PROSPECTIVE SCIENCE TEACHERS’ CONCEPTIONS OF THE SOLUTION CHEMISTRY

This study investigated to determine and characterize prospective science teachers' conception of the concept of solution chemistry and its related concepts. An instrument containing open-ended questions was built by the researcher first and administered to 30 prospective science teachers. In addition, semi-structured interviews were administered by researcher with 5 students from the sample in order to clarify their written responses. The results indicated that the prospective science teachers' understandings of most of the concepts were in specific misconception level. Particularly, prospective science teachers showed good understanding on electrical conductivity of solution, boiling point elevation and characteristics of dissolution process compared to other concepts. On the other hand, they have poor understanding on concept of temperature factor affecting solubility rate, classification of solutions, properties of solutions and difference between melting and dissolution. Furthermore, the results showed that many prospective science teachers could not learn the concepts related to solution chemistry well enough.