Analysis of the Experiments in the Chemistry Textbooks in terms of the Laboratory Study Goal of the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum and Comparison with the Case of Science High School

Abstract

This study aims to examine to what extent the goal of the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum for experimental studies overlaps with the acquisitions of the curriculum and to what extent upper-secondary school chemistry textbooks (high school) are prepared to meet this purpose. The study also seeks to assess the extent to which the activities in the chemistry textbooks are written to meet the four dimensions (gaining data by experimenting, inferring using data, interpretation, and generalization) of the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum. Finally, it is intended to compare this situation with the 2018 Science High School Chemistry Curriculum and determine the similarities and differences. For these purposes, the acquisitions including the experimental studies in the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum were determined at first. Then, the experiments in the 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th-grade chemistry textbooks were analyzed. Two ways were used for textbook analysis. In the first stage, it was defined to what extent the acquisitions in the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum and the experiments in the textbooks overlapped and how the experiments were distributed according to the units. In the second stage, the experiments in the textbooks were analyzed according to the four dimensions of the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum by means of a rubric. it was concluded that the acquisitions that include explanations about experimental studies are approximately 16% of the total acquisitions of the 2018 Chemistry Curriculum. Additionally, as a result of this analysis for SPSs, it is found that the experiments mostly focus on the basic SSBs, and they focus especially on “observation” and “measurement” skills.