A Blended Learning Environment for a Science Education Methods Course: Content Analysis of a Text-Based Online Conference PROCEEDINGS
Nicos Valanides, Charoula Angeli, Department of Education, University of Cyprus, Cyprus
World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications, in Montreal, Canada ISBN 978-1-880094-56-3 Publisher: Association for the Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE), Chesapeake, VA
In a lab meeting, students were asked to predict and discuss in teams of two to three students what would happen when a cylinder is inverted over a burning candle upright in a pan of water. Because students presented conflicting claims about the experiment they were instructed to resolve their differences in an online discussion forum using the asynchronous conferencing system of WebCT. Students' replies to the question posted in the online discussion forum were carefully read and analyzed. The frequency of sound (evidence-based) arguments was low. The presence of specific persistent alternative conceptions and lack of familiarity with the process of hypothesis testing or lack of the ability to clearly differentiate among hypotheses, predictions, results and conclusions seem to be the main obstacles for sound argumentation.
Valanides, N. & Angeli, C. (2005). A Blended Learning Environment for a Science Education Methods Course: Content Analysis of a Text-Based Online Conference. In P. Kommers & G. Richards (Eds.), Proceedings of World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications 2005 (pp. 854-855). Chesapeake, VA: AACE.
© 2005 AACE