Given that students are constantly communicating and documenting special experiences in their social and private lives with digital devices, we suggest that this behavior could be used to record and deepen learning experiences-such as visualizing reactions at the molecular level-in a chemistry class. An example would be the creation of stop-motion…

This paper describes the multiple school and school science experiences of eight Latina students of Central American descent in a tracked, urbanized, middle school setting. Framed by a sociocultural perspective, I describe how eight seventh and eighth grade Latino girls interacted with school science. Implications for the concept "science for…

Biology teachers know how important it is for them and for their students to engage first-hand with nature. Ideally, bringing students to fields, woodlands, and wetlands to observe, explore, and wonder is the best way to stimulate curiosity and practice scientific inquiry. However, for many reasons, field excursions are not always practical or…

Imagine recreating a tsunami's force in a bathtub or exploring the potential of geothermal energy by using steam from a kettle to illuminate a light bulb. These types of activities and more are offered in Matthew Levy and Mario Salvadori's collection of experiments and demonstrations in Earthquakes, Volcanoes and Tsunamis. More than 30 easy and…