Misunderstandings are social in nature, always having two sides. Yet the misunderstandings experienced by people with Asperger's syndrome are usually studied in terms of the individual with a diagnosis, with less emphasis on social relations. We use a two-sided methodology to map out misunderstandings within 22 dyads (n = 44) consisting of people…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Astronomy Education Research.] As part of a larger project studying undergraduate students' understanding of cosmology, we explored students' ideas about the curvature of the Universe. We investigated preinstruction ideas held by introductory astronomy (ASTRO 101) students at three participating…

Climate change encompasses a broad and complex set of concepts that is often challenging for students and educators. Using a learning progressions (LPs) knowledge system, we developed a LP that described student learning of climate change. In this exploratory study, we present findings from written assessments of climate change (n = 294) and…

Instructional coaching has been a professional learning opportunity that many school districts have employed to support teacher practice. Pairing instructional coaching with on-going workshops is a relatively new approach to professional development. Participants for this study include fourteen middle school teachers that teach either mathematics…

Recent curriculum introductions and revisions on a global scale have highlighted the importance of primary teachers' content knowledge in geography and the lack of research in this area (Catling, 2014). This has become a particular focus in Australia with the introduction of the "Australian Curriculum: Geography" in 2013 and the…

Background: Learning processes are usually characterized by students' misunderstandings and misconceptions. Engineering educators intend to help their students overcome their misconceptions and achieve correct understanding of the concept. This paper describes a misconception in digital systems held by many students who believe that combinational…

Visualizing the chemical structure and dynamics of particles has been challenging for many students; therefore, various visualizations and tools have been used in chemistry education. For science educators, it has been important to understand how students visualize and represent particular phenomena--i.e., their mental models-- to design more…

This research was a cross-age study that sought to determine and compare students' ideas about the causes of the seasons. Toward this aim, the research was carried out with 974 students at different educational levels and across the various age groups. First, the data obtained from the responses to the open-ended question was categorized according…

Excessive exposure to solar ultraviolet (UV) radiation causes sunburn and has been consistently associated with increased susceptibility to melanoma and skin ageing. Acknowledging the need to promote healthy sun exposure habits, numerous educational initiatives have been developed to raise public awareness towards this issue. However, studies…

Background: The motivation for this work is built upon the premise that there is a need for research-based materials for design-based science instruction. In this paper, a small portion of our work investigating the impact of a LEGO[TM] engineering unit on fourth grade students' preconceptions and understanding of animals is presented. Purpose:…

This paper examines students' achievements in solving problems and their misunderstandings when using models. A mixed research methodology was applied. Quantitative research investigated how the performance of students with various levels of high school GPAs correlated with their rating of their lecturers' teaching proficiency. Four lecturers and…

This paper reports on an investigation into pre-service teachers' mathematical content knowledge and their ability to interpret students' responses to a multi-digit multiplication task and make subsequent appropriate teaching decisions. Using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods, the researchers tested aspects of the mathematical…

Through a non-experimental descriptive and comparative mixed-methods approach, this study investigated the experiences of sixth grade earth science students with groundwater physical models through an extended SE learning cycle format. The data collection was based on a series of quantitative and qualitative research tools intended to investigate…

School-based HIV/AIDS science education has the potential to impact students when integrated into the science curriculum. However, this mixed method study shows that school-based HIV/AIDS science education is often not infused into career subjects such as science education but integrated into civics education and taught by teachers who lack the…

This study of advanced readers in Reading First (RF) classrooms was part of a larger evaluation of one state's RF implementation. The study's purposes were to (a) assess the longitudinal growth of advanced primary readers as compared with their non-advanced-reading peers over a 3-year timeframe and (b) determine the degree to which RF classrooms…