Attending to practice has become a significant topic in science education today. As scientific argumentation is a typical form of scientific practice as well as an important educational practice, more and more attention has been paid to it by science education researchers. Evaluating students' competence in scientific argumentation is one of the most important research topics, but in China, science researchers seldom concentrate on it because the diverse educational values of scientific argumentation need to be further understood. The present study sought to examine the performance of Chinese students participating in written scientific argumentation in the context of chemistry. After clarifying the conception of scientific argumentation in science education, and comparing the evaluation criteria in domestic and international science education research, written scientific argumentation tasks in the context of chemistry were designed and criteria for their evaluation were constructed and improved. In total five tasks were designed for evaluation. All of the five tasks were aimed at evaluating students' competence of selecting (or putting forward) claims, evidence and warrants, in addition, two tasks investigated the competence of refuting arguments. The general criteria for evaluation was constructed according to the four dimensions of scientific argumentation, they were the structure components, the content quality, the logic of justification and language. For each task, content criteria and performance criteria for evaluation were constructed. After analysis and improvement of the criteria based on two pilot tests and the Rasch model, it was obvious that the criteria met the standards, effectively and credibly, for this study on the assessment of students' competence in written scientific argumentation. The number of students who participated in the formal test was 578 (304 males and 274 females). Through this kind of evaluation, this study found that the students' competence in written scientific argumentation was generally weak, and was influenced by some factors. Specifically, firstly, the students could put forward claims and evidence more easily than warrants and rebuttals. Secondly, the specific tasks had an influence on the performance of the students in written scientific argumentation. In regard to other factors, gender did not influence the students' competence in written scientific argumentation, but the grade level and school level were key factors. The students' competence in written scientific argumentation at grade level four and three other school grade levels were significantly different. Finally, some changes to the Chinese chemistry curriculum were proposed based on the results of this study.
This study examines scientific practices associated with scientific writing in organic chemistry in China. Although there is rapidly growing literature on the features and strategies of scientific writing, further research in this area is needed to recognize and treat scientific writing as a social endeavor to evaluate it in a more comprehensive and detailed way in order to effectively convey scientific information to readers. This study shared these important premises and attempted to investigate the development of Chinese undergraduate students’ competence of scientific writing. Twenty-two undergraduate students majoring in chemistry participated in this study. They experienced a researcher-intervenedAdvanced Organic Chemistry Experimentcourse and were asked to write scientific articles on the six course experiments. Their scientific writings were analyzed based on normativity, objectivity, and logicality. These dimensions of the development of students’ competence in scientific writing during the course were portrayed. This study suggested that student's development in scientific writing can be divided into categories, demonstrating the importance and implications of teaching “learn to write” in science.
Faced with the wave of "Double First-class" construction of higher education in the new era, chemistry major in higher normal university must create their own characteristic projects. Taking the development of chemistry major of Central China Normal University as an example, the national first-class construction of chemistry major in the new era were discussed from three aspects: The first aspect was the construction of objectives, programs and the formation of curriculum groups; the second aspect was the in-depth pedagogies; and the last aspect was related to the creation of management systems and mechanisms.
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