Analysis of nine high school biology laboratory manuals: Promoting scientific inquiry

This was a descriptive study of nine high school biology laboratory manuals to determine how well they promote the basic and integrated science process skills that are involved in scientific inquiry. A total of 90 activities were selected from the reviewed manuals in 11 topic areas. These activities included two subsamples of 5 experimental and 5 descriptive exercises. The lab investigations were evaluated for science process skills using a modification of Tamir and Lunetta's Laboratory Structure and Task Analysis Inventory. Results indicate that while some manuals have made efforts to include a few science process skills, they seldom call upon students to use their knowledge and experience to pose questions, solve problems, investigate natural phenomena, or construct answers or generalizations. These findings are discussed using a modification of Schwab and Herron's framework for inquiry. Suggestions are offered for modifying “cookbook” laboratories to promote student inquiry. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.