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Asia-Pacific Forum
on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 14, Issue 1, Article 3 (Jun., 2013) |
Teaching school science within the cognitive and affective domains
Kok Siang TAN1, Chong Yong HENG2, and Shuhui TAN3
1National Institute of Education, 2Bukit View Secondary School, 3Chung Cheng High School (Main), SINGAPORE
E-mail: koksiang.tan@nie.edu.sg
Received 2 May, 2011
Revised 10 Jan., 2013
Contents
In classrooms, science is usually taught within the cognitive domain while the psychomotor learning domain is achieved through performing science experiments in the laboratory. Although students attend civic and moral education and pastoral care classes where values and life skills are often taught directly, learning experiences in most school subjects such as science are still centred on preparing for high stakes examinations. It is therefore not surprising that affective domain learning outcomes are often the least considered when teachers plan or conduct their science lessons. This paper is a report on three school-based trial lessons in which students from two Singapore secondary schools were taught science concepts and skills in the usual manner with follow-up reflective activities requiring them to draw from their learning experiences parallel scenarios in their daily lives. The students were taught chemistry topics like reactivity of potassium metal (taught to a secondary 4 normal technical class), sedimentation as a separation technique (taught to a secondary 3 express class), and reaction characteristics of weak and strong acids (taught to a secondary 2 express class). At the end of each lesson, students had to discuss, reflect and respond to an everyday event or scenario which has characteristics similar to the chemistry topic or skill they had just learnt. This cognitive-affective integrative teaching approach aims to help students surface important values, positive social habits or effective life skills. Although this is not a research project but an exemplary teaching practice, observations of students’ reflective responses to the tasks and feedback on learning experiences from students and teachers show great potential for this teaching approach to be a possible way in helping raise the profile of affective learning objectives in school science lessons.
Keywords: affective domain, analogies, reflection, school science, values education
Acknowledgements: The authors would like to thank W4 School Cluster for supporting and sponsoring the conference attendance of the teachers from Bukit View Secondary School, the Principals and Heads of Science Department of Bukit View Secondary School and Chung Cheng High School (Main) for their support and encouragement, and the National Institute of Education for leading the teachers in these lesson trials. We also like to thank Mr Lin Zikai, former teacher at Bukit View Secondary School for participating in the project, and Dr Paul Shutler of the National Institute of Education for kindly proof reading our manuscript.
