HOW, WHEN AND

WHY?

An analysis of primary
students science
questions

Beatriz Bravo Torija, Mara Jos Gil Qulez,

Begoa Martnez Pea and Beln Embid

Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain

 The ability to ask questions is recognised as one of the

main scientific practice in science and science
education (NRC, 2012). Being able to formulate
science questions allows students to:
Articulate their understanding of a subject
Make connections among different ideas
Become aware of what they know and what they need to
learn (Chin & Osborne, 2010)

Several studies have shown that students have

difficulties to learn how to ask good research questions
(Roca et al., 2013)

The Smart Notebooks

They are based on the Interactive
notebooks, which have being designed
to:
Support and inquiry-based approach
to science instruction (Macarelli,
2010)
Promote environments where
students have opportunities to be
creative and independent thinkers

They also include different tools such

as thinking keys or graphic organisers
to help students to work for their own.

What type of questions do students

produce at the beginning of the
course?
What are the differences between
their questions at the beginning and
at end of the course?

Participants:131 primary students from 4th, 5th and

6th grade.
Two different tests were performed to collect
students data, one of the beginning of the year and
another at the end. The two tests consisted of:
An initial research question:
Why are there many earthworms in the garden during a
rainy week?
What makes an insect stops on a specific flower?

Different pieces of information about earthworms or

about plants, and four tasks connected with them

We focus on the third task, the formulation of

science questions:

CATEGORIES

DEFINITION: THESE
QUESTIONS

EXAMPLES

Predictive
questions (PQ)

Are used to establish

connections between different
phenomena

What happens if the worm does

not find a leaf?
What happens if there is not fruit
on the plants?

Causal
questions (CQ)

Are used to ask why a

phenomenon occurs

Why do flowers have different

shapes and sizes?

Descriptive
questions (DQ)

Are used to describe a

phenomenon

How do roots absorb nutrients

from the soil?

Declarative
questions
(DECQ)

Only ask for recall of specific

information

Which types of worms are there

in the world?

Anecdotal
questions (AQ)

Do not ask for any information

related with the phenomenon
under study

Do you get sick when you touch

an earthworm?
Why do you like plants?

Science questions pose by 6th grade students

Science questions pose by 5th grade students

Science questions pose by 4th grade students

Categories

6th grade

5th grade

4th grade

Initial

Final

Initial

Final

Initial

Final

PQ

1%

4%

1%

1%

0%

34%

CQ

16%

19%

9%

21%

17%

24%

DQ

24%

20%

12%

8%

21%

22%

DECQ

45%

40%

39%

61%

51%

16%

AQ

14%

17%

39%

9%

11%

4%

The most frequent questions are the declarative questions, and the least are the
predictive questions. One exception is found in the final test of 4th grade
A reduction of the number of the desriptive questions is observed from the initial
to the final test
In causal questions, there is an increment in their number from the initial to the
final test, in particular in 5th grade

 There is an increment of causal and predictive

questions from the initial to the final test, especially in
4th grade. Nevertheless, the number of declarative
question is still quite high in 5th and 6th grade
The findings could indicate that the use of the Smart
Notebooks promotes an improvement in the
formulation of scientific questions by the students
The differences among the three levels could be due to
the scaffolding provide by the teacher along the course

THANK YOU VERY MUCH

FOR YOUR ATTENTION
Beatriz Bravo Torija:
bbtorija@unizar.es
Mara Jos Gil Qulez:
Quilez@unizar.es

Acknowledgements: work supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and

Competitiveness EDU2015-66643-C2-2-P and the research group BEAGLE, that
belongs to the Environmental Sciences Institute (IUCA)