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Research paper (M.A.) -- Cardinal Stritch College -- Milwaukee, 1971. / A research paper submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Education (Reading Specialist). Includes bibliographical references (p. 61-69).

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This thesis Medicinal plants: analysis of biology textbooks and the project proposal for lower secondary school is focused on project-based learning at lower secondary school on the subject of medicinal plants and on the analysis of biology textbooks in the context of the topic. The first part is devoted to the theoretical bases on the method of project-based learning and theory about medicinal plants. The theoretical part of the project-based learning involves the historical development of project-based learning and the current concept of project-based learning. The theoretical part devoted to medicinal plants presents a view of this issue, focusing on the basic active substances of plants and their harvesting, drying and storage. The following is part of the research, which includes quite an extensive analysis of biology textbooks on the subject of medicinal plants. This section presents a considerable part of the thesis and thus represents a valuable material for teachers who want to deal with medicinal plants in their classes. Another key part of this work is design and implementation of project-based learning on the subject of medicinal plants at the lower secondary school. This chapter is focused on the process of creation of the project "Plant treasures of our garden", which is designed by...

The literature contains conflicting ideas about the effectiveness of diagrams, and their constituent symbolism as teaching and learning tools. In addition, only limited research has been specifically conducted on the presentation and interpretation of arrow symbolism used in biology diagrams, let alone on the nature, source and remediation of student difficulties caused by arrows. On the basis of this limited research and 30 years of experience of teaching biology at secondary-level, the author suspected that students might have difficulties interpreting arrow symbolism in diagrams used as explanatory tools and decided to thoroughly investigate this issue. The hypothesis, 'Secondary-level students have difficulty with the use of arrow symbolism in biology diagrams' was formulated and the following broad research questions defined to address the hypothesis: 1. How much of a problem is arrow symbolism in diagrams? 2. How effectively is arrow symbolism used in diagrams to promote the communication of intended ideas? 3. To what extent does the design of arrow symbolism in diagrams influence students ' interpretation and difficulties? 4. How can the emerging empirical data and ideas from literature be combined to illustrate the process of interpretation of arrow symbolism? 5. What measures can be suggested for improving the presentation and interpretation of arrow symbolism in biology diagrams at secondary-level? To address Research question 1, a content analysis of all arrow symbolism in seven popular secondary-level biology textbooks was undertaken. This revealed a wide diversity of arrow styles, spatial organisations, purposes and meanings that could be confusing to students. These results suggested the need for an evaluation of the effectiveness of arrow symbolism (Research question 2). As there was no definitive set of guidelines available for specifically evaluating arrows, general guidelines from the literature on diagrams were used to develop a set of 10 criteria, to evaluate the syntactic, semantic and pragmatic dimensions of arrow symbolism, which were validated by selected educators, students and a graphic design expert. Application of the criteria (which constituted expert opinion) to the arrow symbolism used in 614 realistic, stylised and abstract diagram types, revealed a relatively high incidence (30%) of inappropriately presented arrow designs that could mislead students. To establish whether this problem could be the cause of student difficulties, and to thereby address Research question 3, a stylised and an abstract diagram were selected and evaluated according to the criteria. The results of the evaluation were compared to the responses given by 174 students to a range of written and interview probes and student modified diagrams. In this way, student performance was correlated with expert opinion. The results confirmed that students experience a wide range of difficulties (26 categories) when interpreting arrow symbolism, with some (12 categories) being attributable to inappropriately presented arrow symbolism and others (14 categories) to student-related processing skills and strategies at both surface- and deeper-levels of reasoning. To address question 4, the emerging empirical data from the evaluation and student studies was combined with a wide range of literature, to inform the development of a 3-level, non-tiered model of the process of interpretation of arrow symbolism in diagrams. As this model emphasised the importance of both arrow presentation in diagrams and arrow interpretation by students, it could be used as an effective explanatory tool as well as a predictive tool to identify sources of difficulty with the use of arrow symbolism. This model was, in turn, used to inform the compilation of a range of guidelines for improving the presentation and interpretation of arrow symbolism, and so target Research question 5. These, and other guidelines grounded in the data and relevant literature, were suggested for all role players, including students, educators, textbook writers, graphic artists and researchers, to use as remedial tools. Future research should focus on the implementation of these guidelines and studying their effectiveness for improving the presentation and interpretation of diagrams with arrow and other types of symbolism. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2006.

This study analyses current and older Czech biology textbooks containing information and chapters about genetics. It also proposes suggestions for an update of textbooks content based on this analysis, and prepares methodical materials as help and possible inspiration for biology teachers.

There were two purposes of this study. The first was that of determining, through an analysis of Texas and Thai biology textbooks, which objectives -- cognitive, affective, manual skill, processes of scientific inquiry, and orientation—were emphasized in three major and twenty-seven minor fields of biology. The second purpose was to determine if significant differences exist in the frequency distribution of these objectives. Only one biology program is used in schools throughout Thailand. This program, which was published by the Ministry of Education, consists of four textbooks with 1977 copyright date. The five Texas textbooks used in this study were those adopted under the provisions of the Textbook Law. The contents of each of the six texts included in the study were classified by using the criteria of Klopfer's Table of Specifications for Science Education.

This diploma thesis is focused on the didactic use of woody plants in teaching at the secondary level of elementary schools and in the corresponding years of grammar schools. The purpose is to appropriately use trees and other woody plants that are close to schools and are available for teaching. The theoretical part deals with basic curricular documents, methods of teaching possibly used in science or biology that have been briefly characterized, and the representation of the topic of woody plants and their method of processing in commonly available textbooks. The following chapter provides a description of the woody plants used in the process of making of the practical materials. The research of the thesis includes a questionnaire survey done among teachers of science or biology at chosen elementary and grammar schools in Pilsen and surrounding towns. The research investigated the teaching methods and the actual use of woody plants in lessons and was evaluated afterwards. Based on the survey, a motivational teaching material was created and it was verified in practice with pupils of a specific grammar school. KEYWORDS curriculum documents, biology textbooks, teaching methods, woody plants, questionnaire research, dendrological walk

This diploma thesis deals with the risk factors of cardiovascular diseases in children and their prevention. It briefly describes the influenced risk factors of these diseases and the prevention of their occurrence. It also focuses on preventive programs of cardiovascular diseases in our country and in the world and describes them in more detail. It also provides an overview of current biology textbooks for the lower-secondary school and their evaluation based on whether and to what extent they deal with the issue of cardiovascular diseases. The aim of the thesis is to create a program directed at the prevention of cardiovascular diseases in children at the lower-secondary school, to use it in practice at a selected lower-secondary school and to evaluate its effectiveness in a subsequent questionnaire.

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Considering the multimodal nature of genres (KRESS; VAN LEEUWEN, 2006), the study about how the different semiotic resources articulate is essential, in the sense of motivating the development of knowledge about the semiotic resources that constitute genres, that is, critical multimodal literacy (CML). In order to understand how this knowledge is considered in the school context, the objective of this study is to verify (with focus on static imagetic semiotic resources) how textbooks (TBs) and teachers, of English and Biology, recontextualize the concept of CML. This study is based theoretically and methodologically on the Critical Genre Analysis perspective (MOTTA-ROTH, 2008a), with focus on Multimodal Discourse Analysis (KRESS; VAN LEEUWEN, 1996; 2006). The corpus of this research comprehends a) didactic activities of text comprehension and production from two TBs, one of English language (ELTB) (AGA, 2010) and one of Biology TB (BTB) (AMABIS; MARTHO, 2009), offered by PNLD; and b) interview answers from public school teachers, from Santa Maria, that adopt the selected TBs. The study followed two steps, a contextual and a textual step. In the contextual analysis, the investigation of the TBs contexts of production and distribution involved the analysis of documents related to the TBs in search for linguistic exponents that refer to visual semiotic resources. The analysis of the context of consumption comprehended teachers interviews in order to verify to what extent and how CML is approached in classroom by using TBs. In the textual analysis, we analyzed the activities instructions from the selected TBs in order to find linguistic exponents that make reference to static imagetic semiotic resources. Based on this analysis, we classified the activities according to their focus on CML knowledge that is related to the language levels. The results of the contextual analysis show that the need to consider the visual semiotic resources of texts is recognized in the TBs contexts. In the textual analysis, we verified that the ELTB activities reflect, in part, the contextual results once 50% of the activities refer to visual semiotic resources. Differently, in the BTB, these resources are referred by only 20% of the activities. Regarding the types of knowledge of CML referred by the activities from the TBs and the ones suggested by the teachers on the interviews, we identified a divergence in relation to the contexts of production and distribution: while the TBs and the interviews analysis suggest a focus on lexicogrammar and semantics and pragmatics levels, the analysis of the contexts of production and distribution reveals the focus on the ideological level. The ideological perspective, in the context of production and distribution of TBs, derives from the premise that the knowledge developed in class should not be only related to the propositional content of the area (BRASIL, 2006a; 2006b), but should be in service for an informed participation of the students in society. In this sense, this study shows the urgency of reflecting upon the material we use in class, in order to adapt it, especially considering the development of CML. / Dada a natureza multimodal dos gêneros discursivos (KRESS; van LEEUWEN, 2006), o estudo sobre como os diferentes recursos semióticos se articulam é essencial no sentido de motivar o desenvolvimento de conhecimentos em relação aos recursos semióticos que constituem os gêneros, ou seja, de letramento multimodal crítico (LMC). No intuito de entender como esses conhecimentos são abordados no contexto escolar, o objetivo deste estudo é verificar (com foco nos recursos semióticos imagéticos estáticos) como livros didáticos (LDs) e professores, de inglês e de biologia, recontextualizam o conceito de LMC. Este trabalho tem como base teórica e metodológica a Análise Crítica de Gênero (MOTTA-ROTH, 2008a), com foco na Análise do Discurso Multimodal (KRESS; van LEEUWEN, 2006). O corpus desta pesquisa compreende: a) atividades didáticas de compreensão e produção textual de dois LDs, um de inglês (LDI) e um de biologia (LDB), oferecidos pelo PNLD; e b) respostas a entrevistas de professores de escolas públicas estaduais de Santa Maria, que adotam os LDs selecionados. O estudo se deu em duas etapas: uma contextual e uma textual. Na etapa contextual, a investigação do contexto de produção e de distribuição envolveu a análise de documentos referentes aos LDs em busca de índices linguísticos que se referem a recursos semióticos visuais. A análise do contexto de consumo dos LDs compreendeu entrevistas com professores, no intuito de verificar em que medida e como o LMC é abordado em sala de aula por meio de LDs. Na etapa textual, analisamos os enunciados das atividades didáticas de ambos os LDs a fim de encontrar expoentes linguísticos que fizessem referência a recursos semióticos imagéticos estáticos. A partir dessa verificação, classificamos as atividades de acordo com seu enfoque aos conhecimentos de LMC, que estão relacionados aos estratos linguísticos. Os resultados contextuais apontam que a necessidade de se considerar os recursos semióticos visuais dos textos é reconhecida nos contextos dos LDs. Na análise textual, verificamos que as atividades do LDI refletem, em parte, os resultados da análise contextual, uma vez que 50% das atividades se refere a recursos semióticos visuais. Diferentemente, no LDB, esses recursos são abordados em apenas 20% das atividades. Com relação aos tipos de conhecimentos de LMC abordados pelas atividades dos LDs e pelas atividades sugeridas pelos professores, identificamos uma divergência com relação à análise do contexto de produção e de distribuição: enquanto a análise dos LDs e das entrevistas sugerem um foco nos estratos da lexicogramática e da semântica e pragmática, as análises do contexto de produção e de distribuição revelam o foco no estrato ideológico. Essa perspectiva ideológica, em documentos do contexto de produção e distribuição dos LDs, deriva da premissa de que os conhecimentos desenvolvidos em sala de aula não deveriam estar atrelados apenas ao conteúdo proposicional da área (BRASIL, 2006a; 2006b), mas estar a serviço de uma participação informada do aluno na sociedade. Este estudo, portanto, evidencia a urgência de se refletir sobre o material didático que utilizamos em sala de aula, de modo a adaptá-lo, principalmente no que diz respeito ao desenvolvimento de LMC.