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Minha formação científica é tal que eu sempre tive muita consciência de si. Eu quero
saber se a teoria é que faz sentido, independentemente das idéias / observações
que estão sendo discutidas.
TEORIA ENORME
É muito comum nos estudos de educação científica descobrir que a franquia técnica
utilizada por seus autores foi emprestada em um campo de pesquisa, e esse é o
caso de várias publicações importantes. No Capítulo 5, algumas das fontes desses
empréstimos externos foram identificadas nas publicações por outras que tiveram
grandes influências. Esse empréstimo de teoria foi bastante inevitável nas décadas
de 1960 e 1970, quando a pesquisa em educação científica ainda estava em sua
infantaria, e os pesquisadores estavam trabalhando mais isoladamente do que
agora é o caso. Com tantas pesquisas desde os primeiros dias, é razoável esperar
que deve haver sinais de teoria emergindo da pesquisa, se algumas de suas
subáreas estiverem amadurecendo (nesse sentido teórico, os empréstimos
tomados, no entanto, continuam e, na década de 1960, desde a década de 1960.
novas teorias emprestadas surgiram na década de 1960. relatórios publicados e
apresentações convincentes da pesquisa em educação científica.Esses
empréstimos têm o efeito saudável de trazer novos insights sobre os problemas da
educação em ciências, mas também podem levar a descrições super-visuais que
não são mencionadas no capítulo 6. exemplos de Gaskell, Canadá e Staberg,
Suécia, onde um arcabouço teórico emprestado forneceu insights que Ted tratou de
perguntas e pesquisas que não ocorreriam aos pesquisadores que não adotaram
esse trabalho de parto. Os estudos desses dois pesquisadores tiveram um forte
quadro teórico com a dimensão de gênero que os levou a buscar efeitos de gênero
nas salas de aula de ciências que, para os outros pesquisadores, teriam sido
observados como neutros em termos de gênero. Da mesma forma, se alguém
adotar uma estrutura fortemente política para o currículo que surgiu em Science for
the People por David Layton. Inglaterra (scc, capítulo 12), os fatores que devem
influenciar o ensino e a aprendizagem das ciências são muito diferentes daqueles
que os pesquisadores sem essa estrutura política esperam.
Woolnough, Inglaterra
TEORIAS SOCIAIS
No capítulo 4, os comentários de Reg Fleming. Canadá, sobre sua tentativa de
descrever e analisar a discussão de questões sócio-científicas na ciência salas de
aula e seu interesse em métodos antropológicos de investigação também capítulo
8), lembrou-me o debate nas ciências sociais quando mudei neles da pesquisa
química em meados da década de 1950. Havia uma forte crença e praticar naquele
momento que era possível estudar e analisar situações sociais em termos de um
modelo positivista, análogo àqueles em uso nas ciências biológicas ou agrícolas.
Fatores ou variáveis foram identificados e as relações entre eles foram procuradas.
As situações reais foram reconhecidas por esses pesquisadores como de caráter
multivariável, mas, no entanto, as relações entre essas variáveis puderam ser
reveladas, desde que fossem feitas boas medidas das variáveis e aplicada
estatística adequada. Outros até acreditavam que relacionamentos essenciais em
situações reais podiam ser observados nas simulações controladas e mais simples
deles. que eles estavam criando artificialmente em grupos experimentais.
Outro grupo, incluindo meu supervisor em Cambridge, Oliver Zangwill, acreditava,
novamente por analogia com as ciências naturais, que era muito cuidadoso no
desenvolvimento das ciências sociais esperar que os fatores importantes cederiam
tão facilmente. Essa escola de pensamento considerou a pesquisa necessária como
sendo uma observação sistemática ampliada da complexidade de situações sociais
reais, na esperança de que isso produzisse descrições válidas das múltiplas
perspectivas e consequentes ações dos envolvidos, e possivelmente algumas
generalizações tentativas. Assim, depois de dois anos como observador persistente
de uma pequena comunidade fabril na qual estava ocorrendo uma grande mudança
na tecnologia de suas condições e procedimentos de produção, forneço uma
descrição do caso e uma ou duas instruções muito cautelosas sobre ele (Fensham e
Hooper, 1964). Um deles, lembro-me, era que os grupos sociais cuja coesão interna
aumentava aceitavam as mudanças de maneira mais positiva que aqueles que
tinham coesão atenuada. À primeira vista, isso parece uma hipótese relacional que
agora poderia ser testada através do levantamento de várias outras comunidades
fabris passando por outras grandes mudanças tecnológicas, e havia muitas delas na
Europa na época da reconstrução pós-guerra. O problema era que não havia como
dizer, sem a realização de estudos de caso como o meu, que grupos na fábrica da
eacli deveriam ser questionados sobre suas ações e visões que indicariam sua
coesão social. Certamente não era. no meu caso, os grupos que foram identificados
na estrutura formal da fábrica. Em outras palavras, o importante funcionamento
social foi altamente contextualizado.
Para apoiar meu estudo, fui aconselhado a assistir às aulas de antropologia social
de Cambridge. Nelas, encontrei outra posição teórica que aceitava a mesma
quantidade de relatos valiosos e ricos de situações sociais complexas, mas fazia
uso de palavras estruturais como parentesco e status. para ajudar a parecer
complexo e complexo, melhor a pesquisa. quanto mais essa rica complexidade
fosse descrita, em vez de reduzida a algumas poderosas variáveis conceituais e
relações entre elas. Em retrospecto. Eu acredito que o meu lado pré-maduro
cientítico eu adotei na época
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Uma década depois, quando passei da química para a educação, fiquei surpreso ao
descobrir quão difundido era o paradigma de pesquisa positivista de variáveis e
relacionamentos, e como isso simplificava demais as complexidades das salas de
aula e das escolas, e muito menos dos sistemas educacionais. Somente
historiadores e filósofos da educação pareciam estar imunes a esse domínio.?? No
momento em que fiz minhas entrevistas para este livro, no entanto, paradigmas
alternativos para a pesquisa em educação já estavam bem estabelecidos e
verdadeiramente estabelecidos, como será evidente em vários de meus
entrevistados.
Teoria Cultural
William Cobern, EUA, que precisa de uma teoria encabeça este capítulo, é um
exemplo de um pesquisador que tinha um interesse intenso em desenvolver uma
teoria que pudesse dar sentido às idéias e observações que ele teve em relação à
educação e cultura, depois de trabalhar como professor. educação na Nigéria.
Depois de mais de uma década refletindo sobre seu trabalho com o povo Fulani na
formação geral de professores e na formação de professores de ciências, ele
finalmente descobriu que a teoria da Visão Mundial atendia a sua necessidade. Ele
foi capaz de adaptá-lo em seu artigo de 1996 na Science Science para contribuir
com as idéias de desenvolvimento sobre mudança conceitual na educação
científica.
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OUTROS CONTRATOS
Da ciência cognitiva
De Psicologia
À medida que as idéias teóricas das equipes de projeto eram divulgadas e alguns
de seus materiais apareciam, não é de surpreender que a frouxidão do uso dessas
teorias as tornasse vulneráveis à crítica daqueles com outras histórias David
Ausubel (1968) fez um ataque bastante vitriólico na noção de ganhar os conceitos
de ciência pela descoberta. Seu complexo, mas mais elaborado modelo teórico de
aprendizado, com seus metaforos neurológicos, atraiu Joseph Novak, EUA, um dos
jovens revolucionários do NARST em 1963 (capítulo 2). Ao longo dos anos, a Novak
manteve-se fiel ao xtreum que foi formulado na época, que os teses no ensino de
ciências seriam desenvolvidos e que
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poder preditivo e explicativo. assim como as teorias da ciência natural. Quando ele
encontrou o livro de David Ausubel (1968), Educational Psychology; Um
conhecimento cognitivo, era exatamente o que ele precisava. Seus dados eram
consistentes com as idéias da teoria quase-neural de aprendizagem significativa de
Ausubel, e suas associações biológicas eram confortáveis para o biólogo Novak. Ele
descobriu que era possível projetar instruções científicas que construíssem os
conceitos de ancoragem (ou subsumidores poderosos), a teoria prevista facilitaria o
aprendizado das ciências ao longo da vida. No devido tempo, Novak colaborou com
Ausubel em uma revisão de seu texto original.
Você vê que vim para Cornell em 1964 para fazer meu doutorado e
sabia exatamente o que ia fazer. Eu estava interessado no efeito de
longo prazo de uma escola no ensino médio quando os estudantes
chegavam à universidade. Eu tinha condições extraordinariamente
boas para fazer minha pesquisa. Tenho alguma teoria. Eu estava
fazendo as coisas intuitirriv. Meu orientador não era um excelente
educador de professores e professores, mas ele não era um
tesoureiro ou pesquisador. Ele me deixou fazer o que eu queria e
fiquei feliz com isso, mas de outra maneira eu não estava muito
animada. No verão de 1967, Joe Novak apareceu no Cornell, e no
ano seguinte eu fui seu primeiro asaistanl. Fiz o curso dele sobre
David Ausubel e, de repente, descobri que eu tinha uma história
para o senhor resete. ThA foi muito, muito influente em mim a esse
respeito
Tamir, Isruel
Grande Teorização
Novak é o único entrevistado que se pode dizer que teorizou para um estágio maior
do que o ensino de ciências. Em 1977, ele publicou seu próprio livro, The Theory of
Education. Ele está enraizado em sua pesquisa em ensino de ciências, mas
apresenta uma teoria de aprendizado que é aplicável, mas não restrita, ao ensino de
ciências. Seu grande interesse pela história e filosofia da ciência significava que ele
precisava ter uma dimensão filosófica, bem como a psicológica que herdou de
Ausubel. A solução veio novamente para ele de fora da Science, na forma do
Entendimento Humano de Stephen Toulmin (1972).
Aqui estava uma pedra angular que eu poderia construir. Ele fala
sobre conceitos como coisas que as pessoas criam, como coisas
que crescem e se desenvolvem, e às vezes se extinguem as
descrevem como espécies e população. Com meus interesses
biológicos, essas metáforas, novamente, faziam sentido.
Novak, EUA
Os escritos de Novak fizeram muito para espalhar essas ideias teóricas para além
da América do Norte, e Cornell tornou-se uma Meca para muitos pesquisadores
estrangeiros, incluindo eu e meu colega Leo West. West, que com Lcon Pines (um
estudante de doutorado em Cornell), posteriormente elegeu em 1985 o que
provavelmente era o primeiro livro substancial e teoricamente baseado em
educação científica, Estrutura Cognitiva e Mudança Conceitual. Três conferências
foram organizadas em Cornell, sob o título de Miseonceptions and Strategic
Educational in Science and Mathematics. Esses meelings fizeram muito para
promover e avançar a pesquisa sobre concepções alternativas, mudança conceitual
e suas idéias teóricas associadas, uma subárea que é discutida em mais detalhes
no Capítulo 9.
Teoria Piagetiana
Heinrich Stork, na Alemanha, foi um dos entrevistados que manteve sua crítica à
teoria da psicologia do desenvolvimento de Praget. Ele escolheu como uma de suas
publicações vignificantes o relatório de 1984 de um estudo empírico que ele fez com
Wolfgang Griber. Nele, eles usaram o Teste LawsDn para estabelecer o nível
piagetiano de um grande grupo de estudantes que faz uma unidade formal de
química que lida com ácidos / ácidos. base, oxidação / redução, ete. Os alunos
foram então procurados depois de uma unidade de química de Ising, que tratava de
tópicos que haviam sido abordados com frequência, envolvendo muitas vezes
censuras censuráveis.
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Embora nenhum dos outros entrevistados tenha alegado teorizar em grande escala
na Novak, vários deles selecionaram uma publicação como significativa porque a
viam como uma contribuição à teoria. Um exemplo pode ser encontrado na terceira
das contribuições significativas de Heinrich Stork. Novamente com Gräber, ele
escreveu um capítulo sobre o uso da linguagem no ensino de ciências para o livro
Desenvolvimento Cognitivo e Aprendizagem da Ciência, que se propunha a fornecer
o significado de algumas das idéias de Piaget aos químicos.
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página 110
Uma teoria da formação de professores Beverley Bell, Nova Zelândia, descreve seu
artigo com Barbara Cowie em Science Education, e o livro que escreveu com John
Gilbert (1996), como um movimento para um modelo de desenvolvimento de
professores que inclui desenvolvimento social, pessoal e profissional.
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até que ponto qualquer um dos quatro autores reconheceria seu artigo como
incluindo ou sendo um quadro ou modelo teórico. Peter Hewson, EUA, concordou
que este foi um artigo importante entre suas publicações, porque atraiu um interesse
externo tão grande ao longo dos anos. Para ele, no entanto, este artigo foi
simplesmente um dos artigos desde o início, e o pensamento de seus colegas sobre
a mudança conceitual na ciência e no ensino de ciências, que depois evoluíram
através de vários estudos e artigos por quase uma década. As condições do artigo
eram idéias que precisavam ser exploradas, não apenas no contexto da
aprendizagem dos alunos, mas também no contexto dos professores que aprendiam
a ensinar ciências. Em 1984, ele (desta vez com Nana Hewson) publicou um artigo,
O papel do conflito conceitual na mudança conceitual e no design da instrução.
Então, como resultado de seu trabalho conjunto na formação de professores, a
dupla publicou em 1988 outro artigo intitulado Uma concepção apropriada do ensino
de ciências. Enquanto isso, uma série de estudos de seus alunos de pós-graduação
investigava idéias como ecologia conceitual e status. Isso levou a uma visão mais
refinada das condições para a mudança conceitual, condições que Hewson e
Richard Thorley publicaram em um artigo no 1JSE em 1989. Hewson identificou
esse artigo como uma expressão * significativamente mais madura das condições
da mudança conceitual.
Ok, o que realmente precisamos fazer é ser explícito sobre status.
Essa percepção surgiu através do trabalho de estudantes de pós-
graduação que estavam todos interessados em mudanças
conceituais e status, e como isso acontece na sala de aula, e como
você pode realmente usá-lo. no ensino de ciências.
Hewson, EUA
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Quando fui cativado pelas concepções dos alunos, passei algum
tempo falando aos professores sobre eles, esperando que eles
também sejam cativados por eles e queiram mudar seus
ensinamentos particularmente. Claro que isso não aconteceu. Então
tivemos que reconhecer que poderíamos fazer analogias entre
crianças aprendendo ciências e professores aprendendo a ensinar.
Hewson, EUA
TEORIA DA PRÁTICA
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CHAPTER 7
My scientifie background is such that I have always been very theury-conscious. I want to know wheit
the sheory is thut makes sense of whalever the ideas/observations there are under discussion.
If the existence of theory and its development is a hallmark of a mature research field there is some
evidence that the research in which my respondents have been engaged in science education has
reached this point. On the other hand, the role that theory plays in the respondents' rescarch was so
variable that it is not possible to attach this hallmark in a simple way to much of their research. A
number of them make explicit reference to the existence of the theory or theoretical frame they are
using to shape and discuss their research, but there is less sign thcy are interested in the
developrment of this theory.
BORROWED THEORY
It is very comnion in science edtcation studies to find that the thcoretical frane their authors use has
been borrowed Irom anolfhier rescarch field, and this is the case for a number of the respondents
Jignificant publications. In Clhapter 5 some of the sources of these borrowings from outside have
been identified in the publications by others that have heen mnajor influences. This borrowing of
theory was rather inevitable in the 1960s and 1970s, when research in science education itscll wus in
its infaney, and rescarchers were working more in isolation than is now the case With so much
research since those early days, it is reasonable to expect that there should be signs of theory
emerging Irom the research, if some of its sub-areas are maturing in (this theoretical sense,Borrowing
thcoty has, however, continucd and, in cach decade since the 1960s. new borrowed theories have
appeared in the published reports and conkrence presentations of science educalion research. This
borrowing tan have the healtthy effect of bringing new insights to bear on the problems of science
education, but it Can also lead to supertical descriptions that do not In Chapter 6 1 have already
referred to two xamples from Gaskell, Canada and Staberg, Sweden where a borrowed theoretical
framework provided insights that Ted on to questions and research that would not occur to
researchers who did not adopt this tranework. These two researchers' studies had a strong theoretical
frame with u gender dimension that caused them to
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seek gender effects in science classrooms that to the other researchers would have been observed
as gender neutral. Likewise, if one adopts the strongly political framework for curriculum that
emerged in Science for the People by David Layton. England (scc Chapter 12), the factors that are
expected to have an influence on science teaching and learning are very different from those, that
researchers without such a political framework will expect.
When I was Jeaching physics I had no iden / was involved in a polirical batile. Then the Layton book
shouted it ont to me, and the battles in the 70s between physics/chemistrry/biology and general
science made sense as political struggles about high status knowledge.
Woolnough, England
In some of these cases of a borrowed theory, the researchers seem simply to be attempting to
superimpose the concepts of this theoretical frame (and perhaps, relationships between them) on the
data they have about situations of science education. The use of theory in this way is unlikely to
províde anything more tchan a descriptive framework for the researchers' data and its analysis. Since
the theory was developed in a quite different social or physical context, il may be that not all its
significant features make sense in the contexto of science education. Without thenm, the theory is
incomplete, and likely to lack any explanatory power. The chance of the research testing or extending
the theory is thus very low or impossible. On the other hand, it is possible to translate, or adapt the
key fcatures of some borrowed theories sufficiently well to some seience education contexts, that the
theories can benefit, and be developed by the exploration that a suitably designed study can provide.
Such a case is described by Theo Wubbels. The Netherlands, who found Timothy Leary's book,
Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality, gave him a theoretically sound perspective to describe
communication in science class- rooms adding much more than the mapping procedures like those of
Flanders and Galton and Eggleston had provided.
I provided a whoe sew way of thinking iboit communie'alin i the classroom, and provided ihasis for 15
years research work. We firit thoughi his frainework woald be directly applie-able to educanon, hut a
vear laler we realised ge had t0 adapt or use in educational settings. Ju doing the adlaptoh we founid
a lot more in luu biok that wae inportert. Kinds of behav-Mour that are provoket by the leacher pud
hekeinas be dilferertial etfects on different type of kids.
SOCIAL THEORIES
In Chapter 4 the comments by Reg Fleming. Canada, about his attempt to describe and analyse the
discussion of socio-scientific issues in Science classrooms, and his interest in anthropological
methods of investigation (see also Chapter 8), reminded me of the debate in the social sciences when
I moved into them from chemical research in the mid-1950s. There was a strong belief
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and practice at that time that it was possible to study and analyse social situations in terms of a
positivist model, analogous to those in use in thebiological or agricultural scier ces. Factors or
variables were identified and relationships between them were sought. Actual situntions were
recognised by these researchers as multi-variate in character, but nevertheless, the relationships
between these variables could be revealed, provided good measures of the variables were made and
suitable statistics were applied. Some others even believed that essential relationships in real
situations could be observed in the controlled and simpler simulations of them. that they were creating
artificially in experimenal groups. Another group, including my supervisor in Cambridge, Oliver
Zangwill, believed, again by analogy with the natural sciences, that it was too carly in the development
of the social sciences to expect that the important factors would yield up so easily. This school of
thought saw the research that was needed as being extended systematic observation of the
complexitics of actual social situations, in the hope that this would yield valid descriptions of the
multiple perspectives and consequent actions of those involved, and just possibly some tentati ve
generalising assertions Accordingly, after two years as a persistent observer of a small factory
community in which a major change in the technology of their production conditions and procedures
was occurring, I provided such a description of the case and one or two very cautious ussertions
about it (Fensham and Hooper,1964). One of these, I remember, was that the social groups whose
internal cohesion increased, eccepted the changes more positively thun those granps whose
cohesion was tessened. At first glance, this looks like a relational hypothesis that could now be tested
by surveying a number of other factory communities undergoing other major technological changes,
and there were many of thenm in Europe at that time of post-war reconstruction. The snag was that
there was no way of telling, wilhout conducting case studies like mine, which groups in eacli factory
should be asked about their actions and views that would indicate their social cohesiveness. It
certainly was not. in my case, the groups that were identified in the formal structure of the factory. In
other words, the important social functioning was highly contextualised.
To support my study I was advised to attend the classes at Cambridge in social anthropology In them
I found yet another theoretical position which necepted the same a in of valil and rich accounts of
complex social situations, but made use of structural words like kinship and stattus to help aised and
complex that, the better the research study. the more this rich complexity would be described, rather
than it being reduced to a few powerful conceptual variables and relations between them. In
retrospect. I believe my cientitic one I adopted at the time
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CHAPTER 7
A decade later when I moved agnin from chemistry to education, I was surprised to find how
pervasive the positivist research paradigm of variables and relationships was, and how this
oversimplified the complexities of class-rooms and schools, let alone educational systems. Only
historians and philosophers of education seemed to be immune from this dominance. By the time I did
my interviews for this book, however, alternative paradigms for research in education were well nnd
truly established, as will be apparent from a number of my respondents.
Cultural Theory
William Cobern, USA, whose nced for a theory heads this chapter, is an example of a researcher who
had an intense interest in developing a theory that would make sense of ideas and observations he
had in relation to education and culture, after working in teacher education in Nigeria. After more than
a decade reflecting on his work with the Fulani people in general teacher education and in science
teacher education, he eventually found that World View theory met his need. He was able to adapt it
in his 1996 paper in Science Education to contribute to the dleveloping ideas about conceptual
change in seience education.
I was at a loss to know liow to think abot cagnitivY INSUCS f Culture in u systematie way anlıl
In my paper 1 briefly erplain my ideas abos worldview and how worldview is related to
concept change in science. Ii expresses my mterest in what might be called fundamental ideas
His carly thoughts about cducation and culture were published in 1983, and these remain a foundation
on which he still works. Ten years later he used Contextual constructivism as the main title for a
chapter in the book, The practice of constructivism in seience ediucation, that was edited by Ken
Tobin (1993), In this chapter he extended into science education the things he had learned in his work
with the Fulani. Because of the different roles theory has among the respondents. I will next discuss
the first patt oof the hallmirk above, namely the existence of theory. Then in the last part of the
chapter Iwill discuss the cvidence for the second part of the hallmark above, the resarch's contribulion
to the development of theory The former relates to intra esearch criterion
R3. Conceptual and theoretical development and the latter t this cntenon and to intra- research
Página 105
OTHER BORROWINGS
Alex Johnstone, Scotland, rather unusually fora science educator in the Anglo-American tradition, was
located in the Chemistry Department of Glasgow University. He chose a paper with El-Banna in
Education in Chemistry because it was the first experimental beginning of his long affair with
Information Processing Theory and ils consequences for learning. This led to a simple moděl, wł.ich
allowed him to plan research in undergraduate laboratories, lectures, tutorials, and in assessment that
yielded demonstrable gains in learning. Theoretically, he found Ausubel's theory a useful starting
point, but 'pretty turgid und unnecessarily complicated'.
Baddeley's ideas of working memory and later Norman's 'good common sense' provided us with a
more applicable theoretical framework for the many studies that flowed from the group in Glasgow.
Johnstone, Scotland
From Psychology
In Chapter 2 I referred to the early examples of the borrowing of psychological theories of learning by
the curriculum developers in the 1960s and 1970s, for example, Bruner, Gagne and Piaget. The
influence of these borrowings is better described as the lifting of slogan-like ideas from these theories.
rather than suggesting that the theories were used with any rigour to determine the way the
development of new curriculum materials occurred. Big ideas, discovery learning and the spiral
curriculum (Bruner), hierarchical learning (Gagne), and stages of reasoning (Piaget), each had an
influence, and were quoted as part of giving credence to the new suggestipns for school science.
This is not to say that each of these theories of learning was not explored more seriously by science
education researchers. Indeed, they played important roles in enabling the early researchers to begin
to think theoretically about their fledgling field. Much of value was gained, as we shall see later in this
chapter.
As the theoretical ideas of project teams became publicised and some of their materials appeared, it
Is not surprising that the looseness of the use of these theories made them vulnerahle to the critique
of those with other thcories David Ausubel (1968) made a quite vitriolic attack on ihe notion ol earning
the concepts of scienee by discovery. IHis complex, but more elaborated the- oretical model of
learning with its neurological metaplhors attracted Joseph Novak, USA, one of the young
revolutionaries of NARST in 1963 (Chapter 2). Over the years Novak has stayed faithful to the xtreum
that was formulated then, that theuries in science education would be tleveloped that have
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CHAPTER 7
predictive and explanatory power. just as theories in the natural science have. When he found David
Ausubel's (1968) book, Educational Psychology; A cognitive vlew, it was just what he needed. His
data were consistent with the ideas in Ausubel's quasi-neural theory of meaningful learning, and its
biological associations were comfortable to the biologist Novak. He found it was possible to design
science instruction that would build the anchoring concepts (or powerful subsumers), the theory
predicted would facilitate Science learning throughout life. In due course, Novak collaborated with
Ausubel in a revision of his original text.
I didn't even heur of Piaget until I was out of graduate school. Minnesota was so bedrock behaviorist
that Piaget was not allowed. I was quite taken with his writing when I got into it. But the problen I had
with Piaget was one that persisted. Development, for me, centers around building concepliual
frameworks, not these mysterious cognitive operational capacities. Even though Piaget used explicit
knowledge in his interviews, he was not looking at the conceptual frameworks that imade up that
knowledge. Ausubel's book in 1963 completely turned ine around.I'd been working earlier with a
cybernetic modlel, hut it lacked explanatory power. In fact our data was not really consistent with the
cybernetic inodel. Ausubel's model was just what welooking for. Our data fitted its ideas, so we
started to design instruction thar would build these anchoring concepts in learnersr so that they wuied
lave these powerful subsumers for subse- quent learning. In our 12 year study we demonstrated that
the theory worked.
Nuvak, USA
The twelve year longitudinal study he and Misonda reported in the American Educational Research
Journal in 1991 was for him the ultimate confirmation that the theory worked. Novak became, in quite
a missionary sense, the apostle of Ausubel's theoretical gospel to science education, initially
preaching to students and colleagues at Cornell like Pinchas Tamir, Israel.
You see I came to Cornell in 1964 to do my PhD and I knew exactlv what I was going to do. I was
interested in the lang -term effet ii af high school on students when they come to the universiry. I had
very unusually good condittons in which to do my research.have any theory. I was doing things
intuitirriv. My sepervisor was un excellent teucher and leacher educator, but he war nor a Tesearcher
Sa he let me do whar I wanted and I was happy with that, but in another way i was not very ppy In the
summer of 1967, Joe Novak appeared at Cornell, and the next year I was his first asaistanl. I took his
course on David Ausubel and suddenty found I iad a thtery for mr resete. ThA was very, rery
influential on me in this respect
Tamir, Isruel
Novak then set about presenting the message more widely in North America through the conferences
of NARST, where many science educators, like Vince Lunetta, USA, as a graduate student, heard his
strong advocacy of this theoretical position.
I was alwuys interextet in ying le fincd sinne t-uf theoretIcut ganiser on which to hang my work, and
feeling frustrated when frouldn T tud one, was interested in exploring the effects of graphics in
helpping students trderstant tte natute of concepts at a time and plae where most people did not think
that H a very trehul thing to da I adımired the role Joe Novak took He war somebody swha mamaged
iatlee theoreticat model. and help ir deverlop over a long period of time. I didn't agree with all I saw
him doing, but 1 really valued his pulting long-tern efforts together,
Lunetta, USA
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Grand Theorising
Novak is the only respondent who can be said to have theorised for a grander stage than science
education. In 1977 he published his own book, The Theory of Education. It is rooted in his research in
science education, but it presentes a learning theory that is applicable to, but not restricted to science
education. His great interest in the history and philosophy of science meant he needed to have a
philosophical dimension as well as the psychological one he inherited from Ausubel. The solution
came for him again from outside Science in the form of Stephen Toulmin's (1972) Human
Understanding.
Here was a cornerstone I could build on. He talks about concepts as things thar people create,as
things thut grow and develop, and sometimes become extinct describes them like species and
populationLS. With my biological interests these metaphors reully made sense.
Novak, USA
Novak found that the theoretical ideas of Ausubel and Toulmin fitted, respec tively his data and his
thinking about learning in science. He was also able to interpret and translate them into operational
forms that he and Bob Gowin published in 1984 as Learning How to Learn for use in science and
other areas of instruction.
Novak's writing did much to spread these theorctical idleas beyond North America, and Cornell
became a Mecca for many overseas researchers, including myself and mmy colleague Leo West.
West, who with Lcon Pines (a doctoral student at Cornell), subsequently eilited in 1985 what was
probably the first substantial and theoretically based book in science education, Cognitive Structure
and Conceptual Change. Three conferences were organised at Cornell under the title of
Miseonceptions and Educational Strategics in Science and Mathematics. These meelings did a great
deal to promole and advance the research on alternative conceptions, conceptual change, and their
associnted theoretical ideas a sub-area that is discussed in more detail in Chapter 9.
Piagetian Theory
Heinrich Stork, Germany, wAS one respondent who did maintain his belref in Praget's theory of
developmental psychology. He chose as one of his vignificant publientions the 1984 report of an
emp.rical study he did with Wolfgang Griber In it they Used the LawsDn Test to establish the
Piagetian level of a large group of students taking a formal chemistry unit that dealt with acid/base,
oxidation/reduetion, ete. The students were then tesled after a chemistry unit Ising items that were
about topics that had heen covered hot often involving censiderable rensoning.
página 108
There was a clear correspondence. The formal ininkers averaged 12 correct, the concrete thinkers,
3.9. and those who were transilional, 8.5. These students are in the years when Chemistry is
introduced ro them in Germony, and I think nuch of what is taught to them is too difficult.
Stork, Germany
While none of the other respondent's claimed to theorise on the grand scale of Novak, a number of
them did selected a publication as significant because they saw it as making a contribution to theory.
An example can be found in the third of Heinrich Stork's signijicant contributions. Again with Gräber,
he wrote a chapter on the use of language in science teaching for the book, Cognitive Development
and the Learning of Science, that set out to provide the meaning of some of Piaget's ideas to
chemists.
It's theoreticat initially, but at the end I give chemical exumples so that one can see what is mean
by the theory.
Stork, Germany
Wolff-Michael Roth, Canada, had conducted a series of studies on the use of concept mapping in
classrooms. As a result he was able to produce a paper on The social construction of scientific
concepts, that was published in 1992 in Science Education. In it he gave a description of social
construction – what it means when a concept is constructed by more than one person and then
takenon by the individuals..
This paper helped me to think ilırough the totion of social construction in a very deep wvay. Concept
nrapping was the context in the stedy, and thinking about the concept map having a function othe
than just representing the knowledge - a construction device and a tool for social thinking The
inportance thougit is thar I went beyond a simple description of social construction an put into a more
theoretical framework.
Roth, Canada
A number of respondents present their work as being a step on the way to a theory. They modestly
recognise that nmuch analysis of the various situations of science education is necessary before a
theory with much power can emerge.The examples they gave come from an interesting range of sub-
areas of Science education
Pre Theory
There is a clear sense of pre theory in much of what several respondents see as the significance of
their work. They had a hunch that something important has not been considered in their own or others
earlier work, and so they set up, or planned studies to check this hunch about a new tactor or
dimension to build into an ultimate multi-actored model for science education.Jinwoong Song.
S.Koren, thus describes a paper he published in the Journal
Página 109
of the Korean Physical Society about student proferences for diferente. The context dimension is
really important for me. Research on it kas so far uswally concentrated on the cognitive side of
science learning, so my second paper is a firt step to investigate the context dimension in relation to
the affective domain of science learning. Song, S. Kores
A Theory of Content
For some, Richard White's review (with Robert Gagne) in RER about the four different types of
knowledge and their links with memory, might serve as their theoretical framework. For him it was a
mere beginning of a theory of content, which fourteen years later he still saw as a task ahead,
I was a lirtle disappointed that people don't seem to have picked up the key point in the review,
namtely, thur it's importanr 20 look at the different soris of knowledge. When you read
Ausubel,Gagne, and uthers, they write about subject mairer as if it is some sort of hamogeneous
priste. Only gradually do you realise rhat Ausubel is on abont learning what I call propositions, and
Gagne was about whar lie calls intellectual skills bat might berter be called algorlihms
A Theory of Conceptions
Ruth Stavy, Israel, had contributed substantially to alternative conceptions research, before she was
influenced by Ephraim Fishbein (see Chapler 5) about intuition. This led to a fruitful collaboration with
Dinah Tirosh in a series of studies to test the theoretical idea that a number of alternative conceptions
in different topic areas may have common roots in some commonly held basic and intuitive notions. In
a paper in the IJSE in 1996, and in the book, How Students (Mis-)Understand Science and
Mathematies: Intuitive rules, they now propose a "theory of intuitive rules" (Stavy and Tirosh, 2000).
Many of us were siarting fron Piaget or some kind of general thinking. Then we went deeply
into very specific concepts and misconceptions in sav, physics, and now I'm coming back to a
Página 110
as science education? How are ideological meanings reproduced in Science education? and How are
these meanings changed? In doing so, he argues. that the curriculum in general, and the curriculum
of science more specifically, are caught up with the processes of reproduction of societal power and
privilege (as other sociologists of knowledge have argued so persuasively). But they are also caught
up with how the ways of reproduction themselves change.
When power relations change in cience andl in the ciencey of education, then what counts
Östman, Sweden
Beverley Bell, New Zealand, describes her paper with Barbara Cowie in Science Education, and the
book she wrote with John Gilbert (1996), as moving towards a model of teacher development which
includes social, personal and profession development.
These two publications continue the debate ubout constructivist views of learning as applied to
teucher education, moving it forward from personal into social constructivism, including what it means
to be a science teacher on a collective beas is. This, is I believe, a new and hence significant
contribution,
Science-Technology Relations
Paul Gardner embarked on an extensive exploration of the literature on the relation between science
and technology. In his long paper, Science-Technology Relations: Some historical and philosophical
reflections, in the International Journal of Design and Technology Education he draws, from a very
dispersed literature of examples of technology, a set of ways these two great fields of human
endeavour are, and are not related to each other. In the sense that he generalises and proposes
categories of relationships from individual cases this may be seen as an embryonic theory. When
others find these categories useful for describing their own studies of science and technology it begins
to act as a theory.
DEVELOPING A BORROWED THEORY
The following example of borrowing is interesting, because it also serves as a bridge to the last part of
this chapter and the matter of the development of theory.
A number of the respondents refer to the paper by George Posner, Ian Strike, Peter Hewson and
William Gertzog (1982) as providing the theoretical frame for their research on conceptual change,
and they discuss their findings in terms of the four conditions for change this paper introduced. It is
possible to question
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to what extent any of the four authors would recognise their paper as including,or being a theoretical
frame or model. Peter Hewson, USA, agreed that this was a significant paper among his publications,
because it has attracted such great external interest over the years. To him, however, this paper was
simply one of the papers from an early stage in his, and his colleagues' thinking about conceptual
change in Science and in science education thinking that then went on evolving through a number of
further studies and papers for almost a decade. The conditions in the paper were ideas that needed to
be explored, not only in the context of student learning, but also in the context of teachers learning to
teach science. In 1984 he (this time with Nana Hewson) published a paper, The role of conceptual
conflict in conceptual change and the design of instruction. Then, as a result of their work together in
teacher education, the pair published in 1988 another paper entitled An appropriate conception of
teaching science. Meanwhile, a series of studies by his graduate students were investigating ideas
like conceptual ecology and status. These led to a more refined view of the conditions for conceptual
change, conditions that Hewson and Richard Thorley published in a paper in the 1.JSE in 1989.
Hewson identified this paper as a *significantly more mature expression of the conditions of
conceptual change'.
Okay, what we really need to do is to be explicit about status, That realisation came along through the
work of graduate students who were all interested in conceptual change and status and how that
plays out in the classroom, and how you can actually use that in teaching science.
Hewson, USA
For the other respondents who referred to the four conditions of the 1982 paper as providing their
theoretical frame, it has been a case of borrowing a theory, albeit this time from within science
education. It served for them as a useful frame to discuss the findings of their own studies, but in no
sense were they trying to extend, test, or redefine its features.
Since the four conditions have proved so attractive and useful to many researchers, it is of some
interest to ask how they were derived. Hewson explained that he was fairly new to science education
when he came to Cornell University, and there Posner and Strike introduced him to literature on
conceptual change (see Posner et al., 1977). Hewson suggested using the learning of conceptual
change in science itselfE might be an analogy for the process in science education (Hewson, 1980
and 1981), and he recalls the four conditions coming largely out of the interest the four authors had in
the history and philosophy of science. Before the famous paper, there were thus several precursors
that included the idea of four conditions and even referred to status. At this time Hewson had begun to
interview the students in his freshman physics class and an individual graduate student in physics. He
found in the former an embryonic form of conceptual ecology, and in the latter epistemological beliefs
that had had a significant effect on his learning of physics.
página 112
When I was captivated by students' conceptions, I spent time telling teachers about them,
expecting them also to be captivated by them and to want to change their teaching accord-
ingly. Of course that didn't happen. So we had to recognise that we could draw analogies between
Hewson, USA
If only a few of my respondents referred to their work as theory building or even as theory testing,
there were others for whom theory was important in another sense. James Wandersee's interest in
theory was very much about how his research could contribute to putting a theory into action in the
classroom. At a very formative stage of his career from being staff in a teachers' college to becoming
a university researcher, he encountered not only Joe Novak at Cornell, just as the Theory of
Education was finished, but also Bob Gowin, the philosopher, who was writing the book, Educating.
With such a nurturing in theory-based education, it was not surprising to find him referring to the
influence of Richard Duschl's Restructuring Science Education, a book that is concerned with the
importance of theories and their development.
To represent my work on students’ alternative conceptions about key topics (like photosyn-thesis) in
biology, and to see such studies as vehicles to elaborate learning theories and Ience to improve
biology learning in the classrom, I have chosen, Children’s biology studies on conceptual
development in the life sciences, whirt is in the book, The Psychology of the Learning Sciences.
Wandersee, USA
Although a number of other respondents did not explicitly use the words "thcory" or "theoretical", I
found myself noting that their responses about the significance of a publication were similar to this
one paper by Wandersee. That is, they are a subset of the category Research into Practice that is
specifically concerned with Theory into Practice. Concepts and theories enable deeper questions to
be asked. To answer these questions appropriate methodologies for research studies are needed.
Chapter 8 is concerned with how methodology was discussed by the respondents.
REFERENCES
Ausubel, D. (1968) Educational Pyschology: A cognitive view. New York: Holt Rinehart and
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Bell, B. and Gilbert, J. (1996) Teacher Development: A model from science education. London:
Falmer.
Duschl, R.A. (1990) Restructuring Science Education: The importance of theories and their
Fensham, P.J. and Hooper, D. (1964) The Dynamics of a Changing Technology: A case study
Hewson, P.W. (1980) Learning and teaching science. South African Journal of Science 6:
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Posner, G. and the Cognitive Structure group (1977) The Assessment of Cognitive Structure
Tobin, K.G. (Ed.) (1993) The Practice of Constructivism in Science Education. Hillsdale, NJ-