A Study On The Scientific Nature Of Preschool Teachers' Words In Scientific Inquiry Activitie

The concept of scientific essence is currently a hot topic of academic research and a core issue in the philosophy of science and science education.Teachers’ view of the nature of science has a significant impact on their teaching behaviors.As implementers of kindergarten science education,early childhood teachers’ conceptions of the nature of science will influence their science education behaviors and the formation and development of young children’s conceptions of the nature of science.The teacher’s speech in science activities is a manifestation of the teacher’s level of understanding and application of the essence of science,and its examination is helpful for us to understand the teacher’s ability to teach the essence of science and the latent conception of the essence of science.In order to understand the current status of the implicit conception of science essence behind the current kindergarten teachers’ speech acts and its influencing factors,this study used the naturalistic observation method,interview method and content analysis method to select thirteen frontline teachers’ thirteen science-focused teaching activities in kindergarten D for on-site observation and video recording,organize the videos into classroom transcripts,and then use information technology(Flying Book of Wonders)to extract and organize teachers’ speech to form corpus Data.Teachers were interviewed at the end of the observations and transcribed or recorded to gather information for subsequent interpretive understanding of teachers’ views of the nature of science as reflected in science inquiry activities and to help us infer factors influencing teachers’ views of the nature of science.Prior to the analysis,the analytical framework of this study was constructed through literature combing and the analysis tool was designed in conjunction with the Guidelines for Children’s Learning and Development for Ages 3-6,the specific dimensions of the category list for analyzing teachers’ speech acts in science inquiry activities,the connotation of each dimension and its operational definition were clarified,and then the analysis tool was adjusted and refined through pre-analysis,and finally the collected corpus data were analyzed for a combination of qualitative and quantitative content.The study revealed that: i.Early childhood teachers’ understanding of the nature of science is imperfect,incomplete,and uneven,with a better cognitive and empirical understanding of the nature of scientific inquiry and the nature of scientific knowledge dimensions,and an overall poor understanding of the nature of scientific endeavors dimension,and the overall level of scientific nature view still has much room for improvement.In terms of the distribution of teachers’ speech in science inquiry activities corresponding to the scientific essence dimensions,the number of units of analysis of the scientific essence embodied in the speech acts of early childhood teachers in science inquiry activities is unevenly distributed across the scientific essence dimensions,more distributed in the scientific inquiry essence dimension,and distributed but less in the scientific career dimension;while in the scientific knowledge essence dimension,there appears to be a better understanding of the empirical nature of scientific knowledge and cognitive understanding,and 0 units of analysis of the temporary,cumulative and limited nature of scientific knowledge.To a certain extent,this reflects that early childhood teachers’ understanding of the nature of science is not holistic and unsystematic,and their understanding of different dimensions of the nature of science or different sub-dimensions of the same dimension is fragmented,isolated,and incomplete.Second,early childhood teachers’ view of the nature of science has individual differences.From the results of the study,teachers with the same or close number of units of analysis of scientific essence embodied by speech in scientific inquiry activities had different scores on the dimensions of scientific essence,and education and teaching years were positively correlated with the level of early childhood teachers’ view of scientific essence.Third,the scientific essence of early childhood teachers is characterized by "can do" but "cannot say".Early childhood teachers lack knowledge of the concept of "scientific essence" and do not have a complete and systematic understanding of the connotation of the essence of science,and the concept of scientific essence they embody through their words in their activities is unconscious.They are implicit and ambiguous;teachers do not use "epistemic," "empirical," "logical," "inferential," and other such philosophical The teachers did not use such terms as "epistemic," "empirical," "logical," and "inferential," but rather understood the "essence of science" as the goal to be pursued in science education.The study also found that the neglect of the "essence of science" and the development of teachers’ "essence of science" in preschool education,the teachers’ own experiences and preferences,the age and learning characteristics of preschool children,and the types of science activities all affect the teachers’ conceptions of the essence of science.This study is based on the findings of the study.On this basis,this study analyzes and suggests ways to improve teachers’ conceptions of the nature of science.On the one hand,it can promote the teachers’ understanding of science essence education and reflection on their own science essence concepts;on the other hand,it can provide reference suggestions for improving kindergarten teachers’ science essence concepts and science essence teaching ability.