In considering goals for science education, it is conventional to make arguments for the utility of scientific knowledge for a variety of purposes. Less prominent are rationales based on the beauty or truth of science. In this paper, we examine how an approach to science education might be different if we shift the goals of communication to an…

Addressing student conceptions is crucial in science education. Therefore, teachers should be able to notice and interpret situations, in which student conceptions are part of the complex classroom interactions. This study analyzes the skills known as professional vision using an interpretivist research paradigm and a sociocultural perspective.…

Investigated primary school children's scientific understanding and the conceptual change that occurs when using an interactive approach to teaching science. Discourse analysis of classroom conversations indicated three different types of teacher-child and child-child interactions. (Contains 53 references.) (MDH)