Inquiry and Debate in Science Learning: Potential Strategy for Improving Students’ Scientific Argumentation Skills

Abstract

Scientific argumentation skills are a key component of science learning practices needed by students in the 21st century. Where the essence of scientific argumentation is to support the argument with evidence and reasoning and then refute the claims and evidence of the opponent's argument. Supporting arguments with evidence and reasoning can be facilitated through inquiry activities. Meanwhile, refuting claims and evidence from opposing arguments can be facilitated through debate activities. Inquiry and debate can be a solution to improving students' scientific argumentation skills. This study aims to prove the truth of this statement through a systematic literature review by applying the PRISMA 2020 criteria which are expanded by bibliometric analysis with the help of the VOSviewer software. The results of the study show that research related to inquiry, debate, and their influence on students' scientific argumentation skills has a pretty good trend. In Indonesia the research climate is still quite good, research topics are still in great demand, and it is very possible to carry out research innovations on related topics. Another finding is that the integration of inquiry and debate in science learning can be a potential strategy to improve students' scientific argumentation skills.