Background: Inquiry-based instruction is a prominent teaching strategy in science education that is assumed to be an effective means to foster not only students' understanding of science content but also their procedural and epistemic knowledge concerning inquiry processes. Empirical studies have repeatedly shown that inquiry-related activities…

Vector fields are a highly abstract physical concept that is often taught using visualizations. Although vector representations are particularly suitable for visualizing quantitative data, they are often confusing, especially when describing real fields such as magnetic and electric fields, as the vector arrows can overlap. The present study…

Science education research has repeatedly revealed students' problems with understanding the energy concept, in particular, their understanding of potential energy. Newer research suggests that teaching students fields as a means to store potential energy may promote a more consistent understanding of the energy concept. Yet, it is presently…

Integrating literacy in science and mathematics learning and teaching has been an ongoing endeavour. There are frameworks developed to guide teachers' practices, but little is reported on assessing literacy simultaneously with scientific or mathematical content knowledge. We reviewed the literature on assessing literacy in science and mathematics…

When it comes to biology lessons in Germany, girls generally exhibit higher levels of self-determined motivation than boys. Previous research suggests that fostering student autonomy could be a way to effectively address this gender gap. To investigate gender-related effects in biology education, a sample of 303 sixth-grade students (M[subscript…

Previous research about the presence of nature of science (NOS) within science textbooks has been found to be lacking in sufficient coverage. However, given the shift in how scholars conceive of NOS, the shortcomings may not be present in the textbooks but rather in the NOS frameworks used to analyze textbooks. Whereas traditional NOS has taken a…

Science education reform efforts have emphasized the incorporation of more authentic and meaningful scientific practices into formal learning environments. With this focus on practices, such as scientific modeling, a powerful tool for sense-making and reasoning, comes a need to observe and understand if and how it is actually occurring,…

The greenhouse effect is a complex scientific phenomenon that plays a crucial role in understanding climate change. Grasping students' understanding of this phenomenon on the content-specific level but also how students' conceptions are organized is vital for effective climate change education. This study addresses both levels and delves into the…

Problem solving is considered an essential ability for becoming an expert in physics, and individualized feedback on the structure of problem-solving processes is a key component to support students in developing this ability. Problem-solving processes consist of multiple elements whose order forms the sequential structure of these processes.…

Digital learning environments such as virtual laboratories have been proposed to augment or even replace conventional forms of teaching in recent years. While there is some evidence on comparable learning outcomes between real and virtual labs, empirical evidence on the effectiveness of virtual labs as compared to conventional face-to-face…

Most chemistry students struggle with interpreting and understanding NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) spectra and the general concepts of NMR spectroscopy. NMR spectroscopy seems to be difficult to both teach and learn. Therefore, the corresponding courses should be investigated in more detail. We conducted a survey with N = 39 German university…

Background: The importance of diagnostic and scaffolding activities for early science learning has been shown consistently. However, preschool teachers scarcely engage in them. We developed an instrument to assess preschool teachers' willingness to engage in diagnostic and scaffolding activities in science learning situations and examined its…

The teaching and learning of quantum physics has recently become a topic of increasing interest in physics education research. In particular, the study of two-state systems is gaining importance as a means of teaching quantum physics at various educational levels. Meanwhile, a number of approaches have been developed that are also suitable for…

Using living organisms in biology education is a common practice that provides students with direct contact with living beings in the classroom. Several benefits and barriers of using organisms in classrooms have been proposed in the literature. Hence, biology teachers should carefully consider the pros and cons of using living organisms, and…

Despite rapid changes in education, science classrooms will remain central forums where fragmented pieces of information are brought together to construct coherent knowledge as concepts and explanatory scientific storylines. There is limited work stressing the importance of the interplay between how content is communicated through pedagogical…