A comparative study on the performance and on the perception of two groups of students involved in a peer review activity on the writing of chemical laboratory reports is reported. The first group participated in a compulsory activity, while the second one participated on a voluntary basis. This study was aimed at determining whether the overall…

Traditional laboratory courses involve students following detailed weekly experimental procedures, culminating in either a laboratory report or handout at the end of each experiment. While this setup teaches basic laboratory skills, it usually does not encourage students to think critically or independently. Therefore, many laboratory instructors…

This paper elaborates a process followed to characterise manifestations of cognitive regulation during the collaborative planning of chemistry practical investigations. Metacognitive activity was defined as the demonstration of planning, monitoring, control and evaluation of cognitive activities by students while carrying out the chemistry task.…

Undergraduate research clearly enriches the educational development of participating students, but these experiences are limited by the inherent inefficiency of the standard one student-one mentor model for undergraduate research. Group-effort applied research (GEAR) was developed as a strategy to provide substantial numbers of undergraduates with…

Despite the accepted pedagogical value of integrating research into the laboratory curriculum, this approach has not been widely adopted. The activation barrier to this change is high, especially in organic chemistry, where a large number of students are required to take this course, special glassware or setups may be needed, and dangerous…

Rapid technological advancement influences the communication and information management as well as knowledge construction. Within the context of new challenges, lifelong learning emerges a fundamental element for the constant development of professionals. So that it dynamically adapts to change and retain a state-of-the-art identity. At present,…

Introducing students to the process of scientific inquiry is a major goal of high school and college labs. Environmental toxins are of great concern and public interest. Modifications of a vertebrate developmental toxicity assay using the frog Xenopus laevis can support student-initiated toxicology experiments that are relevant to humans. Teams of…

This article describes a two-semester general chemistry laboratory teaching approach to assist students in gaining experience with science-process skills. The ultimate goal is successful completion of a second-semester service-learning project requiring use of their newly developed science-process skills. The project entails creating an…

This paper presents a teaching methodology involving an independent research project component for use in undergraduate Comparative Vertebrate Anatomy laboratory courses. The proposed project introduces cooperative, active learning in a research context to comparative vertebrate anatomy. This project involves pairs or groups of three students…

Students' conceptions of three major artificial intelligence concepts used in the modeling of systems in science, fuzzy logic, neural networks, and genetic algorithms were investigated before and after a higher education science course. Students initially explored their prior ideas related to the three concepts through active tasks. Then,…

This inquiry-based lab is designed around genetic diseases with a focus on protein structure and function. To allow students to work on their own investigatory projects, 10 projects on 10 different proteins were developed. Students are grouped in sections of 20 and work in pairs on each of the projects. To begin their investigation, students are…