Enhancing students' argumentation skills, content knowledge, and Nature of Science understanding through a web-based educational instrument in the context of socio-scientific issues

Using socio-scientific issues as a learning context is an effectiveapproach to achieve an important goal in science education,which is to enhance scientific literacy. It involves strengtheningskills such as argumentation while also improving anunderstanding of the Nature of Science and imparting contentknowledge. The present study evaluates the impact of a web-basededucational instrument consisting of a unique combinationof features designed to promote students’ development of skillsand knowledge as well as to address the challenges faced byteachers in teaching socio-scientific issues. Participants included423 students in secondary education. Students in theexperimental condition received a three-lesson intervention withthe educational instrument, and students in the control conditionfollowed their regular science lessons. Findings indicated that theinstrument proves effective in fostering learning outcomes whileteachers benefit from the shift of managing classroom discussionto individual guidance of students. Applying the educationalinstrument in the classroom demonstrates promise in improvingstudent engagement and their comprehension of socio-scientificissues.