01/2020 – 12/2022
Professional School of Education (RUB)
Prof. Dr. Joachim Wirth, Prof. Dr. Katrin Sommer, Lena Finger, Vanessa van den Bogaert
The doctoral program Metacognitive Monitoring in Authentic Teaching-Learning Contexts in the Pupil Laboratory (MeMo-akS) is affiliated with the Alfried Krupp Pupil Laboratory of the Ruhr-Universität Bochum and deals with questions about authentic science mediation in the context of learners' metacognitive judgments.
In subproject A, the developmental conditions of interest and motivation through participation in a Citizen Science were investigated and elucidated in more detail. Citizen Science means that citizens make a real contribution to a current scientific study, e.g. by collecting data in a guided but independent way. Participants in Citizen Science projects thus act not only like, but at least partly as researchers.
The question was investigated whether the knowledge of participating as a researcher in a real scientific study and making a scientific contribution to it has effects on various personal characteristics such as interest or motivation. Since it is assumed that students with the knowledge of not being a real researcher and acting as a researcher at the highest level do not perceive the project situation as a real scientific study but as a more or less authentic image of real science, it was also clarified whether the perception of authenticity is a mediator of this effect and whether a guided reflection on their own scientific activities can strengthen this effect.
In order to adequately assess students' perceptions of authenticity, the project first developed and validated the Questionnaire to Assess Perceptions of Authenticity in Science Education (FEWAW). The perceived authenticity of science education is measured multidimensionally on the dimensions of place, facilitator, method, and innovation (Cronbach's α ≥ 0.81).
N=301 students* (in 14 school classes) participated in the subsequent experimental field study in a 2x2 design with the factors knowledge about the contribution to a real scientific study (UV1: yes/no) and reflection on their own approach (UV2: not guided/guided with cues) until June 2022. The study was conducted using the Citizen Science project "Plastic Pirates" (https://www.plastic-pirates.eu/de) as an example. In this project, the pollution of German rivers by plastic waste is determined with the help of data collected by pupils.
Finger, L., van den Bogaert, V., Schmidt, L., Fleischer, J., Stadler, M., Sommer, K., & Wirth, J. (2023). The science of citizen science: a systematic literature review on educational and scientific outcomes. Frontiers in Education, 8, 1226529. DOI
Finger, L., van den Bogaert, V., Fleischer, J., Raimann, J., Sommer, K., & Wirth, J. (2022). Das Schülerlabor als Ort authentischer Wissenschaftsvermittlung? Entwicklung und Validierung eines Fragebogens zur Erfassung der Authentizitätswahrnehmung der Wissenschaftsvermittlung im Schülerlabor. Zeitschrift für Didaktik der Naturwissenschaften, 28(2). DOI
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Last update: Aug 30, 2023
