Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts

Student perceptions of science text impact on their ability to read and understand; highly developed literacy skills are needed to understand the complex language, and scientific descriptions.Textbooks play a big role in science education: these include complex text features, such as diagrams, char...

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Main Author: Thompson, Marilyn Joy
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Curtin University 2011
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/142
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author Thompson, Marilyn Joy
author_facet Thompson, Marilyn Joy
author_sort Thompson, Marilyn Joy
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Student perceptions of science text impact on their ability to read and understand; highly developed literacy skills are needed to understand the complex language, and scientific descriptions.Textbooks play a big role in science education: these include complex text features, such as diagrams, charts, tables etc and offer many distractions for students in understanding the information presented here. The skills are also different from those required to read and understand fiction text.The study investigated students’ perceptions and attitudes of changing text types (fiction to non‐fiction) in their transition to secondary school. It also identified challenges they faced in making meaning of science text. There was also a focus on the impact on student achievement as a result of targeted action with identified student groups around the use of non‐fiction text in the classroom.The findings included higher achievement gains for the targeted groups of students, and improved achievement for students in the study. Students were reported to be engaged more fully in the classroom and enjoying learning science as their skills developed. Students, however, appeared to show more enjoyment in reading fiction compared to non‐fiction text.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-1422017-02-20T06:40:46Z Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts Thompson, Marilyn Joy non-fiction text students scientific texts literacy challenges science education Student perceptions of science text impact on their ability to read and understand; highly developed literacy skills are needed to understand the complex language, and scientific descriptions.Textbooks play a big role in science education: these include complex text features, such as diagrams, charts, tables etc and offer many distractions for students in understanding the information presented here. The skills are also different from those required to read and understand fiction text.The study investigated students’ perceptions and attitudes of changing text types (fiction to non‐fiction) in their transition to secondary school. It also identified challenges they faced in making meaning of science text. There was also a focus on the impact on student achievement as a result of targeted action with identified student groups around the use of non‐fiction text in the classroom.The findings included higher achievement gains for the targeted groups of students, and improved achievement for students in the study. Students were reported to be engaged more fully in the classroom and enjoying learning science as their skills developed. Students, however, appeared to show more enjoyment in reading fiction compared to non‐fiction text. 2011 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/142 en Curtin University fulltext
spellingShingle non-fiction text
students
scientific texts
literacy challenges
science education
Thompson, Marilyn Joy
Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title_full Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title_fullStr Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title_full_unstemmed Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title_short Literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
title_sort literacy challenges faced by students using scientific texts
topic non-fiction text
students
scientific texts
literacy challenges
science education
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/142