Analysis of the Contribution of Argumentation-Based Science Teaching on Student Success and Retention

Observing the argumentation of a scientific event and understanding skill is an important component of scientific literacy. In this paper, the effect of lecturing with scientific-oriented activities in science classes on student success and the retention of knowledge has been analyzed. The study was conducted between 2006 and 2008 academic years in an elementary school in Amasya, Turkey. The study employed a quasy experimental research method. Argumentation based teaching method was used in experimental group. Traditional teaching method was used in control group. It has been found out that there was a significant different in favor of the experimental group in terms of student success and the retention of knowledge.  When 8 th grade experimental groups of the two years were compared, no significant difference was detected between student success rates; however, the scores of second year 8 th grade experimental group were found to be higher.

[1]  Douglas Walton,et al.  Fundamentals Of Argumentation Theory , 1996 .

[2]  Anat Zohar,et al.  Fostering students' knowledge and argumentation skills through dilemmas in human genetics , 2002 .

[3]  E. Nussbaum.  Collaborative Discourse, Argumentation, and Learning: Preface and Literature Review. , 2008 .

[4]  Douglas B. Clark,et al.  A Comparison of the Collaborative Scientific Argumentation Practices of Two High and Two Low Performing Groups , 2011 .

[5]  Shirley Simon,et al.  Enhancing the quality of argumentation in school science , 2004 .

[6]  S Erduran,et al.  Arguing Online: Case Studies of Pre-Service Science Teachers’ Perceptions of Online Tools in Supporting the Learning of Arguments , 2008 .

[7]  J. A. Blair,et al.  Fundamentals of Argumentation Theory : A Handbook of Historical Backgrounds and Contemporary Developments , 1997 .

[8]  Richard Andrews,et al.  Learning to Argue in Higher Education , 2000 .

[9]  D. Treagust,et al.  Learning in Science — From Behaviourism Towards Social Constructivism and Beyond , 1998 .

[10]  A. Okada,et al.  Evidence‐based Dialogue Maps as a research tool to investigate the quality of school pupils’ scientific argumentation , 2008 .

[11]  Troy D. Sadler,et al.  Informal reasoning regarding socioscientific issues: A critical review of research , 2004 .

[12]  K. Kortland.  An STS case study about students' decision making on the waste issue , 1996 .

[13]  Richard C. Anderson,et al.  Collaborative Reasoning: Expanding Ways for Children to Talk and Think in School , 2003 .

[14]  Grady Venville,et al.  Teaching Strategies for Developing Students’ Argumentation Skills About Socioscientific Issues in High School Genetics , 2010 .

[15]  Jacob Cohen.  Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences , 1969, The SAGE Encyclopedia of Research Design.

[16]  J. F. Voss,et al.  Who Reasons Well? Two Studies of Informal Reasoning Among Children of Different Grade, Ability, and Knowledge Levels , 1996 .

[17]  Baruch B. Schwarz,et al.  Argumentation and Explanation in Conceptual Change: Indications From Protocol Analyses of Peer-to-Peer Dialog , 2009, Cogn. Sci..

[18]  Grady Venville,et al.  The impact of a classroom intervention on grade 10 students' argumentation skills, informal reasoning, and conceptual understanding of science , 2010 .

[19]  E. Michael Nussbaum,et al.  Argument and conceptual engagement , 2003 .

[20]  Shirley Simon,et al.  Learning to Teach Argumentation: Research and development in the science classroom , 2006 .

[21]  J. Osborne,et al.  Supporting and Promoting Argumentation Discourse in Science Education , 2002 .

[22]  Gail Richmond,et al.  Making meaning in classrooms: Social processes in small‐group discourse and scientific knowledge building , 1996 .

[23]  G. J. Kelly,et al.  An ethnographic investigation of the discourse processes of school science , 1997 .

[24]  S. Haggerty,et al.  Becoming A Secondary School Science Teacher , 1999 .

[25]  R. Duschl,et al.  "Doing the Lesson" or "Doing Science": Argument in High School Genetics , 2000 .

[26]  M. Jiménez-Aleixandre,et al.  Knowledge producers or knowledge consumers? Argumentation and decision making about environmental management , 2002 .

[27]  Lisa D. Bendixen,et al.  Approaching and avoiding arguments: The role of epistemological beliefs, need for cognition, and extraverted personality traits , 2003 .

[28]  Gayle V. Davidson-Shivers,et al.  The Effects of Gender Interaction Patterns on Student Participation in Computer-Supported Collaborative Argumentation , 2006 .

[29]  Randy Yerrick,et al.  Lower track science students' argumentation and open inquiry instruction , 2000 .

[30]  J. Osborne,et al.  Establishing the norms of scientific argumentation in classrooms , 2000 .

[31]  M. Jiménez-Aleixandre,et al.  Argument in High School Genetics. , 1997 .

[32]  S. Simon.  Using Toulmin’s Argument Pattern in the evaluation of argumentation in school science , 2008 .

[33]  S. Erduran,et al.  TAPping into argumentation: Developments in the application of Toulmin's Argument Pattern for studying science discourse , 2004 .

[34]  V. Albe,et al.  When Scientific Knowledge, Daily Life Experience, Epistemological and Social Considerations Intersect: Students’ Argumentation in Group Discussions on a Socio-scientific Issue , 2008 .

[35]  J. Osborne,et al.  The place of argumentation in the pedagogy of school science , 1999 .

[36]  Troy D. Sadler,et al.  Patterns of Informal Reasoning in the Context of Socioscientific Decision Making. , 2005 .

[37]  P. Scott,et al.  Constructing Scientific Knowledge in the Classroom , 1994 .

[38]  B. Zimmerman.  Academic studing and the development of personal skill: A self-regulatory perspective , 1998 .

[39]  Mansoor Niaz,et al.  Arguments, contradictions, resistances, and conceptual change in students' understanding of atomic structure , 2002 .

[40]  Douglas B. Clark,et al.  Personally‐Seeded Discussions to Scaffold Online Argumentation , 2007 .

[41]  D. Potari,et al.  Students' Argumentation in Decision-Making on a Socio-Scientific Issue: Implications for Teaching. , 1999 .

[42]  Ali Eryilmaz,et al.  Effects of Conceptual Assignments and Conceptual Change Discussions on Students' Misconceptions and Achievement Regarding Force and Motion , 2002 .

[43]  Kenneth Tobin,et al.  International handbook of science education , 1998 .

[44]  Daniel T. Hickey,et al.  Argumentation: A strategy for improving achievement and revealing scientific identities , 2008 .

[45]  Michael Billig,et al.  Arguing and Thinking: A Rhetorical Approach to Social Psychology , 1987 .