This paper addresses the importance of argumentation in science education. A research project was done in order to know how a group of pre-service chemistry teachers has been prepared to promote students' argumentation. A Chemistry degree studies plan from a Colombian university was surveyed, and 18 future teachers' representations about…

Inquiry-driven lab exercises require students to think carefully about a question, carry out an investigation of that question, and critically analyze the results of their investigation. Here, we describe the implementation and assessment of an inquiry-based laboratory exercise in which students obtain and analyze novel data that contribute to our…

Suggests a new subject for the modern undergraduate program. The new subject should be chemical measurement, and its short definition might be the method of describing the properties and reactions of chemicals quantitatively." (Author/TS)

"How the World Works" is an interdisciplinary science and mathematics course in which students design and perform their own experiments, analyze the data, and present their results orally and in writing. Evaluations indicate that most students learn how to do science and gain a better appreciation for science as a process. (SAH)

Describes "chemometrics" courses which focus on statistical and mathematical approaches for interpreting complex chemical data. (SK)

Active learning and research-oriented activities have been increasingly used in smaller, specialized science courses. Application of this type of scientific teaching to large enrollment introductory courses has been, however, a major challenge. The general microbiology lecture/laboratory course described has been designed to incorporate published…