Discussion and Conclusion

This paper has presented data and discussed the views of 124 Turkish first-graders about the planet Earth. Based on the results obtained from the children’s drawings, it was able to identify two alternative models of the earth: the flattened Earth and the dual Earth. Nearly 60% of the participants drew the unconventional scientific version of the Earth. The drawings show some variety among them however, they can easily be grouped into the alternative models of the Earth defended by the mental theorists. These findings are consistent with the results of prior research claiming that children have difficulty in understanding that the Earth is spherical and form various misconceptions regarding its shape (Nussbaum, 1979; Nussbaum & Novak, 1976).

By considering the results obtained from the interviews, however, it can be reported that children have some scientific knowledge about the shape of the Earth. The findings from this study seems to indicate that drawings provide a powerful tool to explore the children’s conception of the Earth, but the information one can get from the drawings and the subsequent conversations about the drawings should be interpreted and used very carefully.

Moreover, when the children were given the opportunity to give an account for the source of their knowledge about the Earth, Moon and the stars, almost all of the children said that they have seen how the earth is seen from the space on TV - mostly from cartoons and in their story books. Those of the children who represented the stars with a star polygon also replied that in their daily lives they observe the stars as tiny and shiny dots in the sky. Thus, one may say that cartoons, the story books and the daily life experiences are the reasons for their misconceptions.

Exploring children’s misconceptions about the nature and natural phenomenon and the sources of their knowledge may strengthen the teachers’ efforts to improve their teaching practices with regard to science concepts. For meaningful learning to take place, teachers should consider what knowledge the learner already possesses (Gunstone, 1990). Knowing children’s (pre-) conceptions will provide the teachers information about the children’s mental models that they have constructed before the instruction. By this way it will be possible to create instructional methods, strategies and aids that may help the students to change the wrong mental models and construct meaningful and useful ones. To understand the natural world, children should be provided conditions for developing positive experiences, imagination, increased sense of wonder, creativity and observation skills.

Science educators should create such learning environments in which the children meet challenges that can encourage them to activate and evaluate what they already know in the light of scientific knowledge that they encounter in the school. By this way it will be possible to promote a conceptual development which is consistent with our existing scientific knowledge about the nature.

(SIBEL ÖZSOY Aksaray University, Turkey)

· Read the article.

· Make some general remarks concerning the content of the paper using words and expressions from Useful Vocabulary Section.

· Discuss the structure of the paper.

· Give some positive comments.

· Express your criticism or objections.

· Analyze the data, results and their presentations.

· Make a conclusion.

ARTICLE 3. UNDERACHIEVING LEARNERS: CAN THEY LEARN AT ALL?