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Asia-Pacific Forum
on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 10, Issue 2, Article 15
(Dec. 2009) |
This is a qualitative research study involving two groups of students using videoconferencing.
The research involved two groups of Secondary Form 1 students from two schools located at two sides of the city of Hong Kong. School A lies in the middle of the downtown area while School B is situated at the north-west corner of the city. The group from School A consists of 40 students and the group from School B has 35 students. The students have mixed abilities, and their age range is from 11 to 13. All were studying in Secondary Form 1 when the research was conducted.
To find the learning outcomes of the students through the use of videoconferencing, the researchers needed to capture the learning process, learning product of the students and the reflections from all the teachers involved. The research involved the design of school-based curriculum, lesson observation, collection of students’ work and holding an evaluation meeting with the teachers. Content analysis and interviews were used as the main research methodology in this study.
Lesson plans, students’ worksheets and their finished product and some video-clips taken during lessons conducted via videoconferencing were analysed. Students’ progress was noted by comparing their work and performance in the consecutive videoconferences. What they learned and how they had learned from their counterparts through the videoconferences were also noted as learning outcomes.
Data collection and data analysis
After collecting water samples from their own water channel, teachers of the two schools guided their students to conduct different tests on the water samples taken from various points of the rivers. Data obtained after the different tests were pooled together from different groups for discussion. Students were advised to search the internet for information about the implication of the existence of certain chemicals in water. They tried to draw conclusions from the interpretation of those data after analyzing them with their teachers’ help. In order to meet the needs of the students, the teacher responsible for School A visited the Hong Kong Wetland Park with some students and performed some water tests there, as they wanted to compare the water quality there with that of the Kai Tak River.
