The contribution of cognitive style and prior knowledge on sixth grade students' knowledge acquisition in polygons in drama based learning environment

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Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, Eğitim Fakültesi, Matematik ve Fen Bilimleri Eğitimi Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2010

Öğrenci: BURÇİN ATAR KOÇKAR

Danışman: BEHİYE UBUZ

Özet:

The purpose of this study is to investigate the contribution of cognitive style and prior knowledge on 6th grade students' knowledge acquisition in polygons in drama based learning environment. The sample of the study was composed of 112 sixth grade students from a public school in Altındağ district of Ankara. There were 9 drama based lesson plans lasting 16 lesson hours in the study. The data was collected through Group Embedded Figure Test (GEFT), and three types of knowledge tests: Declarative Knowledge Test (DecKT), Conditional Knowledge Test (ConKT), and Procedural Knowledge Test (ProKT). GEFT developed by Witkin, Oltman, Raskin and Karp (1971) was used to determine cognitive styles of the students as field dependent (FD), field independent (FI), and field mix (FM). Three types of knowledge tests developed by Erdoğan (2007) were used as pretests and posttests. The quantative analysis was carried out by using standard multiple regression analysis. The results revealed that students’ cognitive style was the most predictive variable in explaining students’ declarative, conditional and procedural knowledge Moreover, students’ prior declarative knowledge explained statistically significant amount of variance in students’ declarative and procedural knowledge acquisition, while students’ prior conditional knowledge explained statistically significant amount of variance in students’ declarative, conditional, and procedural knowledge acquisition. On the other hand, students’ prior procedural knowledge failed to explain declarative, conditional, and procedural knowledge acquisition of students.