Research in Science Education, 28(3), 353-363

Laboratory Learning Environments and Practical Tasks in Senior Secondary Science Classes
Darrell Fisher, Allan Harrison and David Henderson Curtin University of Technology Avi Holstein The Weizmann Institute of Science

Abstract Laboratory work is seen as an integral part of most science courses; however, a significant proportion of laboratory activities remain highly prescriptive and fail to challenge many secondary science students. This study of senior high school biology, chemistry and physics laboratory environments drew data from student responses to the Science Laboratory Environment Inventory (SLEI) and a curriculum analysis of the implemented laboratory tasks. The study involved 387 biology, chemistry and physics students in 20 classes in Tasmania, Australia. The curriculum analysis was based on Lunetta and Tamir's Laboratory Structure and Task Analysis Inventory and the Laboratory Task Analysis. The study found that the SLEI did differentiate between the three subject areas and that the Laboratory Structure and Task Analysis Inventory confirmed the more open-ended nature of the school physics investigations evident from students' responses to the SLEI.

Content analysis of practical investigations in science laboratories has been undertaken in a number of previous studies. For example, Herron (1971) provided a means of categorising the levels of openness and emphasis on enquiry skills found in textbooks and laboratory manuals. A number of subsequent studies based on Herron's scheme (e.g., Hegarty, 1978; Tamir, 1991; Tamir & Lunetta, 1978) showed that most practical tasks in science laboratory manuals provided students with little or no opportunity for open-ended or enquiry learning. This study adds to the analysis of practical investigations in that it combines a measure of science students' perceptions of their laboratory learning environment with an analysis of some of the practical tasks undertaken by the students. In addition to enabling a comparison of the kinds of practical tasks undertaken by biology, chemistry and physics students, such a study permits a comparison between the content of the laboratory activities and students' perceptions of the laboratory environment. In the study, further information was gathered on whether the instrument used to measure students' perceptions of the laboratory environment, the Science Laboratory Environment Inventory, differentiated between alternative approaches to laboratory work. Because some previous studies (e.g., Fisher, Henderson, & Fraser, 1997; Fraser, McRobbie, & Giddings, 1993; Wong & Fraser, 1995) have indicated statistically significant correlations between students' perceptions of aspects of their laboratory learning environment and the students' attitudinal and achievement outcomes, a major aim of this study was to investigate whether there were differences in the perceptions of senior high school biology, chemistry and physics students of their actual science laboratory learning environments. Such a study would determine whether aspects of the laboratory learning environment in any particular science subject were likely to be more favourable regarding student outcomes. The second aim of this study was to investigate the practical tasks undertaken in these three subject areas and to make comparisons between the content of the laboratory activities and the