Fostering primary school students’ understanding of cells and other related concepts with interactive computer animation instruction accompanied by teacher and student-prepared concept maps

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of instruction (application) including interactive computer animation accompanied by teacher and student-prepared concept maps on primary students’ biology achievement during instruction, as well as revealing attitudes towards science as a school subject. A quasi-experimental pre-test/post-test control group design was used in this study. The experimental group had 31 students and the control group had 34 students. The experimental group received instruction including interactive computer animation accompanied by teacher- and student-prepared concept maps, while the control group received traditional instruction. A biology achievement test and an attitude scale toward science were used as data collection instruments. The present study indicates that the experimental group had significantly higher scores than the control group in the biology achievement test (regarding cells and other related concepts). Regarding students’ attitudes toward science as a school subject, there was no significant difference between the experimental and control groups in the pre- and post-test results. However there was a statistically significant difference between the gain scores of the control group and the experimental group in favor of the experimental group.