Laboratory instruction is critical to the understanding of biology and is a central piece of biological sciences instruction. Although much investigation has focused on the content of biology laboratory exercises, we contend that understanding the extent to which the laboratory materials can aid or limit experimental investigation is of equal…

Many studies of design fixation ask designers to work in controlled laboratory or classroom environments, but innovative design work frequently occurs in dynamic, social environments. The two studies reviewed in this paper investigated how three independent variables likely to be present in many design environments affect design fixation. The…

The demographics of public schools in the United States have changed over recent years to include millions of English language learners (ELLs), students whose first language is not English and who demonstrate limited proficiency in English. During this same time period, school personnel have struggled to identify ELLs for gifted programs because…

Children today are born into a world with endless amounts of information at their fingertips, the ability to instantly connect with others, and smartphones with an app for virtually everything. It is a world that is vastly different than that of their parents or grandparents. As these students sit in classrooms all over the world, their teachers…

An incubation effect occurs when taking a break from a problem helps solvers arrive at the correct solution more often than working on it continuously. The forgetting-fixation account, a popular explanation of how incubation works, posits that a break from a problem allows the solver to forget the incorrect path to the solution and finally access…

With the economic collapse of 2008, there has been a dramatic increase in government emphasis on the value of science and technology-based study in the nation's high schools as a means for the United States to remain competitive in the world economic market. Financial, political and societal support for the hard sciences, coupled with…

"Using the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics With Gifted and Advanced Learners" provides teachers and administrators examples and strategies to implement the new Common Core State Standards (CCSS) with advanced learners at all stages of development in K-12 schools. The book describes--and demonstrates with specific examples from the…

The ability to memorize facts is not enough to equip students to solve problems or navigate an evolving world. If we educate young people to become flexible, metacognitive thinkers--and model that behavior for them--they will understand how to adapt their learning and successfully find their way in new territory. This book shows school leaders how…

Based on the results of a survey of the science and mathematics students at our university, we observed that students do not consider mathematics and science to be creative endeavors, though the traditional artistic disciplines rank high in this regard. To address this problem in perception, the authors used photography as a means to encourage…

The number of day-to-day challenges has increased at every stage of life, particularly in developing countries, and therefore there is a crying need for a search for solutions. Education plays an important role in providing correct direction, and science education can prove crucial in achieving this goal. Solutions to individual as well as…

This paper describes changes in students' geometrical knowledge and their creativity associated with implementation of Multiple Solution Tasks (MSTs) in school geometry courses. Three hundred and three students from 14 geometry classes participated in the study, of whom 229 students from 11 classes learned in an experimental environment that…

The sources contained within this annotated bibliography can help inform state efforts to define the competencies that students need to be able to demonstrate, determine how schools and districts can ensure that students master these competencies, and measure school and student progress toward college and career readiness and success goals. This…

For girls there is a distinct loss in interest, lack of confidence, and decline in positive attitudes toward STEM subject areas that begins early on in their academic experience and increases with age. According to the National Academy of Engineering, students need to begin associating the possibilities in STEM fields with the need for creativity…

Although it is essential to incorporate new technologies into the classroom, says Isseks, one trend has negatively affected instruction--the misuse of PowerPoint presentations. The author describes how poorly designed PowerPoint presentations reduce complex thoughts to bullet points and reduce the act of learning to transferring text from slide to…

Children's creativity is different from the creativity shown by adults. Discovery for others, which is what adults do, results in technological, scientific or artistic advances that then become part of the general culture. Discovery for oneself is more subjective, and results in a change in the person rather than in the culture. Although adults…