EVIDENCE AND REASONING IN INQUIRY
Scientific inquiry is built on the interaction of evidence and logical
reasoning-the importance of careful observation, the role of observations
in supporting a line of reasoning, and the value of reasoning in suggesting
new observations. For basic literacy, students should be able to observe
and describe things accurately and understand why those things are important
in scientific inquiry. At the same time, they should understand what constitutes
good reasoning, and practice judging reasons in others' arguments and
in their own.
Instructionally, it may be helpful to think about the benchmarks in this
map in conjunction with the scientific content in the other chapters of
Benchmarks, particularly when student-inquiry activities involve
observation, gathering evidence, and making arguments. Related topics
in Benchmarks that will be mapped in the next edition of Atlas
will provide further context for the benchmarks in this map. They include
measurement, estimation, and the use of technology to improve observation
and measurement.
Notes
Many early ideas and skills come together in the 3-5 benchmark "Scientists
do not pay much attention to claims...," which has a wide fan of connections
to later benchmarks. It provides a reasonably good summation of the central
ideas, framed in language appropriate to the 3-5 level.
The lines of reasoning strand progresses from giving
and looking for reasons in K-2, to evaluating reasons in 3-5, to evaluating
lines of reasoning in 6-8 and 9-12 (when students have some understanding
of logic and inference). This strand also includes a benchmark about how reasoning
can be distorted, which is also in the Avoiding Bias in
Science map. Further benchmarks on detailed principles of reasoning
can be found in Benchmarks Chapter 9: THE MATHEMATICAL WORLD and will
appear in the next edition of Atlas.
In the observations and evidence strand, the relationship
between evidence and theory is hinted at in four early-grades benchmarks that
also appear in the Scientific Theories map. In addition,
the 9-12 benchmark in that strand, "Sometimes, scientists can control conditions...,"
appears in and is supported by benchmarks in the Scientific
Investigations map.
| Research in Benchmarks
Middle-school students tend to invoke personal experiences as evidence
to justify a particular hypothesis. They seem to think of evidence
as selected from what is already known or from personal experience
or secondhand sources, not as information produced by experiment
(Roseberry et al., 1992). Most 6th-graders can judge whether evidence
is related to a theory, although they do not always evaluate this
evidence correctly (Kuhn et al., 1988). When asked to use evidence
to judge a theory, students of all ages may make only theory-based
responses with no reference made to the presented evidence. Sometimes
this appears to be because the available evidence conflicts with
the students' beliefs (Kuhn et al., 1988).
Most high-school students will accept arguments based on inadequate
sample size, accept causality from contiguous events, and accept
conclusions based on statistically insignificant differences (Jungwirth
& Dreyfus, 1990, 1992; Jungwirth, 1987). More students can
recognize these inadequacies in arguments after prompting (for
example, after being told that the conclusions drawn from the
data were invalid and asked to state why) (Jungwirth & Dreyfus,
1992; Jungwirth, 1987). |
