ISSN 1017-2548(Print)
ISSN 2234-8530(Online)
Volume 43, Number 6
JKCSEZ 43(6)
December 20, 1999 

This article studies the understanding of acid and base concepts of the 3rd-grade students in middle school. An effective teaching strategy for improving their acid and base concepts was designed by considering students' prior knowledge using Lawson's learning cycle method. The control group was adapted by the traditional teaching strategy which isn't considering students' prior knowledge. After the class, understanding of acid and base concepts of treatment group was significantly higher than that of control group, But the level of students' understanding of strong acid, weak acid strong base and the strengthof acid in aqueous solution was low even after the class of two groups. This indicates indirectly that the microscopic views of acid and base concepts in aqueous solution are not easy to learn for these students. For the four categories of acid and base concepts, students' responses were reviewed carefully and classified into scientific conceptions and misconceptions. These results will be useful for developing an effective teaching strategy of acid and base concepts.