The effects of Out-of school scientific activities on 9th grade students’ relating the unit of energy to daily life

Abstract

This study aims to determine the effects of out-of school activities on 9 th grade students' relating unit to daily life. The study was carried out with 58 students attending an Anatolian High School in Ankara. In the study, after teaching unit in physics course, a field trip was organized to Energy Park in Ankara, and before and after the trip, students were asked the same 12 open-ended questions. Before the applications were carried out in the Energy Park, the students watched an animation about the production of energy and they were asked to carry out discussions about what they had watched. During the application, the students were accompanied by a teacher and a researcher. The results obtained revealed that the out-of school activities enhanced the students' understanding of unit and their relating it to their daily lives. Summary Introduction: school means teaching in out-of school environments or institutions but in compliance with the curriculum throughout the schooling. Out-of school education uses informal educational resources for formal education (Salmi, 1993). In this regard, science centers, museums, aquariums, botanic gardens, zoos, industrial organizations, planetariums etc. are out-of school environments serving people from every age group. One of the most important institutions where out-of school education is carried out is science centers. Guisasola, Morentin and Zuza (2005) found during their visits to science museums that educational materials-focused school-museum corporation results in more comprehensive and effective learning of science and scientific methods. Yet, some other researchers argued that out-of school teaching activities may lead to the emergence of inadequate realization of the