Examining young children’s conceptual change process in floating and sinking from a social constructivist perspective

This paper presents a case study of the process of conceptual change in six‐year‐old children. The process of conceptual change in learning about floating and sinking is described from two different viewpoints: how the children’s conceptions change during the instructional process, and how the social discussion during the experimental exploration can be seen in terms of the cognitive changes in the children. Based on qualitative analysis of verbal data, changes in the children’s conceptions were mostly epistemological and the children’s theories of flotation became more complete with respect to the scientific view. From the viewpoint of the conceptual change, conceptually orientated teacher–child interactions seemed to support the children’s cognitive progress in cognitive skills and guided the children to consider the reasons for the flotation.