| Summary: | 碩士 === 臺中師範學院 === 自然科學教育學系碩士班 === 94 === A Content Analysis of Children’s Storybooks about Scientists – A Case of Charles Darwin
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to explore the content of children’s storybooks about scientists in a case of Charles Darwin (1809-1882). Four after-school books with phonetic spellings currently available in the domestic market were selected for the analysis of content presentation. The results of this study are as follows:
I. Publishing attributes: The majority of the storybooks about scientists in the market are books published as series. Except for Madam Curie, almost all of them are about male scientists. The circulation of the books is not affected by price.
II. Physical attributes: All four storybooks have Darwin on the covers as the theme. The illustrations in the books take up over 10% of the total pages. The colors are lively and bright. Based on the consensus of the judges, the binding, printing, font size, phonetic symbols and spacing of the books all meet children’s reading standards.
III. Content attributes: All four books encourage children to follow the example of Charles Darwin, who enjoyed doing scientific research. The books have smooth content flow, distinct paragraphs, and appropriate layout. In terms of the “readability” and “arousing interest in reading”, all of them received above 3.8 average points. Their fluent phrasing and storytelling make them appropriate reading materials for fifth to sixth grade children.
IV. Descriptive attributes: The books clearly list and describe 85 characteristics of Charles Darwin in different periods. Each storybook has a distinctive way with words, but still shares something in common. The descriptions in the books are reasonably consistent with the history.
V. Historic event attributes: All four storybooks focus on introducing Charles Darwin’s “The Origin of Species”. However, each storybook has different Chinese translations for the book titles. The author of this study suggests the original English titles be added back for the readers. Out of all the life events described in the four books, each book has over 40 events that are consistent with the history and less than 27 events that are not mentioned in the history.
Based on the analysis of the results, this study proposes a number of suggestions to provide references for the authors/editors and publishers of the related books, teachers, parents and further studies.
Keywords: Stories about Scientists, Charles Darwin,
Content Analysis
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