The effect of analyzing sections of the history of science on pre-service elementary science teachers? views of the nature of science

The aim of this research is to determine the effect of analyzing sections of the history of science on pre-service elementary science teachers? views of the nature of science. For this purpose, a four-week long research study was conducted with 4 th year pre-service elemantary science teachers. 56 pre-service elementary science teachers who were attending to science technology and society course participated to the study.In order to follow the change in the pre-service elementary science teachers? views of the nature of science, VOSTS-Tr, (Doğan Bora Arslan Çakıroğlu, 2006) questionaire was applied as pre-test and post-test. VOSTS-TR is a modified poll of VOST developed by Aikenhead, Ryan ve Fleming (1989) During for weeks of application, the pre-service elementary science teachers analyzed 13 popular history of science articles each of which explains the scientists and their finalings on a subject and how that scientific knowledge was developed and changed throughout the history. The articles were chosen from the books about science and history of science. The course was held as 3 hours sesion at each week and 3 articles analyzed each week.Results showed that participants were already aware of the effect of secrety on science and technology, characteristics of scientists and had a modern view of science. A small but positive change was observed in the participants views on these respects from pretest to post test.It was concluded that reading and critizally analyzing the history of science articles positively effects the pre-service elementary science teachers?views of science.Key Words: Nature of Science, Science History, VOSTS