Using an advance organizer to facilitate change in students’ conceptualisation of the role of creativity in science

Abstract

An advance organizer pertaining to the nature of science (NOS) aspect of the role creativity plays in science was incorporated into a problem-based laboratory activity of an undergraduate first-year chemistry curriculum. The advance organizer was presented in one of three versions to different sections of students: (1) definite explication of the NOS learning outcome, (2) indefinite explication, and (3) no explication. An NOS survey was administered to 235 students prior to implementation of the advance organizer and to 136 students after completion of the instructional activity involving the advance organizer. The results of this study indicate that the different versions of the advance organizer differ with respect to altering students’ conceptualisation of creativity: specifically, only the indefinite explication of the intended learning outcome led to a significant change in the percentage of students holding more informed views. This finding suggests that a relatively small change in instructional design can advance improvement in achieving NOS learning outcomes within a large-scale content-based science course.