Developing and Evaluating Elementary-Level Teaching Materials “Magnetic Top”: An Analysis of Questionnaire Using Text Mining

Takekuni Yamaoka^1, , Kimihito Takeno², Shinichi Okino³ and Shinji Matsumoto⁴

¹Kitauwa High School, Japan

²Shiga University, Japan

³Kanazawa Nishikioka High School, Japan

⁴Hyogo University of Teacher Education, Japan

Cite this paper

Takekuni Yamaoka, Kimihito Takeno, Shinichi Okino and Shinji Matsumoto. Developing and Evaluating Elementary-Level Teaching Materials “Magnetic Top”: An Analysis of Questionnaire Using Text Mining. American Journal of Educational Research. 2017; 5(2):189-195. doi: 10.12691/EDUCATION-5-2-13

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to create and evaluate an educational magnetic top. The experiment was conducted with elementary school children at the Youngsters’ Science Festival in Matsuyama, Japan. In order to evaluate the study, an open-ended questionnaire was created. Upon receiving permission from parents, 139 elementary school children were surveyed, which included 56 students from the lower grades, 54 students from the middle grades, and 29 students from the upper grades. The survey was analyzed using the text mining technique. As a result, three important results were gathered: 1) it became clear that most students in the middle grades stop feeling like they were bad at the screw tightening; and 2) Most students in the upper grades that had experience in motor learning, students tended to be able to adequately explain the principle of screw tightening; and 3) As long as students learn about the principles of motors, the teaching materials that are proposed in this study can be used to describe complex principles to students in all elementary school grade levels.

Keywords

magnetic top, text mining, screw tightening, scientific principles

Copyright

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

References

[1]	Yamaoka, T.. Science education to confirm the establishment of learning (1) - Case study of physical examination problem -, Proceedings of Shikoku Branch of Society Japan Science Teaching, No.22, 3-4, 2003.
[2]	Berlyne, D.E., trans. Structure and direction in thinking, second printing by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1966.
[3]	Novak, J.D., Mintzes, J.J., & Wandersee, J.H.. Teaching Science for Understanding: A Human Constructivist View, 272-273, Academic Press, 1998.
[4]	Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology.. Commentary to the course of study - Science version, 1-105, Dainippon Tosho Publishing Co., Ltd., 2008.
[5]	Yamaoka, T., Shirahama, H., Matsumoto, S.. Development and Evaluation of Teaching Materials for Elementary School Students Using LED - An Analysis of Questionnaires Using Text mining, Japan Association of Energy and Environmental Education, Vol.10, No.1, 3-9, 2016.
[6]	Executive committee of the Youngsters’ Science Festival was held in Ehime Prefecture, Japan.. Experimental commentary book of the Youngsters’ Science Festival was held in Ehime Prefecture, Japan, 1-57, Takara dou publication, 2015.
[7]	Fujikawa, S., Andoh, S.. Development and Practice of a Subject “Interior Lamp of Blue LED” to Cultivate Interest in and Positive Attitudes toward the Study of Energy Conversion, The Japan Society of Technology Education, Vol.53 No.2, 2011, 107-114, 2011.
[8]	Higuchi Koichi. Quantitative text analysis for social research - Toward the inheritance and development of content analysis-, 1-16, Nakanishiya publication, 2014.
[9]	Retrieved from http://khc.sourceforge.net/en/.