Exploring Third-Grade Students' Model-Based Explanations About the Interactions Between Plant Processes and the Hydrosphere

• In Event: 66.025 - Meaningful Student Engagement in Scientific Discourse and Practice

Abstract

Elementary students have a great deal of knowledge about the biosphere generally, and plant processes specifically, that they have developed through experience. However, the ways in which they conceptualize this system and if they consider interrelationships between the biosphere and other systems such as the hydrosphere is largely unexplored. We engaged 3rd-grade students in the practices of modeling (NRC, 2013) to explore their conceptions of and reasoning about plant processes and if they consider interrelationships with the hydrosphere. Our findings indicate that students engaged in elements of systems thinking through their sophisticated conceptions about plant processes that included hydrosphere relationships. Study findings contribute to research on scientific modeling in elementary classrooms and have important implications for teachers and curriculum developers.

Authors

• Laura Zangori, University of Missouri - Columbia

• Cory T. Forbes, University of Nebraska - Lincoln