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The identification of students’ alternative conceptions in biology by the use of creative writing

This paper summarises the results of a study of how the use of creative writing by 224 second level science students could reveal the nature of their understanding of a number of biological topics in the Junior Certificate Science and Leaving Certificate Biology courses (Duggan, 2001). We do not attempt to provide a technical analysis of the students' use of language such as that to be found in the work of Lemke (1989, 1990). Rather, the research had its origins in an investigation by Fellows (1994) that used different types of creative writing in order to identify the extent of conceptual change in students'learning of science.