Development of Argumentation Skills through Socioscientific Issues in Science Course: A Collaborative Action Research

Abstract

This study was designed as a collaborative action research, aimed to develop secondary school 8th graders' argumentation skills through socioscientific issues (SSI) in science course. The participants of the research were comprised of 26 eight graders. In the study, an action plan which had lasted 27 weeks was implemented. The data was collected by means of written documents related to the argumentation skills, unstructured observations, teacher and student diaries. The data was analyzed using content analysis. The study results showed that at the end of the implementation, all students were able to create arguments that were comprised of components of claim, warrant, evidence, counter claim-warrantand rebuttal. Also, in the process of development of argumentation skills, some problems both related to the components of argumentation skills and learning-teaching variables were observed. Thisresearch is significant in terms of presenting information regarding regulations to be made for the development of argumentation skills through SSI in science course and problems that may be encountered in this process, forimplementation processof collaborative action research.