Effect of "integrated discrepant instructional model" in chimistry laboratory on grade 10 students' cognitive engagement, epistemological beliefs about science, nature of science understanding, and metacognitive awareness

النوع : Thèse

This study explored the effect of the “Integrated Discrepant Instructional Model” (IDIM) in chemistry laboratory on grade-10 students’ (a) cognitive engagement in laboratory learning experiences (CELLE), (b) personal epistemological beliefs about science (PEBS), (c) nature of science understanding (NOSU), and (d) meta-cognitive awareness (MA). The investigation followed a semi-naturalistic mixed method case study approach with qualitative predominance. The predominant qualitative traits were manifested in a constructivist, interpretative, and exploratory line of investigation that emphasized participants' views, contextual considerations, process rather than only results, and the development of beliefs, as outcomes of the research process. The ‘minor’ quantitative part was essentially pre-experimental ('one-group pretest-posttest'), where posttests were administered to the participants after they had been pretested and subjected to an experimental treatment condition (i.e. implementation of the IDIM). Twelve tenth graders from a coeducational school (diverse population, four educational programs) participated in the study. Participants were selected from two grade-10 sections (40 students) in the College Preparatory Program (CPP). Stratified random sampling (with respect to gender and achievement) was followed to improve the representativeness of the sample. To maximize the richness and diversity of collected data, a variety of instruments was used: Inventories [The Epistemological Beliefs Assessment for the Physical Science (EBAPS), Metacognitive Awareness Inventory (MAI), and Nature of Scientific Knowledge Scale (NSKS)], comprehensive pre-post questionnaires, and interviews (focus group and informal), and IDIM's components (write - up, quiz, and debriefing reflective phase). The study's trustworthiness (methods and findings) was ensured through ‘respecting sensitivity to reader’s needs’ (audit trail, truthfulness, & usefulness), ‘using sound research methods’ (triangulation and consistency with literature recommendations), and 'thoroughness of data collection and analysis' (contextual completeness and self-reflection). The study (short termed and small sample) was meant to be an in-depth, focused, scrupulous, and multifaceted preliminary exploration to lay a solid foundational framework for future extended research about the study's subject. Therefore, the outcomes were not intended to be generalizable in any way. Different lines of evidence originating from the study suggested that the IDIM’s influence seemed promising on students': (a) ’conceptual awareness' level (fundamental rationale, parts of its structure, and its essential learning implications) pertaining to cognitive engagement (b) epistemological beliefs about science associated with the ‘nature of knowing and learning’ (c) nature of science understanding associated with the ‘creative’ attribute of scientific knowledge and (d) metacognitive awareness associated with the regulatory skills of 'information management’. Expectedly, the model ought to be more advantageous when incorporated within an integrated science curriculum framework that is founded on ‘big ideas’ associated with personal epistemology, the nature of science, and metacognition.