Semiotic Perspectives to the Students’ Conceptual Development with the Virtual Inquiry in „Young Scientist“ Environment Kai Pata University of Tartu, Science Didactics Department Tartu, Estonia kpata@ut.ee Margus Pedaste University of Tartu, Science Didactics Department Tartu, Estonia pedaste@ut.ee Evald Sepp University of Tartu, Science Didactics Department Tartu, Estonia votteli@ut.ee Abstract: It was investigated how students developed conceptually when performing inquiry learning in web-based simulation “Young Scientist”. Semiotic approach for analyzing information-processing with multiple representations in complex environment was proposed. The progress of 91 6 th grade students’ conceptual coherence on environmental issues with virtual inquiry was studied. What characterized students’ conceptual coherence; how it influenced students’ inquiry steps, and what the effect of virtual inquiry on students’ conceptual development was, were studied. Three profiles of general conceptual coherence were described. The low level of students’ initial conceptual coherence influenced students’ effectiveness in the measurement taking phase with the web-based model; ineffective students in the measurement and inference phases showed less progress in their conceptual development. Introduction This paper proposes a semiotic approach for analyzing information-processing with multiple representations in complex inquiry learning environment “Young Scientist” (Pata, et al., in press). Complex inquiry learning environments are described as semiotic tools, focusing on certain critical factors that might limit knowledge transformations with them. Critical learning aspects in complex environments with multiple representations also suggest different view to the students’ conceptual profile. The study analyses the development of students’ general conceptual coherence as a result of learning in the complex web-based multi-representational inquiry settings. The implications to the semiotic view of learning settings and conceptual development are discussed. Semiotic approach to complex instructional systems Studies on learning from multiple representations focus on the role of semiotic systems in developing conceptual understanding (Duval, 2000; Ainsworth & van Labeke, 2004) and coherence (Seufert, 2002), applying the semiotic ideas of classifying different semiotic systems, developing learners’ referential connections between systems, and with real world objects and phenomena (Seufert, 2002; van der Meij & deJong, 2003). In this paper the dynamic semiosis processes that appear between learner and learning materials, representing sign-systems that do not have complete mutual translability, are discussed. Sun, Williams and Liu (2003) emphasised that semiotics views knowledge not merely as an entity to be acquired but the process how we come to know. Deeley (2005) defined semiosis as a process of applying signs to understand some phenomena, reasoning from sign to sign, and intervention of new signs to make sense of some new experiences. This process involves translation acts between semiotic systems. According to Ch. S. Peirce, meaning in its primary sense is a translation of a sign into another system of signs (Eco, 2000). In Eco’s (2000) interpretation signs are not fixed semiotic entities but rather the meeting ground for independent elements coming from different planes and meeting on the basis of coding