The ability of czech lower secondary schools’ students to identify and operationalize a research problem
Abstract
One of the essential skills for full application in society is scientific thinking. This is essential not only for carrying out one's own research, but also for assessing the presented scientific information and making responsible decisions in everyday life.
Its complexity also includes specific scientific skills. For the possibility of their effective development, it is necessary to understand the initial state and the problems that the students face in the particular skills.
The starting point for solving any research is a clear operationalization of the research problem and its transformation into a research question that is answered. A clear identification of the research problem is also essential for understanding possible results, their interpretation and assessment of their validity and the possibility of extrapolation not only in the context of science as such, but also in other spheres of human life.
Thus, these skills appear to be key for all students. For these reasons, the aim of the conducted research was to find out the students' ability to operationalize the research problem characterized by the given inquiry procedure into a research question that can be answered by this procedure.
The research was conducted on a sample of 127 Czech lower secondary school students in the 7th grade (ISCED 2). All students solved four inquiry-based tasks.
Based on the given inquiry procedure, laboratory equipment and material, the students formulated a research question, which they then answered based on the own inquiry. Students' formulations of research questions were qualitatively analysed.
The correspondence of the problem characterized by the students' formulations of the research questions to the research problem in the given inquiry procedure was assessed. With the use of an open coding, typical problems in student formulations of research questions were identified.
It was found that in most cases the research problem was in correspondence with the task only partially. Students were typically unable to identify all the variables involved in the procedure and include them in the correct relationship to the research question.
The insufficient grammatical correctness of the formulation of the research questions also proved to be a significant problem. The results of the research point to aspects that need to be given specific attention in teaching.