Kärkkäinen, Sirpa
Biologiaa oppimassa. Vee-heuristiikka ja käsitekartat kahdeksasluokkalaisten talviprojektissa.
(Biology Learning. The Use of Vee Heuristic And Mind Maps With The Eight-Grade Students’ Winter Project)
Abstract
In this study, modified Vee heuristic and concept maps were investigated with the 8th grade pupils as methods to improve quality in learning and teaching biology. The purpose of this study was to describe the process of problem solving and mental processing concerning the conceptual and methodical knowledge in winter project. The main focus of this study was to investigate the focus questions, values and experiences about the Vee heuristic made by the pupils. Also, the teacher collected knowledge about learning and teaching evaluation for continuous improvement of the quality of the teaching process. In this study, Vee heuristic and concept maps were considered to be tools for improvement of the learning process for both pupils and teacher, and teaching process for the teacher herself.
The study material consisted of Vee heuristic, concept maps, diaries, self evaluation, essays, and credits of the pupils in the study. This study was mainly qualitative research as an action and a case research, in which the pupils (n=92) in the 8th grade in Juhani Aho secondary school participated during the years 1996 and 1999. The teacher participated in this study as a researcher and also as a teacher. The frame of this study was the high quality learning in the biology. Also, the teacher investigated her own work and development as a teacher.
Most of the focus questions made by the pupils were what and which questions, and the pupils were able to answer to these questions by using factual knowledge. The why and how questions showed typical way of thinking in biology, but however, the preknowledge of the pupils in the planning phase did not contain the explanations or cause and result relationship. The one third of the pupils had only intrinsic motivation and were interested in the contents of biology and learning in general. Some pupils had only external motivation, in which case it was assumed, that the pupils were motivated by the urge to raise their credits or gain some benefit from the use of the learned knowledge in the future. In the planning phase, the pupils had external processing skills i.e. using data sources and illustrations. Almost all of the pupils could use the subconcepts, but only few pupils specified their own study questions in the implementation phase.
In the evaluation phase, the pupils used editing, selecting and structuring, which all are important in learning based on textual context. When compared the planning and implementation phases with the evaluation phase, the concepts were diversified and more abstractive showing the understanding of the biology in the evaluation phase. The pupils evaluated the achieved knowledge to be useful for the future and it was also appreciated. The majority of the pupils found their learning to be fun and variable. 35 per cent of the pupils had positive thoughts about the Vee heuristic. The Vee heuristic was found to be new, variable, and concise and by using Vee it was possible to follow their own learning process. 45 per cent of the pupils had negative thoughts about Vee heuristic, which reflected the normal confusion and attitude against a new method.
The thinking and learning processes of nine of the pupils were investigated in more detail as a metatext of the Vee heuristic and concept maps. These nine pupils were selected from the total of 92 as follows: the pupils were arranged according to the average of the credits and then three pupils having the best and three having the lowest average were selected, and furthermore, one pupil in the median and one above and one below the median were selected, too. The why questions made by these pupils directed to the discussion of the cause and result relationship in the learning process. The fact questions resulted descriptive knowledge and how questions directed to explanation of the phenomena.
The ten questions of the Vee heuristic asked from all 92 pupils directed the pupils to observe their own learning and the pupils had a feeling of independence. Thinking about the basis of the values bound the pupils into the learning process and the learning was found to be valuable despite of the negative experience about Vee heuristic. According to this study, Vee heuristic and concept maps are useful methods in the 8th grade in secondary school. For a teacher, Vee heuristic and concept maps are qualitative tools for observing the learning process of the pupils and for the evaluation and planning of the teaching process.
The major scientific achievement of the study is the extension of biology research from primary education to secondary education. The results of the present study demonstrate that eight-grade students are able to plan, monitor and evaluate their own learning process, which indicates deep learning, meaningful learning and metalearning.
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