Exploring Chemistry Teachers' Awareness of FabLab for Transformative Educational Practices

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In this chapter, we review recent trends in the philosophy of chemistry and its applications in chemical education. Chemistry has maintained quite a peripheral existence in the philosophy of science for a long time, thus evading focused attention and critical analysis. However, since the 1990s an increasing number of books, journals, conferences and associations focused on philosophy of chemistry highlighting the contributions of chemistry to philosophy of science (Bhushan and Rosenfeld, Of minds and molecules: new philosophical perspectives on chemistry. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2000; Hendry, The metaphysics of chemistry. Oxford University Press, 2012; McIntyre and Scerri, Synthese 111(3):211–212, 1997; Scerri and McIntyre, Synthese 111(3):213–232, 1997; Schummer, The philosophy of chemistry: From infancy toward maturity. In: Baird D, Scerri E, McIntyre L (eds) Philosophy of chemistry: synthesis of a new discipline. Springer, Dordrecht, pp 19–39, 2006; Van Brakel, Ambix 57(2):233–234, 2010; Van Brakel, Synthese 111(3):253–282, 1997; Woody, Philosophy of Science 67 (Proceedings):S612–S627, 2000). The uptake of this new domain in the context of chemical education research and practice has been minimal despite some earlier acknowledgment of the potential significance for chemical education (Erduran, Science & Education 10:581–593, 2001; Gilbert et al. Research and development for the future of chemical education. In: Gilbert et al. (eds) Chemical education: towards research-based practice. Kluwer, Dordrecht, pp 391–408, 2003). The special edition of the Science & Education journal on ‘Philosophy, Chemistry and Education: An Introduction’ (Erduran, Science & Education, 2013) is the first collection where the work on the applications of philosophy of chemistry in chemical education has been collated. This chapter will begin with an overview of some of the key and example debates in philosophy of chemistry. These examples will include themes such as reductionism (e.g. Scerri, Journal of Chemical Education 68(2):122–126, 1991) and supervenience (e.g. Papineau, Arguments for supervenience and physical realization. In: Savellos EE, Yalcin U (eds) supervenience: new essays. Cambridge University Press, 1995) as well as aspects of chemical knowledge such as laws (e.g. Christie and Christie, “Laws” and “theories” in chemistry do not obey the rules. In: Bhushan N, Rosenfeld S (eds) Of minds and molecules. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 34–50, 2000), models (e.g. Woody, Science & Education, 2013) and explanations (e.g. Hendry, The chemical bond: structure, energy and explanation. In: Dorato M, Redei M, Suarez M (eds) EPSA: Philosophical issues in the sciences: launch of the European Philosophy of Science Association. Springer, Berlin, pp 117–127, 2010.). Second, the implications of these themes for chemical education research and practice will be explored. The central argument is that understanding of how chemistry is conceptualised and how chemistry is learned, chemical education research has to be informed by the debates about the epistemology and ontology of chemistry. The discussion will be contextualised in the area of nature of science (NOS) that has been one of the highly studied areas of research in science education (Chang et al. Journal of Science Education and Technology, 2010). Contributions of how philosophy of chemistry can contribute to the characterisation of NOS by nuanced perspectives on the nature of chemistry will be discussed. Theoretical perspectives and empirical studies on NOS have tended to focus on domain-general aspects of scientific knowledge with limited understanding of domain-specific ways of thinking. NOS literature can be further developed both theoretically and empirically, thereby contributing more to HPS studies in science education. Third, some applications of philosophy of chemistry in chemical education will be reviewed in more detail. For example, proposed work for secondary chemical education, including the context of the teaching of periodic law through argumentation, will be visited (e.g. Erduran, Foundations of Chemistry 9(3):247–263, 2007). Fourth, the chapter will argue that there is developing potential for reciprocal interplay between philosophy of chemistry and chemical education. While philosophy of chemistry has the potential to influence chemistry education, chemistry education in turn can influences philosophy of chemistry, particularly in relation to empirical foundations of chemical reasoning. The paper will conclude with some recommendations on the future directions of research in chemical education that is informed by philosophy of chemistry.

Students today are increasingly engaged in the use of digital information and communication technologies. The Internet continues to grow and more and more young people are using it worldwide. Educational practices, however, have been slow to adapt to the corresponding developments. For example, Internet forums are generally ignored in most educational practices, including chemistry education, although they are often used to find new information by everyday people. The question therefore arises: Why are such media not used to provoke and promote science or chemistry teaching and learning, while simultaneously developing critical scientific media literacy? To understand how the younger generation learns via Internet forums, this article looks at a survey of Internet forum usage behavior by lower and upper secondary school students (age range 12–17) in relation to chemistry-specific content. The findings are then contrasted with an analysis of user behavior. The final analysis revealed that students are open and critical when using Internet forums, even though such learning is mostly unconnected to formal education. These results can inform science and chemistry teaching by focusing teaching and learning more on Internet forums in order to employ them as an educational medium in science class.

Although creativity is considered one of the key competencies in modern society and a central aspect of nature of science, it has been neither established as a main topic in chemistry education research nor in today’s chemistry education practice. In contrast to its real nature, students mostly characterise chemistry as a solely logical and analytical discipline and fail to appreciate the importance of creativity in the development of chemical knowledge. The research project tries to address this deficiency. Based on the assumption that chemistry teachers’ adequate conceptions represent a necessary condition on the way to implement creativity into education practice, the principle aim of our study was to support prospective chemistry teachers in developing these conceptions. Thus, two different approaches were evaluated concerning their impact on teacher students’ conceptions in pre-service chemistry teacher courses at the University of Cologne. While the first approach reflects concrete historical examples of creative modelling processes, the latter offers learning environments, in which teacher students have to become creative themselves. Data were collected by open-ended questionnaires, participant observation and semi-structured interviews. The findings indicate that the first approach particularly enables the students to recognise that creativity is important in chemistry, while the latter rather offers the opportunity to realise how creativity works in chemistry. In order to develop comprehensive conceptions, a combined approach seems to be the most suitable.

Although several reforms have shifted the direction of education, a debate on the strengths and limitations of science education in Kosovo has not yet been initiated. The present article analyses the development of chemistry education in Kosovo and encourages questions that could shape science education practices in general. In particular, the article analyses the pre-university chemistry curriculum in Kosovo over the years, as well as examining chemistry teacher education programmes. The analysis is based on descriptive research of data and document analysis. The multidimensional analysis of the issues and challenges of chemistry education will provide recommendations for future research on chemistry education and chemistry teaching practices in order to make chemistry education and the pre-university chemistry curriculum relevant to the context of Kosovo. As pre-university education curricula, especially the curriculum for the natural sciences, and the preparation of both pre-service and in-service teachers in Kosovo are considered challenging, a firm conclusion for actions has not been reached. Nevertheless, the article seeks to spark a debate in the field.

This article systematically reviews the pedagogical approaches adopted in high school chemistry education with the aim of highlighting the most effective evidence-based instructional practices reported in the literature. For this, a meta-analysis of 35 pedagogical approaches is analyzed, and their effect sizes (Cohen’s d) are compared in terms of students’ learning performance. In comparison to the traditional teaching approach, the data confirmed the effectiveness of using various teaching strategies in chemistry education toward student accomplishment. The results indicate that, in general, deploying chemistry education practices in secondary education improves student learning compared to control settings (d = 1.06). Furthermore, this impact is considerably stronger when the problem-based learning approach (d = 3.35) is adopted. Therefore, according to the meta-analytical evaluation, embracing various learning paths through creative teaching promotes academic achievement. In terms of instructional quality, the findings provide a comprehensive picture of recent educational practices in chemistry instruction, which will serve as the foundation for future educational changes. We believe the results of this study will promote a progression of intimation to evolve the current high school chemistry practices and pave the direction for future research in chemistry education.

Using Bruno Latour’s framework of a “collective of humans and nonhumans”, this paper presents an analysis of chemistry instruction in a high school curriculum and professional development setting to present the chemistry education community with a new way to think about reality and knowledge construction and, at the same time, to reconsider the contentious problem of constructivism and realism in chemistry education. Latour’s notion of science as a process where humans and nonhumans produce knowledge in “construction sites” enables a research and commentary project where, through the methodology of narrative case study, four different parts of Latour’s framework are considered: (1) mobilization of the world into scientific activity, (2) the use of procedures that act as “speech prostheses” where nonhumans can enter discourse, (3) the depiction of a process where small steps enable the activity of materials to circulate into the knowledge structures of the classroom, and (4) a process where humans and nonhumans have new identities constructed and stabilized through the mutual exchange of their properties. This paper presents Latour’s ideas through the research question: “What are empirical examples from chemistry education of the operation of Latour’s framework of a concept of collective of humans and nonhumans in knowledge construction?” These results support a conclusion where Latour’s collective of humans and nonhumans has the potential to support new ways to think about research and practice in chemistry education, including in ways that align with emerging feminist materialist research.

Esta pesquisa, de perspectiva documental, objetivou realizar um levantamento dos trabalhos do Pibid do Instituto Federal de Educação, Ciência e Tecnologia do Sertão Pernambucano (IF Sertão-PE), que contribuíram para o ensino-aprendizagem da disciplina de Química nas escolas da Educação Básica, objeto de intervenção. O estudo pautou-se pelos princípios da pesquisa qualitativa e análise documental. Analisou-se, por meio da técnica de análise de conteúdo, os resumos dos trabalhos apresentados na Jornada de Iniciação à Docência (JID) do IF Sertão-PE, nos anos de 2016 e 2017, que fizeram parte das atividades didático-pedagógicas relacionadas ao ensino de conteúdos da disciplina de Química nas escolas. Os resultados apontaram que o Pibid do IF Sertão-PE contribuiu para o desenvolvimento e a utilização de novas ações didático-metodológicas no ensino de Química na sala de aula, proporcionando aprendizagens significativas dos discentes assistidos, além de contribuir para o desenvolvimento de atividades pedagógicas que promoveram a inclusão social de alunos, uma vez que a vivência de situações reais da rotina escolar e da sala de aula na Educação Básica favorecem o desenvolvimento de novas práticas educacionais em busca de um ensino-aprendizado inovador, contextual, cidadão e investigativo no ensino de Química.

Although the value of educational robotics (ER) is recognised in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines, limited research has been published that focusses on using ER to support and enhance chemistry education (CE). This article considers the existing body of scholarly knowledge related to the use of ER in CE published in scholarly literature by means of a systematic literature review. To structure the findings conceptually, a Robotics-Education-Chemistry Considerations (RECC) framework was developed and applied. The findings indicate that the use of ER in CE is understudied. ER is largely applied to enhance the operational and content aspects of traditional CE, rather than to exploit the affordances related to modern education theories and practices that using ER potentially offers to CE.

This paper presents Part I of a two-part study. This first part reviews the literature of transfer of learning as one of the major goals of instruction. Transfer refers to students' ability to apply knowledge and skills in new learning contexts. The literature suggests partially or non-overlapping definitions, and empirical studies on transfer often lack sufficient theoretical background. The goal of this first study is twofold: (a) narrowing the gap between theoretical and empirical aspects of transfer skills, and (b) designing a theoretically-founded transfer framework that can be applied to research and practice in education. The framework was then investigated in the field of chemical education and will be further discussed in Part II. A comprehensive literature search resulted in 664 papers being identified for review. Papers in which transfer was a secondary issue were filtered out. Afterwards, we formulated a theoretical transfer framework that distinguishes between near and far transfer. The framework consists of three attributes: task distance, interdisciplinarity, and skills set. Our study contributes to the body of literature of transfer at several levels. At the theoretical level, we have pointed out commonalities and differences between the various current transfer definitions and proposed a three-attribute transfer framework. Part two will focus on the empirical-application level, showing the interplay between specific learning environments and their effect on students' transfer skills with emphasis on chemical education. These contributions help narrow gaps between the theory of transfer and empirical research.

This chapter focuses on teaching and learning of chemistry through argumentation. It focuses on chemistry educators’ uptake of argumentation, provides a summary and critique of argumentation studies conducted in the field of chemical education across K-16 classrooms, and discusses implications of the findings reported in these studies for practice and future argumentation studies in chemistry education. One critical piece of this chapter is a discussion on the nature of chemical knowledge and how to promote the philosophy of chemistry in argumentation-based teaching and learning. This chapter also provides a sample argumentation task that can be adopted and used by high school chemistry teachers, professors of introductory chemistry courses and pre-service teacher educators.

A Perspective on Chemistry Education

Research studies in chemical education pose a communication problem for chemists. Unlike the findings from other specializations in chemistry the findings in chemical education tend to be reported in education journals that are not readily accessible to most chemists or chemistry teachers. This lecture is an attempt to remedy this gap in communication. Research studies fall into three broad categories. (i) issues related to the content of chemistry itself, that is, What content to teach? And What meaning of each topic is to be conveyed? (ii) issues related to how chemical content is taught, such as, the role of lectures, practical work, particular pedagogies, etc. and (iii) issues related to its learning, that is, learning of concepts, conceptual change, motivation, etc. Findings in each of these categories of research over the last twenty years have drawn attention to opportunities for improving the quality of chemical education in each of the levels of formal education where chemistry is taught. Sometimes the research findings seem small since they, in fact, merely diagnose the actual problem in teaching and learning. At other times, the research findings are large because they provide a solution to these problems. What remains to be done is to disseminate the findings so that appropriate teaching occurs more widely, with its consequent gains in the quality of learning. Research findings, of these small and large types will be used to illustrate the potential of research to make the practice of chemical education more effective.

The July 2014 issue of the Chemistry Education Research and Practice is dedicated to physical chemistry education. Major sub-themes are: the role of controversies in PC education, quantum chemistry, chemical thermodynamics (including a review of research on the teaching and learning of thermodynamics) and PC textbooks. Topics covered include: the significance of the origin of PC in connection with the case of electrolyte solution chemistry; the true nature of the hydrogen bond; using the history of science and science education for teaching introductory quantum physics and quantum chemistry; a module for teaching elementary quantum chemistry; undergraduate students’ conceptions of enthalpy, enthalpy change and related concepts; particulate level models of adiabatic and isothermal processes; prospective teachers’ mental models of vapor pressure; an instrument that can be used to identify students’ alternative conceptions regarding thermochemistry concepts; and the organization/sequencing of the major areas of PC in many PC textbooks.

Assessment instruments that generate quantitative data on attributes (cognitive, affective, behavioral, etc.) of participants are commonly used in the chemistry education community to draw conclusions in research studies or inform practice. Recently, articles and editorials have stressed the importance of providing evidence for the validity and reliability of data collected with these instruments following guidance from the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing. This study examines how quantitative instruments have been used in the journal Chemistry Education Research and Practice (CERP) from 2010–2021. Of the 369 unique researcher-developed instruments used during this time frame, the majority only appeared in a single publication (89.7%) and were rarely reused. Cognitive topics were the most common target of the instruments (56.6%). Validity and/or reliability evidence was provided in 64.4% of instances where instruments were used in CERP publications. The most frequently reported evidence was single administration reliability (e.g., coefficient alpha), appearing in 47.9% of instances. Only 37.2% of instances reported evidence of both validity and reliability. These results indicate that, as a field, opportunities exist to increase the amount of validity and reliability evidence available for data collected with instruments and that reusing instruments may be one method of increasing this type of data quality evidence for instruments used by the chemistry education community.