Children’s Drawings from Scientific Stories as Vehicles for enhancing Argument Construction

Naim Najami, Leleian Nassour and Mohammed Hugerat

The purpose of this study was to examine how children’s drawings derived from scientific stories can be used to construct the children’s scientific arguments. This study was conducted using a quantitative and qualitative integrated approach. The study population includes 38 first graders who attend elementary school in an Arab education system in a rural village, in northern Israel.
The study findings indicated that drawings based on scientific stories significantly improved the ability to raise scientific arguments among those pupils who drew the drawings. In addition, it improved their achievements in a scientific assessment given to them after the intervention.
From this study it was concluded that the pupils’ ability to internalize the logical structure of informal scientific statements in the form of a narrative whose contents they are required to depict through drawing is essential both for constructing the evidence and for compiling it. When pupils are required to determine whether a new assertion is based on previous scientific statements, first, they must determine what statement was used to support the new argument, and what general scientific principle was actually used. Some pupils tend to reject tasks in which they are required to determine whether a statement is correct or alternatively, they are required to choose an array of loaded assumptions based on a predictable conclusion.
The findings of this study show that this is indeed an optimal tool to enhance learning, although it requires additional testing and research, after which it will be possible to improve the pupils’ ability to raise accurate and logical scientific arguments linked to the findings, along with the ability to justify the relationships in question.

Keywords: Children’s drawings • Argumentation • Elementary school • Scientific stories