Estimating astronomical scales requires multiple complex mental processes, such as spatial thinking and interpreting large numbers. As such, it is a nontrivial question how these estimates can be most efficiently assessed. There is reason to believe that results from previous studies probing astronomical scale estimates are possibly susceptible to…

The purpose of the current study is to conduct developmental comparison of the middle school students' misconceptions about the concepts of astronomy. The sampling of the study is comprised of middle school students attending a private school located in the west of Turkey. A total of 144 students participated in the study. In order to determine…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Astronomy Education Research.] Several decades of research have contributed to our understanding of students' reasoning about astronomical phenomena. Some authors have pointed out the difficulty in reading and interpreting images used in school textbooks as factors that may justify the persistence…

As part of an effort to improve students' knowledge of constellations and bright stars in an introductory level descriptive astronomy survey course, we measured the baseline knowledge that students bring to the class and how their score evolve over the course of the semester. This baseline is needed by the broader astronomy education research…

The authors mainly aimed to investigate the following question: Are there any significant effects of the first combined method of a conceptual change approach with refutation text, worksheets, and activities with respect to the second combined method of a conceptual change approach with conceptual texts, presentations, and activities on students'…

The 2014 study, "Conceptualizing Astronomical Scale: Virtual Simulations on Handheld Tablet Computers Reverse Misconceptions," examined the effects of using the true-to-scale (TTS) display mode versus the orrery display mode in the iPad's Solar Walk software application on students' knowledge of the Earth's place in the solar system. The…

Literacy remains an area of concern in early secondary education in Scotland (ages 12-14), with recent research suggesting a continued decline in attainment levels. As literacy underpins learning, interdisciplinary and collaborative approaches to teaching literacy are now being emphasized through the new Curriculum for Excellence that aims to…

The recent missions to Mars have produced a mass of data and information in all forms and have forced the minds of many people world-wide to rethink their own perspectives on life itself. This drama unfolding about 35 million miles from Earth, and digitally on our TV screens, is offering a growing reservoir for teachable moments. The curiosity and…

In this study, high school and first-year undergraduate students were asked about their understanding of stars. The hypothesis guiding this research posits that high school students who have taken a semester-long astronomy course will have an understanding of stars most related to scientific knowledge, compared with high school students enrolled…