A Study on Elementary Students' Perceptions of Science, Engineering, and Technology and on the Images of Scientists, Engineers, and Technicians

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate elementary school students’ perceptions about science, engineering and technology and their images of scientists, engineers, and technicians. In order to investigate students' images of scientists, engineers, technicians and student's perception of science, engineering, and technology, we used the tools “Draw a scientist at work, Draw an engineer at work, and Draw a technician at work.” We have revised the tool DAST (Draw a scientist test), which was used in Fralick et al.’s study (2009). Subjects were 209 6th grade students sampled from an elementary school in G-city in Korea. According to the results of this study, the students' representative image of a scientist was similar to stereotypical scientist image in previous studies, but the students perceived science as a field of research with various professionals. The students' representative image of an engineer was a man with short hair, no beard or mustache, wearing ordinary clothes but no glasses. The engineer was designing or constructing a ship, a robot, a computer, and an airplane. The students' representative image of a technician was a man with short hair, wearing protective goggles and a mask for welding. The technician was fixing a car, a robot, a rocket, etc. and working with wrenches, hammers, screw drivers, welding machines, etc. Many students didn't perceive engineering and technology as fields of research. Also, many students didn't variously perceive engineering and technology as fields and ways of study.