Ask a Scientist Website; Trends in Chemistry Questions in Turkey

Ask a Scientist Website: Trends in Chemistry Questions in Turkey

Rıdvan Elmas • Fatma Nur Akın • Omer Geban

Published online: 23 January 2013

� De La Salle University 2013

Abstract The purpose of this study was to investigate

questions submitted by users of a website that is popular

with Turkish students learning about chemistry and thereby

to inform teachers about trends in student interest. The

website contains articles and information about chemistry

and encourages visitors to ‘‘Ask a Scientist’’ questions

about the subject. Over 1,500 enquiries, submitted over a

5-year period between 2006 and 2011, were classified

according to field of interest in chemistry, type of infor-

mation requested in the question, and motivation for asking

the question. The most popular category was basics of

chemistry (27.1 %), followed by nuclear chemistry and

chemistry of the elements (19.1 %). We found that 37.3 %

of the questions sought factual information and 20.1 %

explanatory information. Our analysis of enquirers’ moti-

vation for asking their questions indicated that 55.6 % were

asked for non-applicative, while 26.8 % were asked for

applicative reasons. With respect to gender, males asked

54.44 % of the questions.

Keywords Ask a scientist website �Chemistry questions � Interest � Gender

Introduction

Students need flexible learning environments that provide

opportunities for questions (Dyche and Epstein 2011).

Higher level questions support and enhance meaningful

learning and students’ motivation. In addition, student

generated questions are used as a hint to redesign the

classroom instruction to cater for students’ curiosity,

enthusiasm, and engagement. Students, who are encour-

aged to pose their own questions about a course topic,

develop their understanding as to how answers are related,

conditional, and contextual, and how they rely on supple-

mentary questions (Bowker 2010). The active process of

questioning rather than the passive repetition of concepts

and facts supports the development of critical and creative

thinking, which shapes our perspective (Deluty 2010).

Questions are simply sentences that are used to demand

a request for information as an answer (Dillon 1982).

Asking questions shows questioners’ will, effort, courage,

commitment, skill, and the level of knowledge (Van Der

Meij 1992). Besides, they are key tools that reflect stu-

dents’ understanding, interest, and creativity (McDevitt

1994). Although the effectiveness and usage of questions in

the classroom settings are well known, generally students

are rarely used to generate and ask questions as in their

conventional roles (Pedrosa de Jesus et al. 2003). In tra-

ditional classroom design, students are under pressure of

teacher domination, peer ridicule, and instructional barriers

R. Elmas (&)

Department of Secondary Science and Mathematics Education,

Room 207, Faculty of Education, Middle East Technical

University, Universiteler Mah. Dumlupinar Blv. No:1, Cankaya,

06800 Ankara, Turkey

e-mail: [email protected]

F. N. AkınDepartment of Secondary Science and Mathematics Education,





O. Geban

Department of Secondary Science and Mathematics Education,





123

Asia-Pacific Edu Res (2013) 22(4):559–569

DOI 10.1007/s40299-013-0058-0

(Pedrosa de Jesus et al. 2003; Rop 2003; Baram-Tsabari

et al. 2006). Students commonly prefer asking questions

after, or between, class hours to avoid class reaction. The

accepted norms in the classroom are teacher and textbook

questioning. Such constraints of formality can produce

ineffective and incomplete educational practices. Students

ask questions when they feel safe and secure (Baram-

Tsabari and Yarden 2010).

The internet, for example, is perceived as a safe and

secure environment to ask questions. There are many ways

to ask questions on the internet, one of the most popular of

which is to use ‘ask a scientist’ sites or websites which

have a section for answering questions for a specific topic

or field. The use of such websites for any science related

question is promoted and suggested as a good way of

learning in an informal environment (e.g., science muse-

ums/centers, botanical gardens, arboretums, and zoos)

without boundaries (Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2010). It is

thought that the questions people pose on these websites

tend to be intuitive and interest driven and mostly relate to

topics of interest or importance to the questioner. In

addition, the use of internet and computers such a way also

supports cooperation and collaboration in the student

community (Yeo and Chee Tan 2011).

Many studies have considered the in-class questions of

students, teachers and their generation process (Chin and

Osborne 2008; Keys 1998; Commeyras 1995) but little is

known about students’ out-of-class questions. Therefore,

many researchers started to gather data on students’ interest

and curiosity about science and technology by using

unobtrusive measures, such as making content analysis of

questions which were asked on a website or a TV show

(Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2005, 2009, 2010; Baram-

Tsabari et al. 2006, 2009; Falchetti et al. 2007; Yerdelen-

Damar and Eryilmaz 2010), and a science magazine

(Cakmakci et al. 2011). For researchers, the advantage of

using this method is to be able to analyze the expression of

spontaneous ideas and interest driven intrinsic motivation

questions, without disturbing the questioners.

In this study, researchers analyzed questions that were

sent to a website about chemistry and determined which

topics were perceived as more popular and interesting by

students and the other questioners. It is known that deter-

mining which topics are more popular from the perspec-

tives of learners of chemistry has implications for

educational practice (Sjoberg and Schreiner 2010; Jidesjo

et al. 2009). For instance, determined trends and tendencies

in chemistry topics can be used in curriculum development

studies, chemistry course designs, test construction pro-

cesses, and remedial works with under achiever students.

Moreover, the trends and emerging ideas of students give

many perspectives to classroom instruction, thus enabling

teachers to reorganize the activities and instruction in a

more student oriented way. In addition, the topics which

students are more willing to learn may be promoted in

chemistry experiments and projects in schools.

Ask a Scientist Website

It used to be difficult for students to finding serious, reli-

able, and genuine web pages related to chemistry in

Turkish. For this reason the website www.kimyasanal.net

was established with the aim of providing a virtual envi-

ronment for sharing knowledge, experience, and questions

concerning chemistry. At the time of the study the website

featured the work of 23 authors with 906 articles on various

aspects of chemistry such as organic, inorganic, and

physical. Contributing authors included faculty members,

post-graduates, graduates, and undergraduate students.

There were 9,496 registered users of the website. The guest

questions feature enables users to ‘ask a scientist’ a ques-

tion about chemistry. To ask a question, users are presented

with a form to complete and submit with the following

information: their name, surname, e-mail, and question.

There are no other prompts to complete when asking a

question.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the chemistry

questions submitted to the student use web site, to gauge

topics of interest to students, and to contribute to classroom

practice by informing teachers about trends in chemistry

topics students are interested in. For these purposes, all the

questions were classified according to field of interest, type

of requested information, and the motivation for asking the

question. In addition, gender is one of the important vari-

ables that we took into account in the classification process

of the questions.

Method

The Sample

1,565 participants are those people who asked questions

using this website over a 5-year period between 2006 and

2011. Since there is no prompt for additional information

in the website, we do not have extra information about the

participants. In the light of the questions asked, it is

acceptable to assume that many questioners are students,

professionals in chemistry, or people who have an interest

in the subject matter. Moreover, the type of questions also

signaled that questioners were from different age groups

and various educational backgrounds. Gender classification

was undertaken by analysis of Turkish first names which

560 R. Elmas et al.

123

http://www.kimyasanal.net

are mostly selective to gender; however, the gender of

some participants remained unknown in those cases where

names were given that are used by both genders in Turkey

(Yerdelen-Damar and Eryilmaz 2010; Cakmakci et al.

2011). Meanwhile, a total of the 1,530 questioners stated

their gender when asking their questions. Among 1,530

questions submitted to this website, 833 (54.44 %) were

asked by males, and 697 (45.56 %) were asked by females.

Procedure

This study is a content analysis of chemistry questions

submitted to a student use web site. Content analysis is a

technique that supports researchers generally to work with

any type of content of communication (Marshall and

Rossman 2006). Using this technique, a researcher can

indirectly study from questions to infer about the trendiest

topics of chemistry (Fraenkel and Wallen 2000). The unit

of analysis of this study was chemistry questions. The

strength of content analysis is that it is indirect and unob-

trusive (Marshall and Rossman 2006).

Classifying the Questions

Classification of the questions was made with reference to

three schemas: field of interest in chemistry, type of

requested information in the question, and motivation for

asking the question. The basic principles of this classifi-

cation were taken from similar, previous studies and

adapted for use in this study (Baram-Tsabari and Yarden

2005; Yerdelen-Damar and Eryilmaz 2010).

Field of Interest in Chemistry

The classification of the questions with respect to the field

of interest in chemistry was carried out in accordance with

the topics areas set out in the book General Chemistry by

Ebbing and Gammon (2002). This textbook was chosen

because of its extensive popularity and usage in many

studies (Kovac 1999; Deese et al. 2000; Brito et al. 2005)

in addition to its being the choice of many universities

including ours. Due to the extensive coverage of the variety

of the chemistry topics in the selected General Chemistry

textbook, most of the questions were classified according to

which categories and subcategories they fall under. Some

exceptional questions that were not directly related to

chemistry but rather to the life styles of chemists, univer-

sities, departments, chemistry books, internships, and

equipments, etc. Such questions were categorized into

three categories as follows:

(a) Information about universities, chemistry courses,

books, and internships;

(b) Information about chemical investments, products,

and equipments;

(c) Information about jobs, lifestyles, and scientists.

The reason for adding these three categories was to

refrain from excluding a very high number of questions

because they did not directly related to the discipline but

rather to the social aspects of it. These questions were

considered useful to providing us with a frame concerning

the range of interest of questioners related to the social

aspects of chemistry to a certain extent. The questions

analyzed under these three categories were not further

analyzed according to type of requested information or

motivation for asking the question, and they were called

undistinguished in the results part in these two categories.

Type of Information Requested in the Question

As the second classification, the type of information

requested in the question was identified as in previous

studies (Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2005; Yerdelen-Damar

and Eryilmaz 2010). Five coding themes were used to

classify the questions; factual, explanatory, methodologi-

cal, open-ended, and applicative (Table 1).

Motivation for Asking the Question

In addition, questions were classified according to the

motivation of the questioners’ for asking the question. A

possible way to understand their motivation was to evalu-

ate the way in which their questions were worded or

phrased. This classification was undertaken using the

methods applied in previous studies (Baram-Tsabari and

Yarden 2005; Yerdelen-Damar and Eryilmaz 2010). Two

main categories were classified first: non-applicative and

applicative. Then, these two main categories were subdi-

vided into subcategories (Table 2).

Table 1 Classification according to type of requested information

Factual (Terminological) What is…?

(Historical) When was…?

(Descriptive) What are the characteristics of acids?

(Confirmatory) Is it true that…?

Explanatory Why and how questions…?

Methodological Scientific ways of finding things out and with

scientific and methodological procedures

Open-ended Opinions, controversial themes, and futuristic

questions that science cannot answer for the time

being

Applicative Scientific and technological knowledge is being

used to solve problems and challenges

Ask a Scientist Website 561

123

Reliability

For inter-coder reliability, 250 questions were separately

coded in three categorization types by two researchers (first

and second authors). The concordance of coding styles

according to classifications between the two researchers

was 86, 84, and 80 % respectively. The researchers met on

several occasions to consider their coding of the questions

with a view to enhancing their agreement.

Results

Field of Interest in Chemistry

The questions (n = 1565), were divided into five catego-

ries, Basics of Chemistry (n = 423), Atomic and Molec-

ular Structure (n = 83), States of Matter and Solutions

(n = 193), Chemical Reactions and Equilibrium (n = 201)

and Nuclear Chemistry and Chemistry of the Elements

(n = 298). In addition, a further three categories were

applied where it was identified that the questioner was

seeking to obtain information about universities, chemistry

courses, books, and internships (n = 86), information

about chemical investments, products, and equipment

(n = 110) and information about jobs, lifestyles, and sci-

entists (n = 35). The first five categories were further

divided into subcategories, resulting in a total of 25 sub-

categories. Examples of the application of the categories

and subcategories in this coding scheme are presented in

Table 3.

According to the first schema, 135 questions (8.6 %)

were not classified because they were related to other

disciplines (biology, physics, etc.). Those questions that did

not fit the schema were categorized as undistinguished, e.g.

‘‘What are the effects of poison on the human body?’’. The

remaining questions were placed in one of the eight cate-

gories in this scheme.

In light of the analysis, the most popular category for

questioners was basics of chemistry (27.1 %) (Fig. 1).

Within this category, most questions were concerned with

chemical reactions (14.5 %) (Table 4). The second most

popular category was nuclear chemistry and chemistry of

the elements category (19.1 %), where most of the ques-

tions were related to the organic chemistry (13.0 %) sub-

category. The third most popular category was chemical

reactions and equilibrium (12.9 %) with the highest num-

ber of questions related to the acids and bases (5.2 %)

subcategory. In the States of matter and solutions (12.3 %)

category most questions were related to the solutions

(9.3 %) subcategory. The category, atomic and molecular

structure (5.3 %) generated the least number of questions

as shown in Fig. 1. In addition to these results, in the other

three main categories, information about chemical invest-

ments, products and equipment (7.0 %) was the most

interesting category. It was followed by the information

about universities, chemistry courses, books and intern-

ships (5.5 %) category. On the other hand, information

about jobs, lifestyles and scientists (2.2 %) was the least

interesting category.

Finally, the sample was also analyzed according to gen-

der. A total of 1,530 of the questioners stated their gender

when asking their questions. With respect to the results

related to gender, males asked 54.44 % of all the questions

while the ratio for females was 45.56 %. The ratio of males to

females in our sample is consistent with the ratio of students

who are attending primary and secondary schools in Turkey.

The percentage of males and females in continuing primary

and secondary formal education are 53.99 and 46.01 %,

respectively (MoNE 2010). Figure 2 presents the percentage

of the questions of males and females to field of interest in

chemistry. The analysis concerning atomic and molecular

structure indicated that, only in this category, female ques-

tioners (2.6 %) asked more questions than males (2.5 %).

The percentage of questions asked by both genders in

information about jobs, lifestyles and scientists category

(1.1 %) is equal. Males submitted more questions than

females in all remaining categories.

Type of Information Requested in the Question

This schema was subdivided into five categories: factual,

explanatory, methodological, open-ended, and applicative.

This finding provides a framework for informing us about

the students’ questioning quality and ability. Some exam-

ples of the classified questions with respect to type of

information requested in the question are presented in

Table 2 Classification according to motivation for asking the

question

Non-applicative

Spectacular aspects Biggest, fastest, oldest, strongest thing ever

Personnel use Asking about personal questions which are

not applicable

General curiosity Is soap an alkali?

Explanation for an

observation

Science and technology related questions that

stem from questioner’s personal

observations

Linguistic aspects Why things were named the way they are

Applicative

Personnel use Asking about personal questions which are

applicable

Health & lifestyle Questions that are related to the medical and

social issues

562 R. Elmas et al.

123

Table 5. In this category, 277 questions (17.7 %) were

categorized as undistinguished.

In this category, 37.3 % of questions asked by students

were posed to obtain factual information and 20.1 % of

them required explanatory information. Figure 3 indicated

that 584 questioners requested factual and 314 questioners

requested explanatory information. The percentage of the

Table 3 Some examples of classification according to field of interest in chemistry

Category Subcategory Example

Basics of Chemistry Chemical Reactions Why does silver darken in bleach? (m)

What happens when nitrogen meets with water? (f)

Atomic and Molecular Structure Molecular Geometry and

Chemical Bonding Theory

How are five water molecules connected to copper(II)

sulfate penta hydrate compound? (m)

States of Matter and Solutions States of Matter; Liquids

and Solids

When plastic flask filled with water is put on hot plate,

water boils without melting plastic flask. How can we

explain this? (m)

Chemical Reactions and Equilibrium Rates of Reaction What is the highest overall reaction order of a chemical

reaction? (f)

Nuclear Chemistry and Chemistry

of the Elements

Nuclear Chemistry What is the most stable substance in the world? (m)

Information about universities,

chemistry courses, books, and internships

What educational sources do you suggest for

International Chemistry Olympiads? (m)

Information about chemical investments,

products and equipments

Where can I obtain sulfur hexafluoride? (m)

Information about jobs, lifestyles, and

scientists

What are the job opportunities for a chemistry graduate? (f)

27.1

5.3

12.312.9

19.1

5.5

7

2.2

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Basics ofChemistry

Atomic andMolecularStructure

States ofMatter andSolutions

ChemicalReactions and

Equilibrium

NuclearChemistry andChemistry ofthe Elements

Informationabout

universities,chemistrycourses,

books, andinternships

Informationabout

chemicalinvestments,products andequipments

Informationabout jobs,

lifestyles, andscientists

Fig. 1 Percentage of the

categorized questions according

to field of interest in chemistry

Table 4 Most interesting topics concerning field of interest

Subject Frequency Percent

Chemical reactions 227 14.5

Organic chemistry 204 13.0

Solutions 145 9.3

Acids and bases 81 5.2


123

categorized questions asking for both methodological and

applicative information is 10.4 %. On the other hand,

questions requiring open-ended information account for

only 4.1 % of the sample.

According to analysis of the questions, males asked many

more questions requesting open-ended, explanatory, and

applicative information than females in these categories (see

Fig. 4). In the other categories, there is only a slight difference

between the percentage of the questions of males and females

according to type of information requested in the question.

Motivation for Asking the Question

This coding schema was firstly subdivided into two catego-

ries, namely: non-applicative and applicative. The former was

subdivided as spectacular aspects, general curiosity, seeking

an explanation for a direct observation, linguistic aspects, and

personal use. The latter was subdivided as personal use and

human health and lifestyle. Sample questions from this cate-

gory can be seen in Table 6. In this category, 276 questions

(17.6 %) were categorized as undistinguished.

The findings concerning motivation for asking the questions

showed that more than half of the questions (55.6 %) were

asked for non-applicative (see Fig. 5) reasons. Nearly half of

the questions (45.3 %) were asked for general curiosity in the

non-applicative category. The percentages of the questions

categorized as seeking an explanation for a direct observation

subcategory were 3.5 % and in the non-applicative personal

use subcategory 5.7 %. The percentages of the remaining

subcategories concerning the categorized questions according

to motivation for asking questions are less than 1 %.

The results concerning motivation for asking the questions

showed that a little more than one-quarter of the questions

(26.8 %) were asked for applicative reasons (see Fig. 6). 23.0 %

of the questions relate to personal use and 3.8 % concerned

human health and lifestyle in the applicative category.

According to the analyses of the questions, in both

applicative and non-applicative categories, females had a

higher motivation for asking questions that only concerned

linguistic aspects and non-applicative personal use sub-

categories. In the remaining subcategories, males had a

higher motivation for asking the questions (Figs. 7, 8).

Conclusion and Discussion

This study investigated Turkish questioners’ interest in

chemistry using 1,565 of their self-generated chemistry-

related questions. It should be emphasized that although

our data consisted of self-generated questions, some were

prompted by the questioners’ homework, teacher and

textbook-generated questions. We know that chemistry is

one of the most popular science subjects among students

13.7

2.5

6.3 6.6

10

2.7

4.9

1.1

11.7

2.6

5.5 5.9

8.9

2.62

1.1

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Male

Female


questions of males and females

to field of interest in chemistry

564 R. Elmas et al.

123

and adults (Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2009), and the

results of this study give information about what ques-

tioners are interested in knowing about chemistry. The

findings of this study can therefore be used to inform

chemistry teachers, curriculum developers, school admin-

istrators, and textbook writers.

A previous study by Baram-Tsabari and Yarden (2009),

found that the most popular chemistry subjects were what

things are made of and bonding and structure (5.4 %). In

our study the similar subcategories of atoms, molecules and

ions, and ionic and covalent bonding, were also emerged

but they are not as popular as Baram-Tsabari and Yarden’s

work and this result may be related to the different contexts

of Turkey and Israel. When students in high schools were

asked to display their interest in learning about different

topics, they wanted to ask questions related to topics such

as disease, drugs, biological and chemical weapons, the

ozone layer, and green house gases which were not inclu-

ded in the curriculum (Kwiek et al. 2007). These topics can

be considered as conceptual names of contexts for different

science subjects (Elmas et al. 2011; Lavonen et al. 2005).

According to our findings, the most interesting topics of

field of interest were chemical reactions and organic

chemistry, which can be easily applied to these contexts.

For instance, organic chemistry can easily be applied to

disease and drugs contexts and chemical reactions with

biological and chemical weapons contexts.

In this study, the most frequently asked questions related

to the chemical reactions, organic chemistry, solutions, and

acids and bases subcategories, accounting for 42 % of the

inquiries submitted to the website. These topics are also the

Table 5 Some examples of classification according to type of

requested information in the question

Category Example

Factual What is ethyl acetate? (f)

Does sugar dissolve in alcohol? (m)

Methodological How can we separate ethane–ethylene–acetylene

gas mixture? (f)

How can we separate ethanol, naphthalene, and

chlorobenzene mixture? (m)

Open-ended Why do pH values of the solutions have to be

between 0 and 14? Is it possible to prepare a

solution having a pH value between -2 and 16?

(f)

How can we decide where a new discovered

element should be placed in the Periodic Table?

(m)

Applicative How can I separate silver from silver nitrate

solution? (m)

Is it possible to make cellulose from cotton? (m)

37.3

20.1

10.4

4.1

10.4

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

Factual Explanatory Methodological Open-ended Applicative

%



to type of requested information

in the question

18.1

10.1

5.4

2.5

6.3

17.8

9.2

4.9

1.5

4

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

Factual Explanatory Methodological Open-ended Applicative

Male

Female



according to type of requested

information in the question


123

main topics of Turkish Chemistry Curriculum from grades 9

through to 12. As an example, in Grade 9, chemical reactions

are taught under the chapter of chemical changes (e.g., what is

a reaction, reaction types, polymerization, and hydrolyses) for

12 h. In Grade 12, organic chemistry is taught under the two

different chapters, an introduction to organic chemistry (e.g.,

organic compounds, hybridization, and molecular geometry)

for 16 h, and organic reactions (e.g., organic redox reactions,

substitution reactions) for 14 h. Solutions are taught in both

Grade 9 (e.g., classification of mixtures and separation of

mixtures) for 16 h and in Grade 10 (e.g., solutions, concen-

tration, heterogeneous mixtures) for 20 h. The popularity of

these topics in the questions proved us to consider our per-

spectives related to all educational settings in Turkey. The

huge pile of questions related to these topics is very relevant to

chemistry curriculum, however, they are needed to cover fully

in the classroom instruction efficiently.

Table 6 Some examples of classification according to motivation for asking the question

Category Subcategory Example

Non-

applicative

Spectacular aspects How can any substance be transformed into gold? (m)

Which is the highest reaction order of a chemical reaction? (f)

General curiosity Why are alkaline metals colored? (f)

Is D2O radioactive? (m)

Seeking an explanation for a direct

observation

Why does an ant bite hurt? (f)

Why do we see a colored line when squeezing toothpaste though it is otherwise not

possible to see that line? (m)

Linguistic aspects Why is electron distribution named as electron cloud? (m)

Personal use Where can I find the information about names and molecule formulas of

Polymer additive substances used in concrete material? (m)

How can I find phase change diagram of iodine? (f)

Applicative Human health & lifestyle Which gases cause ozone depletion? (f)

What is the ideal range of aluminum in drinking water? (f)

Personal use How is shampoo produce? (m)

0.8

45.3

3.50.3

5.7

05

101520253035404550

%



to motivation for asking

question/non-applicative

category

23.0

3.8

0

5

10

15

20

25

Applicative-Personal use Human health & lifestyle

%

Fig. 6 Percentage of the categorized questions according to motiva-

tion for asking question/applicative category

566 R. Elmas et al.

123

Some 14.7 % of questions concerned issues that did not

directly relate to chemistry and were categorized as

requests for information about universities, chemistry

courses, books, and internships; information about chem-

ical investments, products, and equipment; and information

about jobs, lifestyles, and scientists. The most popular

category, accounting for 7 % of such questions was for

information about chemical investments, products and

equipment. It may be inferred that these questioners

required some applications of chemistry in their lives and

did not know how to obtain chemicals and necessary

equipment. Moreover, some questioners, especially stu-

dents, used the website to try and obtain information about

careers in chemistry. These questions relate to social

aspects of chemistry that are not emphasized in the Turkish

Chemistry Curriculum. It can therefore be inferred that

some learners may benefit from greater awareness of the

social aspects of the subject matter.

More than one-third of the questions (37.3 %) desired to

reach factual information. This result is consistent with

previous studies in the literature (Yerdelen-Damar and

Eryilmaz 2010; Baram-Tsabari and Yarden 2005). In our

study sample, 898 questioners requested factual (37.3 %)

and explanatory (20.1 %) information because they are

mostly exposed to such questions during their educational

life. In Turkey, high stake testing and school exams mostly

require the exam taker to answer questions relating to the

provision of factual and explanatory information. In addi-

tion, teachers encourage students to take notes regularly

during lessons, which indicate that in Turkish education

settings, emphasis is placed on the transfer of factual and

explanatory information.

Moreover, the students’ motivation for asking their

question was mostly non-applicative. Similar findings were

also observed in previous studies in the literature (Yerdelen-

Damar and Eryilmaz 2010; Baram-Tsabari and Yarden

2005, 2009). General curiosity was considered the main

reason for asking questions, as in the study of Yerdelen-

Damar and Eryilmaz (2010). Females were mostly interested

in chemistry and measurement, chemical reactions, solu-

tions subcategories while males were mostly interested in

chemical reactions, solutions, acids and bases subcatego-

ries. All these topics are related to the daily life of students in

some way so it may be inferred that the issues and problems

students encountered in their lives are more interesting to

them. Similar studies found that especially girls are more

interested in life experiences than boys but boys presented

greater interest to sustainability issues than girls (Chang et al.

2009). Moreover, organizing out of school contextual

0.6

22.4

1.90.1

2.30.2

21.6

1.50.3

3.4

0

5

10

15

20

25male

female



according to motivation for

asking the question/non-

applicative category

13.8

2

8.9

1.6

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

personal use human health & lifestyle

male

female

Fig. 8 Percentage of the questions of males and females according to

motivation for asking the question/applicative category


123

outdoor nature experiences boosts students’ interest in sci-

ence subjects (Uitto et al. 2006).

According to our results, males visit the website more

than females to ask chemistry questions (54.44 vs. 45.56 %

respectively). Several studies in the literature showed that

males were more likely to be interested in chemistry than

females (Cakmakci et al. 2011; Baram-Tsabari and Yarden

2009). However, according to our findings, we could not

claim that males were more interested in chemistry,

although they asked slightly more questions (Cheng et al.

2012). The reason for this difference may be that the

numbers of males and females in continuing primary and

secondary formal education in Turkey were 53.99 and

46.01 %, respectively (MoNE 2010). The values in our

study therefore mirror the lower participation of females in

national education. It should also be stated that this dif-

ference probably does not arise from experience in using

computers or the internet.

Implications

For Curriculum and Curriculum Reform

In general, curriculum developers are seen to consider the

importance of chemistry for students but do not necessarily

take into account students’ interests that may have a role

as an instructional guide within the science curriculum

(Baram-Tsabari et al. 2006). Therefore, besides the essen-

tial topics of chemistry, the curriculum should embrace

what students want to know and what they are interested in.

The curriculum does not particularly address the social

applications of chemistry. In seeking to address such defi-

ciencies in the formal education setting, curriculum devel-

opers may benefit from analysis of information about

students’ interest obtained from out of class and informal

settings. Developers would therefore be able to consider

reasons why some essential topics are considered to be of

least interest to students, and how to make them more

interesting and meaningful.

Teaching and Learning

It is known that one of the important guides to science

teaching is students’ individual science interest (Cakmakci

et al. 2011). Baram-Tsabari and Yarden (2009) also

emphasized that asking questions is a self-regulated process,

which enables students to control their learning process

actively and meaningfully. Students’ chemistry interests can

therefore be inferred from the questions they submit to a

website, which in turn may be used to inform classroom

science teaching. Teachers can deduce students’ interest and

knowledge from their questions; therefore, teachers should

design their instruction based on student-centered learning

environments to develop students’ question generating skills

(Yerdelen-Damar and Eryilmaz 2010). Teachers, while

designing their instruction, should encourage students’ to ask

questions and have due regard for those questions that are

repeated.

Chemistry teachers should be aware of the gender dif-

ferences in chemistry and design their instruction to

increase both female and male students’ interest. It is also

known that informal learning environments can be used to

affect girls’ interest toward science in a positive manner

(Cakmakci et al. 2011). Students, especially girls, required

more discussion in classroom settings and about everyday

applications of physics and chemistry (Jenkins 2006). In

order to meet their needs, teachers may emphasize the

practical application of chemistry in their activities, dem-

onstrations, and experiments.

The findings of this study underline the need to use science

and technology together in education. Schools may design a

web page for students to ask their questions about chemistry

which could be answered by peers and teachers. Baram-

Tsabari et al. (2006) stated that there was no time restriction

for generating questions in an online setting, whereas limits

apply to the classroom environment. Therefore, teachers

should also look to out of class activities to better understand

what their students’ are interested in and what they want to

know. Teachers could also encourage students to ask and

answer each other’s questions both inside and outside the

formal setting. Such activities and informal learning envi-

ronments may increase students’ interest in chemistry.

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http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11165-010-9206-1

http://eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED343950.pdf

http://eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED343950.pdf

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