The Effect of Using Socioscientific Issues Approach In Teaching Biology on Socioscientific Issues Decision Making on 1st Grade Scientific Stream Students

This study aimed to determine the impact of the use of socioscientific issues orientation in teaching biology on the secondary scientific stream first grade students' ability to make decisions about socioscientific issues. To achieve that, the researcher prepared and development some tools for the study, which included: a pre-test of knowledge and an open-question sheet focusing on socioscientific issues in genetics and genetic engineering. The validity and reliability of the test tools were properly verified. The study community consisted of first secondary grade students, scientific stream, from Salt Secondary School for Boys in Salt City in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, in the first semester of the academic year 2008/2009.
The results of the study pointed to the existence of five types of the nature of students' decisions, namely: making decisions that include moral logic of applications containing false statements, making decisions that include moral logical in a linear logic / formal manner, making decisions that include moral logic and indicates polemical patterns but it is not an indication of the high level of controversy, making decisions that include moral logic which indicate the scientific thinking in a theoretical way, but in the context of weak existence of the capacity of description in the attitudes of life, and making decisions that include moral logic using nonlinear scientific logic / informal.
The results of the study also indicated that teaching using socioscientific issues orientation has improved the ability of students to improve their decisions about the socioscientific issues on the subject of genetics and genetic engineering. In addition, the results showed that teaching using the socioscientific issues orientation has contributed to the improvement of student achievement in the experimental group.
Based on the results of the study, the researcher recommends the need for attention to the socioscientific oriented issues SSI, by the reformulation of the science curricula in accordance with this approach.