Abilities in scientific thinking and reasoning have been emphasized as core areas of initiatives, such as the Next Generation Science Standards or the College Board Standards for College Success in Science, which focus on the skills the future will demand of today's students. Although there is rich literature on studies of how these abilities…

Disciplines such as Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, which involve concepts not included in the high-school curriculum, are very challenging for many first year university students. These subjects are particularly difficult for students accustomed to surface learning strategies involving memorization and recall of facts, as a deeper…

Observation systems are increasingly used around the world for a variety of purposes; 2 critical purposes are to understand and to improve teaching. As observation systems differ considerably, individuals must decide what observation system to use. But the field does not have a common specification of an observation system, nor does it have…

This paper reports a laboratorial internship included in the Portuguese Science and Technology promotion program "Internships for Young People in Laboratories (Ciência Viva no Laboratório)", which provided high school students an opportunity to approach the reality of scientific and technological research in a higher education…

Passive, lecture-based forms of instruction are often ineffective in helping students develop deep conceptual understanding of scientific concepts. Student-centered forms of instruction based in a constructivist framework, where students are guided toward actively constructing their understanding, have been met with greater success. However,…

Assessing the achievement of students in elementary and secondary schools and the nation's educational progress is fundamental to informing education policy approaches. Congressional interest in this area includes and extends beyond the annual assessments administered by states to comply with the educational accountability requirements of Title…

This report summarizes the Austin Independent School District bilingual and English as a second language programs students' academic performance during 2017-2018. Students' advanced placement course performance, state academic tests (STAAR and EOC) performance, and graduation and dropout rates are summarized. [For the Executive Summary, see…

A thematic course called "Climate Change: Chemistry and Controversy" was developed for upper-level non-STEM students. This course used the socioscientific context of climate change to teach chemical principles and the nature of science. Students used principles of agnotology (direct study of misinformation) to debunk climate change…

Three emerging technologies were used in a large introductory chemistry class: a tablet PC, a lecture capture and replay software program, and an online homework program. At the end of the semester, student usage of the lecture replay and online homework systems was compared to course performance as measured by course grade and by a standardized…

In September 2010 the Wellcome Trust published a detailed report which, for the first time, gave an in-depth analysis of the learning experiences of children in England and Wales as they prepare for science assessment at the end of their primary education (key stage 2), and the children's ideas about how the experience might be improved. The…

We present a MATLAB script INSOLATE.m that calculates insolation at the top of the atmosphere and the total amount of daylight during the year (and other quantities) with respect to geographic latitude and Earth's obliquity (axial tilt). The script output displays insolation values for an entire year on a three-dimensional graph. This tool…

The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act requires states to measure the adequate yearly progress (AYP) of each public school and local educational agency (LEA) and to hold schools and LEAs accountable for failing to make AYP. Although it is required that science be assessed in at least three grades, the achievement results from science examinations are…

Students who chose to enroll in a supplemental course associated with a large biology lecture performed better on lecture exams than those students who chose not to enroll in the supplemental course. Sections of the supplemental course were taught with instructor-centered methods prior to some exams, student-centered methods prior to other exams,…

A recent UK House of Commons report on Science 14-19 identified problems with coursework and argued for a greater emphasis on teaching and assessment of scientific literacy. This paper describes a written test for procedural understanding, given to 15 year olds, that addresses both of these issues. Comparisons are made between the scores on a…

Describes the development of the performance assessment tasks of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study. The challenge was to produce tasks that would measure the achievement of curricular objectives while being sufficiently reliable to allow comparisons between countries and of groups within countries. (SLD)