Multiple reviews point out that immersive virtual reality (IVR) educational studies often lack the consideration of learning theories in research design and IVR application development to promote students' learning. In response to the lack of theoretical foundations in educational research of IVR applications, an increased number of scholarly…

Since the beginning of the 21st century, the appropriation of the sociocultural perspective by the physics education research community has represented a linguistic turn in the field, pointing out a promising path to overcome the dominance of the "individual paradigm," both in terms of student learning and initial and continuing teacher…

Pre-service teachers often learn to teach in siloed methods courses despite evidence that interdisciplinary pedagogies benefit elementary school students. To address this discrepancy, six teacher educators initiated a two-year self-study to improve their practice. They co-created a shared module to integrate technology, literacy, and science…

Dual-process theories of reasoning suggest that humans reason using two processes often referred to as process 1 (heuristic) and process 2 (analytic). When presented with a situation requiring any sort of reasoning or decision making, process 1 automatically engages and generates an initial mental model to address the situation. Process 2 may or…

The current wave of science education reforms emphasizes more equitable opportunities for students as they learn disciplinary core ideas and apply crosscutting concepts by engaging in the practices of scientists. Formative assessment--the assessment teachers and students conduct while learning is in progress--also needs to shift to support this…

A range of pedagogical learning theories has been proposed to guide science teachers' classroom teaching. This study presents the results of the development and use of an 18-item Arabic language rating scale survey to assess Omani teachers' (N = 400) views towards the application of selected pedagogical learning theories of potential use in their…

Three-dimensional learning is the name given to the vision for science education described in the National Academies consensus report "A Framework for K-12 Science Education." Of the three dimensions described in the Framework, the Disciplinary Core Ideas and the Science and Engineering Practices have been enthusiastically adopted by…

An important goal of science education is for students to understand the nature of science. Science education has raised the question of what science is, how scientific knowledge is developed and how people participate in this process under the conceptual umbrella of 'nature of science' (NOS). This study aims to look at the effectiveness of the…

This study explored principals' epistemic beliefs towards learning theory and student agency as essential criteria for the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Following the understanding of these beliefs the principals went through an iterative process to develop a walkthrough matrix to evaluate the criteria deemed essential for immersive…

Study abroad attempts to prepare students to effectively work in a multi-national environment. This study compares students' experiences in a unit operations laboratory course offered in multiple modalities: at students' home university, and four- and eight-week study abroad. The results examine the impact of support on students' learning and…

Formal science education is the last stage of acquiring scientific knowledge for most people. They rely on the knowledge acquired at school for the rest of their lives. Therefore, it is important that formal education changes students' colloquial knowledge into scientific knowledge and is correct. The study decided to test three situations. In the…

The advanced visualisation and interactive capabilities make immersive virtual reality (IVR) attractive for educators to investigate its educational benefits. This research reviewed 64 studies published in 2016-2020 to understand how science educators designed, implemented, and evaluated IVR-based learning. The immersive design features (sensory,…

The role writing plays in learning science has evolved over time, as have the settings and contexts in which writing in science research has taken place. This systematic review examines 20 years (1996-2016) of writing in science intervention studies in K-12 settings with a specific focus on comparing contexts that do and do not include English…

The present study aimed to examine the affordances and constraints of small-group discussions in relation to student teachers' learning of science. By drawing on variation theory, this study focused explicitly on the student teachers themselves as the primary agents for providing opportunities for their own learning of science. The results show…

This paper proposes the Learning in Embodied Activity Framework (LEAF) which aims to synthesize across individual and sociocultural theories of learning to provide a more robust account of how the body plays a role in collaborative learning, particularly when students are learning about a collective phenomenon where coordination between and across…