A well-known educator and researcher Anton E. Lawson highlights critical points on effective teaching, meaningful learning, and problem solving. He feels that every citizen should know that science is a collective enterprise that seeks to explain nature based on the open generation and test of ideas.

Scientific literacy is far more than knowing a list of terms and definitions. Scientific literacy is the ability to do processes related to a specific scientific field and knowing, at minimum, basic problem solving. This paper discusses what students need to know in the different science and mathematics fields and describes the teacher's role in…

This paper, which analyzes the evaluative aspect of affectivity, argues that the functional internalization of organic evolution for the formation of the intellectual system of human beings required that some means of selecting behavioral variations be devised, and that the selective mechanism devised was the affective system. From this…

Reviews the approaches presented in the Self-Paced Study of Strategies Useful for Solving Word Problems in the Physical and Biological Sciences that can be used by students to successfully solve word problems encountered in any entry-level science course. Describes the topics covered in five "study sessions" that allow the students to practice the…

The writing done in a biology class has a great deal in common with the writing done in the humanities and the social sciences. Because the scientific method of investigation requires the student to examine and understand the physical world by asking questions and then answering them through empirical investigation, clear and concise writing is…

Input from constructivist scholars and science teachers helps develop future biologists and biology teachers who better understand scientific investigation through their development and use of investigative software, as well as through laboratory and field activities. (SM)

Presents the idea that, to improve secondary science, school science teaching students must be taught to use the activities of science: questioning, information gathering, hypothesizing, testing and conveying, and confronting current issues and problems in science. Activities and ideas that can be used to help students understand and use the…

Biology teachers can provide lessons for students to help them plan the future wisely. Three natural laws are emphasized as imperative to understanding how to plan wisely for restoring a balance in nature. (SA)

The forces and torques experienced by the spine are examined to understand, and possibly avoid, low back pain. The structure, degrees of freedom, forces and torques when lifting objects, an experimental study, and other factors affecting the back are discussed. (KR)

Discusses the advantages of using content specific problem solving as a vehicle for undergraduate instruction in biology, and describes different software tools used to implement this model. The areas discussed include simulated laboratories, the construction of binary classification schemes using computer programs, and scientific writing using…

Argues that the life sciences offer potential for practical work to be undertaken outside the classroom. Explores a rationale for such work and draws on reported studies from a number of countries. Contains 44 references. (DDR)

The coauthor and developer of Logo (a computer programming language for children) describes (1) the changes in his responses to debates about computers in education, (2) some of the uses of the new LogoWriter in the classroom, and (3) how one fifth-grade class used LogoWriter in a biology unit. (IW)