Student’s scientific reasoning on advertising as literature

Abstract

The objective of this study was to investigate students in Grade 9 on scientific reasoning skills by combining basic learning about advertising. The s amples were 30 students in Grade 9 at Khon Kaen Demonstration Secondary School, Khon Kaen Province. In this study, interpretative paradigm was used to analyze teaching and learning activities aiming at enhancing students’ scientific reasoning skills through advertising as literature. Data were collected from class observation and assignment that reflect students’ scientific reasoning process based on the Four-Phased Approach of Reasoning proposed by Wu [1] that consists of 4 phases: (1) Issues identification as to identify key issues, (2) Clarification as to clarify personal views or attitudes toward issues, (3) Discussion and Defense as to logically present viewpoints and discuss them, and (4) Synthesis and Conclusion. Students were challenged to express their arguments regarding adverting they have exposed to and seek appropriate solutions to the problems. Students’ scientific reasoning process to analyse advertising as knowledge literacy also reflects their problem-solving skills. The results showed that students could express their opinions in logical thinking process by starting from 1) identifying issues, 2) clarifying viewpoints on adverting, 3) discussing and defensing, and 4) synthesizing and concluding. Therefore, using advertising as literature to induce students can significantly develop their scientific reasoning skills . This study also presents practical implications to enhance students’ scientific reasoning through learning activities of literary advertising.