificate science examination questions would improve student achievement. Results show that changing certain readability factors, such as sentence length, simplified vocabulary and the removal of obscure information, brought about an improvement in achievement. The conclusion considers the implications of the study for the writers of examinations and other texts in science.     

School Work,Homework and Gender

This paper explores female and male students' attitudes towards school work in terms of application and achievement. The data are drawn from interviews with students, teachers, careers officers and welfare officers in three semi‐rural comprehensive schools in one local education authority (LEA) [1]. (The students were in their last year of compulsory schooling, Year 11, and were aged 16 [2].) The three schools had invited the authors to explore why boys were achieving below their potential in terms of course work and end of course grades. The findings of the study show how school, peer group and community factors influence students' attitudes towards school work and homework. However, the situation is not just one of boys' under‐performance: the pattern of girls' achievement at 16 (the school leaving age) is not always carried through post‐16 or into career destinations. The problem is one of ‘equalising opportunities’ for all young people, taking into account the different patterns of need at different stages in their school careers.     

A Cross-grade Comparison to Examine the Context Effect on the Relationships Among Family Resources,School Climate,Learning Participation,Science Attitude,and Science Achievement Based on TIMSS 2003 in Taiwan

This study aimed to examine whether the relationships among family resources, school climate, learning participation, science attitude, and science achievement are different between primary school students and junior high school students within one educational system. The subjects included 4,181 Grade 4 students and 5,074 Grade 8 students who participated in TIMSS 2003 in Taiwan. Using structural equation modeling, the results showed that family resources had significant positive effects for both groups of learners. Furthermore, a context effect for the structural relationship between school climate, learning participation, and science achievement was revealed. In the primary school context, Grade 4 students who perceived positive school climate participated in school activities more actively, and had better science performance. However, in the secondary school context, learning participation had a negative impact and led to lower science achievement. The implications about this result in relation to the characteristics of the two educational contexts in Taiwan were further discussed.