Preservice science teachers' informal reasoning and scientific habits of mind: A case for hydroelectric powerplants

This study was carried out to investigate preservice science teachers' informal reasoning and scientific habits of mind about hydroelectric power plants (HEPP). The sample of the study consists of 587 pre-service teachers who were studying at the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th years the science education programs of the universities in the provinces, which are in the top four in terms of HEPP numbers in the Eastern Black Sea. In order to reveal the informal reasoning in, the HEPP information form composed of open ended questions and adopted by the researcher and scientific habits of mind scale were used. Content analysis was used to analyze the data obtained from the HEPP information form. Independent samples t test was used to determine the relationship between scientific thinking habits and informal reasoning. As a result of the research, it was determined that the preservice teachers mostly used ecological informal reasoning mode in their reasoning, they could not produce enough sociological arguments, and they had problems in creating counterarguments. Informal reasoning quality of students with high scientific habits of mind was found to be high, but no difference was found in informal reasoning modes. Implications were provided for preservice teacher training.