This chapter explores the extent to which project-based science (PBS) curricula designed with supports for students' inquiry into complex scientific data can help urban students make sense of such data and promote their deep understanding of standards-based content. We review qualitative and quantitative data from classroom enactments of a PBS…

Group exams in science courses can enhance students' achievement and encourage retention of students within the discipline. The challenge to instructors is to recognize when and how they are best used.

For three biology professors, visualizing molecular processes is central to thinking in their discipline. This chapter reports their attempts at getting students to make this same cognitive move and the results of their assessments. (Contains 2 figures.)

A discussion of group dynamics in collaborative learning describes use of this approach in an experimental biology course. Three approaches to group dynamics are outlined (personality and learning style, cognitive style, and group life). Identified are variables that teachers either have little power to affect, can address in course design, or can…

Three cases of use of collaborative learning techniques in the college classroom are described: a developmental mathematics course, a graduate-level writing project, and college science instruction. Each case includes description of specific class activities and assignments, results, and teacher concerns and comments. (MSE)

In its use of complex, real-world problems to introduce concepts and motivate learning in an active and cooperative learning environment, problem-based learning is a powerful alternative to the passive lecture in introductory college science. Use of technology and multimedia instruction, focus on large classes, and use of interdisciplinary…