Effect of the verbal mnemonics on students` achievements and their attitudes

Transcription

1 Available online a Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 47 ( 2012 ) CY-ICER 2012 Effec of he verbal mnemonics on sudens` achievemens and heir aiudes Musafa Aydin a *, Ali Mura Sunbul b a Konya Universiy, Faculy of Educaion,Konya, 42099, Turkey a Konya Universiy, Faculy of Educaion,Konya, 42099, Turkey Absrac In his sudy he effecs of he insrucion of Science and Technology, which is based on he verbal mnemonics, on he learning producs has been searched. In his sudy eperimenal mehod s 1 has been used. Sudy has been conduced wih wo fifh grade classes which are equal o each oher wih heir scienific and cogniive enre behaviour. Toally 66 pupils have paricipaed o his sudy. A he conrol group normal educaional aciviies have been pracised as foresighed. A he eperimenal group educaion and insrucion have been coninued wih he maerials which suppored and based on he verbal memory Published by by Elsevier Ld. Selecion and/or peer review under responsibiliy of Prof. Dr. Hüseyin Uzunboylu Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license. Keywords: Verbal mnemonics, aiude, suden achievemens; 1. Inroducion As a social being, human is always in a relaionship wih he environmen. The human ries o learn abou he environmen and o be oriened o i. The effor of human o undersand he living environmen is as old as he hisory of human. In his process human ries o undersand he changes and developmens around firs. Today hese changes and developmens occur dizzily. So informaion is no sable bu always posiive. In such a sysem, he individual should be in a posiion ha can produce soluions for he problems of he developing world, quesion and ha can make he human acive raher han eising learning. Oherwise he sored, sable knowledge of he individual can ake he individual only o a cerain een. Thus he need for educaion is ineviable in erms of faciliaing he orienaion of he individual o he environmen. When many definiions on educaion are analyzed, i can be seen ha erm erminal behavior ofen akes place in many of hem. For he achievemen of erminal behaviors saed in hese definiions, planned and programmed implemenaions are required. Curriculum; is he mechanism of learning eperiences provided o he learner hough he planned in and ou of he school (Demirel 2008). Curriculum can be defined as a dynamic inegriy comprising he arges planned o be observed on he individual and he regular educaion and esing condiions ha can realize hem (Sönmez, 1993). Learning is he permanen changes occurring on he behaviors as a resul of ineracion (eperience) of he individual, according o his mauraion level, wih he environmen (Büyükaragöz, Çivi, 1997: 38). According o anoher definiion, learning is he changes occurring on he behaviors of he individual as a resul of he changes * Musafa Aydin. Tel.: address: maydinselcuk@gmail.com Published by Elsevier Ld. Selecion and/or peer review under responsibiliy of Prof. Dr. Hüseyin Uzunboylu Open access under CC BY-NC-ND license. doi: /j.sbspro

2 Musafa Aydin and Ali Mura Sunbul / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 47 ( 2012 ) occurred on he menal srucures of he individual (Eggen, Kauchak, 1999). Teaching which means he guiding of educaion is he whole of he processes applied for he realizaion of learning and he developmen of he behaviors required for he individual ). In he number of he sudies relaed o he planning of eaching process, an increase has been observed. Especially he sudies in he area of cogniive psychology ake more place han he sudies in he area of behavioral psychology. According o modern approaches learning in his process; is a more complicaed process han he relaion of simulan-reacion relaion. This process comprises he cogniive processes including he comparison of previous informaion wih he new obained wih simulans, soring of he informaion obained in he memory and hen recalling of his informaion According o he informaion processing heory, human ges he informaion from he ouer world, processes, changes is form and conen, sores, recalls when required and creaes reacions The heoris of informaion processing defines learning as he process in which he simulans go from he environmen are made meaningful, sored, recalled for using and convered ino behavior (Fidan, Erden; 1993). Human mind resembles o compuers in erms of his funcion. According o informaion processing heory, learning includes processing he srucure in he cogniive symbols wih he cogniive processes (Mayer, 2008: 168). Informaion processing heory mainly aims o answer he following four quesions: How is he new informaion aken from he ouer world? How is he new informaion processed? How is he new informaion sored in he long erm memory? How is he sored informaion recalled? Scieniss have ried o undersand he funcions and working of he mind wihin he scope of hese four quesions. Two main componens of he informaion processing heory draw aenion. The firs one is he sensory recepion, shor erm memory (working memory) and long erm memory which are soring unis. The second one is he cogniive processes. Cogniive processes are inernal, menal acions ha allow he informaion o be ransferred from one srucure o anoher. I can be said on memory and learning ha lef hemisphere abiliies have been focused on and adequae imporance has no been given o aciviies such as dreaming, fanasy, music and ar. Thus one of he mos imporan feaures of memory has been negleced. To resore he memory, he use of special memory suppor echniques developed by ancien Greeks in respec of acivaing all brain skills (by inspiring from Greek memory goddess Mnemosyne) and called mnemonic, can be useful. Memory suppors faciliaing learning and recalling of he learned, are acually mehods ha have been used for housands of years. For eample, i has been known ha he use of loci mehod, one of he mos effecive memory supporing mehods during rheoric eaching was augh in Romans period I is also possible o compose he memory suppors by coding he verbal symbols. In hese echniques arrangemens are made wih he help of inonaion. Memory suppors composed of verbal symbols are divided ino wo groups: Firs leer arranging sraegies Rhyme composing sraegies When he sudies performed on relaed field are analyzed, i has been seen ha memory suppors conribue o he learning of new conceps and recalling of learned informaion. In his research, he effec of Science and Technology eaching based on verbal memory suppors on he producs of learning has been analyzed. 2. Mehod 2.1. Paricipans

3 1508 Musafa Aydin and Ali Mura Sunbul / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 47 ( 2012 ) The research was performed on he 5h grade sudens of Hasanpasa elemenary school in Sulanbeyli couny of Isanbul in educaion years. Five classes in he school had been analyzed, 4h grade year end marks of hese classes had been eamined and he ages of he eachers and years of heir eperiences in educaion had been compared before he applicaion. In he resul of hese comparisons, i was deermined ha 5/A and 5/B classes are close o each oher in erms of his daa. In he findings obained in he preliminary ess performed before he applicaion, i was concluded ha he wo groups were equal. 32 sudens were seleced from 5/A as he conrol group and 34 sudens from 5/B as he eperimen group a random Eperimenal Process Achievemen es and aiude scale was performed on conrol and eperimen groups as preliminary ess. These applicaions were performed by he researcher before he sar of educaion aciviies. Learning-eaching process relaed o he given courses was performed by he researcher in he conrol and eperimen groups. In he conrol group he courses were given in he scope of he aciviies saed in he elemenary educaion program. In-course aciviies are composed of he aciviies aking place in he curren guide books. Besides, similar aciviies were used wih he eperimen group. In he eperimen group, course plans were made including verbal memory suppors. The courses were coninued wih he plans prepared by he researcher. In hese plans, he verbal memory suppors were presened someimes a he end of he course and someimes following he newly learned conceps, according o he subjec field and ype of he informaion presened Daa collecion ool In he research, Science and Technology Course Achievemen and Aiude Scale for Science and Technology Course were used as daa collecion ool. Validaion and reliabiliy sudies were performed abou he achievemen es and he es was composed of 25 clauses. Liker ype scale, composed of 20 clauses and developed 3. Resuls In his par, assessmen insrumens and daa obained from researches were analyzed hrough suiable saisical mehods. Findings will be presened as ables. Table 1. T es resuls on he comparison of pre es-pos es grades of he achievemen ess of eperimen and conrol group Conrol Group Eperimen Group Pre es 32 44,63 11,77 2,08 Pos es 32 53,63 18,17 3,21 Pre es 34 44,82 12,79 2,19 Pos es 34 63,30 18,54 3,18 Sd p -2, ,029-5,19 33,000 In he able, resuls of he es performed o deermine wheher he achievemen es grades of conrol and eperimen group sudens differ according o he preliminary es- final es variable are seen. In he resul of he mached group es, he difference beween he averages is considered as saisically significan. The said difference occurred in favor of he final es.

4 Musafa Aydin and Ali Mura Sunbul / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 47 ( 2012 ) Table 2. Comparison of achievemen es and final es grades of eperimen and conrol groups Achievemen es final es grades Groups Conrol 32 53,63 18,17 3,21 Eperimen 34 63,29 18,54 3,18 Sd p -2, ,036 As i is seen in he able, he final es grades on he achievemen ess of conrol and eperimen groups are compared. Resuls of he es performed o deermine wheher he final es grades of conrol and eperimen group sudens differ according o he conrol and eperimen group variable are seen. In he resul of independen es, he difference beween he arihmeic averages of he groups is considered as saisically significan (=-2,14; p<0,05). The said difference occurred in favor of he sudens in he eperimen group. Table 3. Comparison of he final es grades of aiude scale of eperimen and conrol groups Aiude es final es grades Groups Conrol 32 76,97 12,51 2,21 Eperimen 34 85,06 16,24 2,78 Sd p -2, ,027 As i is seen in he able, he final es grades on he aiude scale grades of conrol and eperimen groups are compared. Resuls of he es performed o deermine wheher he final es grades of conrol and eperimen group sudens differ according o he conrol and eperimen group variable are seen. In he resul of independen es, he difference beween he arihmeic averages of he groups is considered as saisically significan (=-2,26; p<0,05). The said difference occurred in favor of he sudens in he eperimen group. 4. Conclusion Due o he spiral program applied in elemenary educaion programs, sudens develop he informaion of he same learning domain more in he ne educaion erm. In his sudy i is seen ha he average of he grades achieved by he sudens in preliminary es level are considerably high. The high level of averages also shows ha he informaion o be learned overlaps wih he informaion remembered from he previous year. Consequenly he aainmen of cerain informaion by he sudens who previously did no have he same informaion caused a significan increase beween he preliminary and final ess in he conrol and eperimen groups of he sudens. When he achievemen es final es grades relaed o were compared, a significan difference was seen in he favor of eperimen group. I is possible o say ha his difference occurred as a resul of he differen eaching echniques applied in he eperimen group. Through he applied verbal memory suppors, i became easy o recall he learned informaion. Science and Technology course, especially he relaed uni includes many verbal conceps. I was hough ha memory supporive sraegies would be effecive in he learning of his verbal informaion. Erden and Akman (1996) have saed ha memory suppors can faciliae he learning of verbal informaion. In he analysis of he aiudes, i is possible o say ha aiudes are a comple process and akes ime o change. This feaure should no be negleced for elemenary grade sudens. The changes of applied echnique, mehod or eacher ake effec on he suden from he firs day and affec he suden. In he even ha he class eacher is changed, he suden ges prepared o he lesson more carefully if he/she does no encouner wih a very imporan problem. This siuaion is showed by he class eachers clearly wih he aending of branch eacher in 4h and 5h grade. In he resul of he research, an increase, even small, even if i is no considered as significan in he conrol group sudens, can be considered as he resul of he change of he eacher. Bu

5 1510 Musafa Aydin and Ali Mura Sunbul / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 47 ( 2012 ) his resul which occurred in favor of he eperimen group sudens can be eplained by he furher applied echniques and memory supporive sraegies. References. Konya : Kuzucular Ofse Bellezza F. S. (1981). Mnemonic Devices: Classificaion, Characerisics, and Crieria. Review of Educaional Research, 51(2), pp Eggen, P.& Kauchak, D. (1999). Educaional Psychology (4.ed). Prenice Hall/Merril. Erden, M., Akman, Y. ( 1996). Higbee K. L. (1996). Your Memory : How I Works and How o Improve. New York: Prenice Hall. Svanesson, I. (2004). Learning Maps and Memory Skills. London: Kogan Page