Preservice Science Teachers’ Views about Scientific Inquiry: The Case of Turkey and Taiwan

Abstract

In recent years, the importance of examining the opinions of preservice science teachers who will
educate future science literate individuals towards scientific research has been frequently mentioned. In
this research, in order to contribute to the field, 88 preservice science teachers in Turkey and 80
preservice science teachers in Taiwan participated in the study. The data was collected via Views about
Scientific Inquiry - VASI Questionnaires. Also, semi-structured interviews with volunteered preservice
science teachers. Results showed that there is a significant difference on behalf of preservice science
teachers in Taiwan in terms of “the way that the scientific inquiries are done”, “the place of experiment
and observation in scientific inquiries” as for the first dimension, and “there is no single set or sequence
of steps followed in all inquiries” as for the second dimension. Besides, the preservice science teachers
from both countries stated their views in “scientific” level on the dimension of “The result of an inquiry
should be in accordance with the collected data”. Moreover, it was revealed that preservice science
teachers in Turkey have difficulty in defining that scientific research always starts with a question; and
preservice science teachers in Taiwan have difficulty in defining the scientific data and scientific
evidence. Considering all the findings, preservice science teachers’ views of scientific inquiry in Taiwan
are better than them in Turkey.