Abstract:

The purpose of the study was to investigate the change in American students’ argumentation skills and NOS understandings as a result of explicit nature of science (NOS) and explicit argumentation instruction in the context of a socioscientific issue. An additional focus of the study was to explore the transfer of American students’ NOS understandings and argumentation skills learned in one socioscientific context into other similar contexts. A total of 121 seventh grade American students from two schools participated in the study. The treatment lasted for eight weeks and involved a physical science unit, which was taught separately by two teachers for two intact groups (Treatments A and B) in each school. Both groups in each school received explicit NOS instruction, but only the Treatment A groups had the additional explicit instruction about argumentation. All participants in the two schools were assessed for the learning and transfer of argumentation skills and NOS understandings in a pre-/post manner using an open-ended questionnaire and interviews about two socioscientific issues. Results showed that Treatment A group participants improved in their learning and transfer of argumentation practice and NOS understandings. Similarly, there were improvements in the learning and transfer of NOS understandings for Treatment B group participants with only some improvements for the argumentation practice. It is worth noting that some of the Treatment A group participants made connections to argumentation when explicating their NOS understandings by end of the study. Results were interpreted in relation to classroom practice and an optimum instructional approach.