Along-standing energy lab involves dropping bouncy balls and measuring their rebound heights on successive bounces. The lab demonstrates a situation in which the mechanical energy of a system is not conserved. Although students enjoyed the lab, the author wanted to deepen their thinking about energy, including the connections to motion, with a new…

This study aims to characterize a group of students' preliminary oral explanations of a scientific phenomenon produced as part of their learning process. The students were encouraged to use their own wordings to test out their own interpretation of observations when conducting practical activities. They presented their explanations orally in the…

Group work is becoming increasingly common in introductory physics classrooms. Understanding how students engage in these group learning environments is important for designing and facilitating productive learning opportunities for students. We conducted a study in which we collected video of groups of students working on conceptual electricity…

Antibiotic resistance is typically used to justify education about evolution, as evolutionary reasoning improves our understanding of causes of resistance and possible countermeasures. It has also been promoted as a useful context for teaching natural selection, because its potency as a selection factor, in combination with the very short…

This study investigates the development of Topic-Specific Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TSPCK) of 14 novice uncertified graduate science teachers during a Professional Development Intervention (PDI) on teaching particulate nature of matter. TSPCK was defined in terms of five knowledge components: learner prior knowledge, curricular saliency,…

We present experiments giving new insights into the classical light-emitting pickle experiment. In particular, measurements of the spectra and temperatures, as well as high-speed recordings, reveal that light emission is connected to the polarity of the electrodes and the presence of hydrogen.

Depending upon a cultural-historical perspective, where play is defined as the creation of an imaginary situation, this study seeks to examine whether and how family joint creation of imaginary situations can provide the conditions for a child's science learning in early childhood. The paper reported here forms part of a broader study, and the…

This article reports a case study on classroom interaction in teacher education in Norway. It addresses how teacher students in the school subject Norwegian constitute scientific talk in a student-led discussion. First, the analysis reveals tension in the classroom conversation between "mundane talk"--that is, where students make claims…

Vygotsky (1987) stated that the restructured form of everyday concepts learned at home and in the community interact with scientific concepts introduced in formal school settings, leading to a higher level of scientific thinking for school-aged children. But, what does this mean for the scientific learning of infants and toddlers? What kinds of…

Materials designed for self-guided experiences such as worksheets and digital applications are widely used as tools to enable interactive science exhibitions to support students' progress towards conceptual understanding. However, there is a need to find expedient ways to evaluate the quality of educational experiences resulting from the use of…

The aim of this study is to analyze the effect of meaning making based instruction regarding angular momentum conservation on the change of two 11th grade students' alternative ideas they have before instruction. Case study model is used in the research. Conceptual test (implemented before the instruction, right after the instruction and fifteen…

The purpose of this study is to examines the relationship between the communicative approach of classroom talk and the modes of representations used by science teachers. Based on video data from two physics classrooms in Singapore, a recurring pattern in the relationship was observed as the teaching sequence of a lesson unfolded. It was found that…

When visually impaired students attend regular high school, additional materials are necessary to help them understand physics concepts. The time for teachers to develop teaching materials for such students is scarce. Visually impaired students in regular high school physics classes often use a braille version of the physics textbook. Previously,…

Science education reforms articulate a vision of ambitious science teaching where teachers engage students in sensemaking discussions and emphasise the integration of scientific practices with science content. Learning to teach in this way is complex, and there are few examples of sensemaking discussions in schools where textbook lessons and…

This study analyzes the analogies used in the teaching of introductory quantum theory concepts. Over twelve weeks, the researcher observed each class for a semester and conducted interviews with the students and the instructor. In the interviews, students answered questions about quantum theory concepts, which the instructor had taught them using…