The Emergence of Scientific Reasoning

Morris, Bradley J.; Croker, Steve; Masnick, Amy M.; Zimmerman, Corinne

doi:10.5772/53885

Cited by 23 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 117 publications

(99 reference statements)

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“…Only when people know what kind of information they need to pay attention to, can they more readily encode this critical information, allowing them to process and represent it in an effective way. Generally, encoding and representing the problem in an effective way are considered important prerequisites that facilitate reasoning and that are conducive to more sophisticated scientific thinking (Morris et al 2012).…”

Section: Science Content Knowledge Enables Students To Think Scientifically (Hypothesis 2)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Science competencies in kindergarten: a prospective study in the last year of kindergarten

Koerber

Osterhaus

2021

Unterrichtswiss

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Science competencies are considered an important 21st century skill. How this skill develops in childhood is, however, not well understood, and in particular little is known about how different aspects of science competencies are related. In this prospective study with 58 children aged 5–6 years, we investigate the development of two aspects of science competence: scientific thinking and science content knowledge. Scientific thinking was assessed with a comprehensive 30-item instrument; science content knowledge was measured with an 18-item instrument that assesses children’s knowledge with regard to melting and evaporation. The results revealed basic competencies in scientific thinking and science content knowledge at the end of kindergarten (46% and 49% correct, respectively, both different from chance). In mid-kindergarten, children performed better than chance on the assessment of science content knowledge (40% correct) but not on the assessment of scientific thinking (34% correct). Science content knowledge in mid-kindergarten predicted children’s science content knowledge at the end of kindergarten, as well as scientific thinking (both at 6 years). The opposite pattern did not hold: scientific thinking in mid-kindergarten did not predict science content knowledge at the end of kindergarten. Our findings show initial science competencies during kindergarten, and they suggest that children’s science content knowledge and scientific thinking are interrelated in a meaningful way. These results are discussed with respect to the different hypotheses that connect scientific thinking and science content knowledge as key features of science competencies. Implications for research and teaching are discussed.

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Section: Science Content Knowledge Enables Students To Think Scientifically (Hypothesis 2)mentioning

confidence: 99%

Science competencies in kindergarten: a prospective study in the last year of kindergarten

Koerber

Osterhaus

2021

Unterrichtswiss

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“…Scientific thinking is a type of knowledge seeking involving intentional information seeking, including asking questions, testing hypotheses, making observations, recognizing patterns, and making inferences (Kuhn, 2002;Morris et al, 2012). Much research indicates that children engage in this information-seeking process very early on through questioning behaviors and exploration.…”

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confidence: 99%

Supporting Early Scientific Thinking Through Curiosity

Jirout

2020

Front. Psychol.

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Curiosity and curiosity-driven questioning are important for developing scientific thinking and more general interest and motivation to pursue scientific questions. Curiosity has been operationalized as preference for uncertainty (Jirout and Klahr, 2012), and engaging in inquiry-an essential part of scientific reasoning-generates high levels of uncertainty (Metz, 2004; van Schijndel et al., 2018). This perspective piece begins by discussing mechanisms through which curiosity can support learning and motivation in science, including motivating information-seeking behaviors, gathering information in response to curiosity, and promoting deeper understanding through connection-making related to addressing information gaps. In the second part of the article, a recent theory of how to promote curiosity in schools is discussed in relation to early childhood science reasoning. Finally, potential directions for research on the development of curiosity and curiosity-driven inquiry in young children are discussed. Although quite a bit is known about the development of children's question asking specifically, and there are convincing arguments for developing scientific curiosity to promote science reasoning skills, there are many important areas for future research to address how to effectively use curiosity to support science learning.

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“…In general terms, scientific reasoning involves individuals' knowledge-seeking by the application of scientific methods (Klahr and Dunbar, 1988;Klahr, 2000;Piekny and Maehler, 2013). Models of scientific reasoning typically refer to processes of inductive reasoning to explain individuals' knowledge construction, as well as their hypothesis and inference generation (Zimmerman, 2007;Morris et al, 2012). Inductive reasoning is regarded as a cognitive process that captures how individuals encode information, mentally represent this information, organize information into patterns, and derive inferences (cf.…”

Section: Scientific Reasoning In Preschoolersmentioning

confidence: 99%