THE EFFECT OF COMPUTER-ASSISTED SCIENCE INSTRUCTION ATTITUDE TOWARDS SCIENCE AND THE COMPUTER

Abstract

The aim of the study was to investigate the effect of the use of the computer-assisted instruction (CAI) program prepared according to the constructivist approach in the primary school 6^th grade level on students’ attitude toward science and the computer. The randomized pretest-posttest control group design based on the split-pilot model was used. The study was conducted on 6^th grade primary school children who were assigned to experimental and control groups in a primary school in Buca, İzmir, Turkey. In this study the “Attitude Scale toward Science” and the “Attitude Scale toward the Computer” were used as a means of collecting data. T-test, paired-samples t-test, Man-Whitney U test and Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test for paired sample were used for analyses. It was determined that computer-assisted science instruction based on the constructivist method positively affected the attitude of students toward science and the computer and that there was a statistically significant difference in favor of the experimental group.

Key Words: computer-assisted instruction, constructivism, science, computer, attitude, primary school pupil. 

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