The study presented here is an action research that was conducted in a science and technology teaching course in a pre-service elementary teaching program at a private university in Turkey aiming at improving the pre-service elementary teachers' understanding of science and teaching science. In order to achieve this aim, an innovative approach,…

Effective use of educational technologies by teachers in classrooms has come into prominence as the integration of technology into educational settings in todays world is considered as an inseparable part of an effective teaching. Besides, recent teacher training curriculums too emphasize the use of teaching strategies including technology to…

The aim of this study is to evaluate the effects of Argumentation Based Science Teaching on 5th grade students' conceptual understanding of the subjects related to "Matter and Change". This research is a qualitative research and its design is a multiple (compare) case study. In this study, semi-structured interviews related to the…

One of the four basic language skills of children, writing, is central to expressing themselves and to developing high level thinking capabilities. Competence in writing is a rather complex learning structure in which cognitive and, especially, psycho-motor learning processes are intensively employed and it further needs to be fed by perceptive…

The purpose of this study is to explain prospective science and technology teachers' pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) about the cell. Lesson preparation, laboratory plan, interview with teacher candidates, and concept mapping were used to collect the data for prospective teacher's PCK. The study was conducted with six prospective science and…

This study aims to investigate the effects of concept maps, together with conceptual change texts, given to 11th grade students' on the subject of molecules carrying genetical information. The semistructured individual interviews were conducted with 5 upper class students to find misconceptions related to the subject. A success test was developed…

Various methods have been performed to identify teachers' attitudes towards assessment. Recognizing the idea that mapping is one of the most efficient tools, this study was aimed to investigate the effectiveness of attitude maps in the evaluation of teachers' attitudes towards assessment. The instrument, composed of open-ended questions, was…

Teacher beliefs have become important constructs in educational research with the recognition that beliefs are the best indicators of teachers' planning, decision-making and subsequent classroom behaviour. In this movement many probes and strategies have been employed by researchers for effective data collection and analysis. This paper discusses…