Effectiveness of Conceptual Change-Oriented Teaching Strategy To Improve Students' Understanding of Electrochemistry Concerning Galvanic Cells
Ali Riza Özkaya
Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science and Letters, Marmara University, 34722 Kadıköy, Istanbul, Turkey
Musa Üce, Hakan Sarıçayır, and Musa Şahin
Department of Science and Mathematics Education, Atatürk Faculty of Education, Marmara University, 34722 Kadıköy, Istanbul, Turkey
The results of previous educational research raise some questions about the efficacy of conventional teaching strategies and point to a need for using teaching strategies that explicitly take into account misconceptions students bring to the classes or acquire during the teaching–learning process. Accordingly, this article presents efforts to develop a conceptual change-oriented instruction strategy designed to teach galvanic cells in electrochemistry. The objective is to assess the effectiveness of conceptual change-oriented instruction relative to conventional instruction using statistical comparisons. Two general chemistry classes were selected as comparison and experimental groups. Students in the experimental group received conceptual change-oriented instruction while students in the comparison group received conventional instruction. The conceptual change-oriented instruction used conceptual explanation texts and conceptual questions as supplementary teaching materials. The authors of this study designed the conceptual materials taking into account documented electrochemistry misconceptions and their proposed origins from the relevant educational research literature. It was found after the treatment that the students in the experimental group scored significantly higher in terms of their achievement in conceptual and quantitative problem-solving tests than students in the comparison group. In addition, the number of students having misconceptions in the experimental group was, in most occasions, remarkably fewer than students in the comparison group.
Supplement
Conceptual change materials for teaching about the electrochemistry of galvanic cells are available. These materials include tasks 1–8 mentioned in this article (with explanations, figures, questions, and answers); the Conceptual Test on Galvanic Cells (18 concept questions with figures and corresponding answers); the Problem-Solving Test on Galvanic Cells (9 problems and corresponding answers); and a list of the statements related to the concept test (17 scientifically accepted statements of fact and 29 misconception statements).
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