This study aims to elicit secondary education pupils’ views on euthanasia based on a survey model and with a study group of 253 pupils in year 9 studying in the city of Ankara in the school year 2010-2011. The study makes use of a combination of qualitative and quantitative research techniques as well as a Questionnaire for Personal Particulars in order to clarify the pupils’ demographics in data collection, and scenarios based on ethical dilemmas about active and passive euthanasia in order to elicit their views on the issue. The pupils’ views were elicited through the argumentative paragraphs that they were asked to write on the situations given in the scenarios. Of the qualitative data analysis techniques, the content analysis method was selected for the analysis of the argumentative paragraphs on the scenarios. In light of the data yielded by the content analysis, the pupils’ basic ethical guidelines in their decision-making processes were studied taking into account such variables as gender, school type, and family’s income.

Argumentation in science education is a well-established and successful research programme. Key theoretical underpinnings of this approach come from situated cognition perspective, the theory of communicative action and the sociocultural perspective, language studies and social semiotics, philosophy of science studies, and developmental psychology. In this paper, it will be argued that all these theoretical frameworks that aim to provide a rationale for promoting argument-based inquiry approach to science education stand to benefit if their unique insights can be brought together within the theory of Deweyan pragmatist aesthetics. It is my contention that learners first need to experience the most fundamental human situation, namely, the problematic as the ontological condition of experiencing the world as a human, in carefully calibrated pedagogically appropriate settings to get the process of collaborative inquiry going. One such setting is provided by the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH), an argument-based collaborative inquiry approach to experience negotiation of meaning in relation to science content in school. It will be claimed that the SWH approach, which is an immersion-oriented argument intervention model, is successful to the extent that it enacts a learning situation whereby the process of collaborative inquiry as understood by Dewey unfolds and provides a consummatory experience for the learners as well as the teachers.

The aim of this study is to investigate the possible problems confronted in implementing Argumentation Based Science Inquiry (ABI) approach. In addition, the ways that teacher used to deal with those problems were further investigated in this study. For this purpose, this study utilized a case study methodology. The participant was a teacher at a primary school located in the eastern part of Turkey. The teacher took part in a project1 related to ABI. Data were collected through classroom videotape recordings and semistructured interviews. The results indicated problems in grasping the ABI by the teacher, questioning (teacher and student questioning), classroom interaction, classroom management, and accessing resources and equipment.

This study investigated high school students’ perception and understanding of scientific argumentation. The sample consisted of 245 high school students. Two questionnaires were administered with the sample resulting in quantitative data. Qualitative analyses of students’ responses were also carried out. The results indicate that students’ understanding of scientific argument particularly with respect to their differentiation of justification is quite limited. Students have difficulties in understanding types of justification. Even though students appreciate the role of argumentation and discourse in science teaching and learning, their perceptions of the use of various strategies in the implementation of argumentation were contradictory. Students’ perceptions of discourse are based on categories classified as knowledge, implementation, understanding, importance of science, actions by students and teachers, and classroom management. Students’ perceptions’ of argumentation include similar themes as in perceptions of discourse. There were only two different themes which were related to knowledge and nature of science instead of classroom environment and importance of science, respectively. This study contributes to the evidence base for understanding the connection between students’ argumentation perceptions and their improved engagement in argumentative discourse. Additionally, the study suggests the need for developing students’ metacognitive skills.

Pre-service elementary teachers' view on how scientific practice works could be shown in their lab reports especially which were designed to write their testing questions, methods, claims and evidences. For better practice of scientific inquiry for the pre-service teachers, Science Writing Heuristic was used as a teaching method. Only adopting worksheet of SWH and following the steps may lead students to the proper experience of scientific inquiry, which might be hardly expected. The stage of making their own testable questions is essential and critical for the scientific practice as well. This study presumed that a group questioning strategy at this stage would be effective for better scientific inquiry. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate changes of scientific practices after adapting group questioning strategy in terms of scientific reasoning and consistency among elements of scientific practices including questions, methods, claims, and evidences based on pre-service teachers' lab reports on elementary level science activities. During the science teaching methods course for pre-service elementary science teachers, the activity of various subjects in elementary science textbooks were implemented. In this study, two classes were observed and participants' writings were collected; one used science writing form without and the other with group questioning strategy. During participants' practices with the form, participants were asked to write what they were curious about, what they did and was their evidences, and what they claimed through the activity. There were found to be more interactions among participants and more relevant and testable questions asked in a class with group questioning strategies. It was implicated that participant pre-service teachers acted similar with children in terms of scientific practices as well. Further it was discussed whether scientific practice in school science truly include testing students' own questions.

This study seeks to characterize the discourse of classrooms that utilize the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH), an approach to Argument Based Inquiry (ABI). Linguistic behaviors that lend themselves to inclusion in a discourse that supports argumentation are examined, such as frequency of dialog interchange and instances of student-student speech. Students and teachers in SWH classrooms utilize linguistic behaviors that support argumentation significantly more frequently than their counterparts in classrooms that utilize more traditional pedagogies. The linguistic behaviors characterized in this study allow us to more clearly describe the discourse that develops under the SWH approach. This discourse is specifically illuminated as a discourse of argumentation, in which the importance of student voice is a key underlying value.

The main aim of this research is to understand how inquiry-based learning in the context of fuel cells support the interest of 14 to 15- year-old male and female junior high school students. In total, 18 student groups (N=159) were involved in the case study in which a learning material with inquiry-based laboratory work in the context of fuel cells, designed based on previous research, was used. According to the survey conducted as a part of this research, the majority of youth liked inquiry-based chemistry experiments. The tangible stages of the work, i.e. compiling the miniature fuel cell car and operating it in practice, interested the youth the most. Boys were significantly more interested than girls in the applications of fuel cells related to the studied subject. Girls were interested in hydrogen energy economy, and that the issue is topical at the moment. Girls were also significantly more interested in the stages of inquiry-based learning – reporting the results and answering the questions that required reasoning. It seems that the model of inquiry-based learning used here and the learning materials give good opportunities for increasing the interests in chemistry among girls and boys alike, and thus provide a solution for the biggest challenge in chemistry education – increasing the youth’s interest in chemistry

In this paper we will present an evidence-based model for the continuous professional development (CPD) of chemistry teachers, using the inquiry approach in the chemistry laboratory. The teachers had to fill protocols assembled in a portfolio that can be used to demonstrate evidence-based practice in chemistry teaching in the inquiry laboratory. Seven experienced chemistry teachers participated in a workshop, coordinated by three CPD providers from the Department of Science Teaching, at the Weizmann Institute of Science. The meetings, lasting about three hours, were conducted once a month. Of the seven teachers, some were videotaped while conducting inquiry-type experiments in their classes, and were interviewed immediately afterwards. Based on the findings, we concluded that the teachers became more reflective and more aware of their practice. In addition, we observed a change in their pedagogical knowledge and content knowledge regarding the inquiry teaching