Abstract
This monograph outlines and enframes the outcomes of the research projects in didactics for the subjects of biology, geography, and chemistry. This project has been supported by the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic (P407/10/0514).
Based on a multi-level analysis of skills on the levels of the intended, realised, and achieved curriculum, an entirely new structure of skills which students should master at the end of primary, lower secondary and upper secondary education has been proposed for the given subjects. The proposed skill system corresponds to the inquiry based learning model.
For the relevant student age categories in all three subjects, the required skills have been structured into 4-5 skill sets: questions in natural science, information gathering from various sources, information organization, evaluation of outputs, formation of conclusions. In the next phase, the proposed overview of skills was subjected to surveys addressed to primary, lower secondary and upper secondary school teachers, as well as to university pedagogues.
The analysis of their responses represents one of the bases for the modification of the first draft of the skill system proposal and allows for an observation of disparities of participants. The third phase of the project consisted in the testing of partial skills from the aforementioned skillsets on students of various age.
Simultaneously, we have created a survey for teachers and students, in order to successfully put the students' test results into context. The outputs of structured interviews with 27 randomly selected teachers with varying approbations and lengths of experience also formed an important source of information used for an adjustment of our original proposals.
The comparison of results across disciplines, conducted during the final stage, allows for a deeper insight into the formation and structuring of subject-relevant skills, as well as into the process of their implementation.