PROCESS SKILLS DEVELOPMENT AND SCIENCE PRACTICAL ACTIVITIES: THE CASE OF GBEWAA COLLEGE OF EDUCATION, GHANA

E.I. Azuuga; A. Baawuo; A.E. Apene

Authors

E.I. Azuuga Gbewaa College of Education, P.O.Box 157, Pusiga, Upper East Region, GHANA
A. Baawuo Gbewaa College of Education, P.O.Box 157, Pusiga, Upper East Region, GHANA
A.E. Apene Gbewaa College of Education, P.O.Box 157, Pusiga, Upper East Region, GHANA

Keywords:

Process skills,, Technical Skills, Pre-service, Knowledge, Scientific Apparatus

Abstract

This paper reports a study on colleges of education pre-service teachers’ science process skills. Students’ development of process skills could be investigated by understanding their technical skills and their functional aspects of experimenting. However, this paper focused on students’ technical skills in using basic scientific apparatus. Technical skills in this study refer to skills, abilities, and knowledge required for accomplishing a specific task in the laboratory. The skills include knowledge and skills needed to properly manipulate and operate scientific apparatus when executing a scientific task. It was found that students perform the skills in a certain pattern that reflects a form of hierarchy. This hierarchy could be used to aid science teachers in teaching process skills. The
paper presented the hierarchy of these technical skills and discussed these skills specifically from the perspective of colleges of education pre-service teachers teaching and learning science. The results of this study provided an insight on the issue of science process skills that supports the importance of practical work.