Science education researchers and curriculum documents have advocated scientific inquiry for more than six decades; however, inconsistent findings concerning its effects on students' learning outcomes have been revealed in recent analyses of large-scale international assessment data (e.g., the Programme for International Student Assessment…

An essential aspect of scientific practice involves grappling with the generation of predictions, representations, interpretations, investigations, and communications related to scientific phenomena, all of which are inherently permeated with uncertainty. Transferring this practice from expert settings to the classroom is invaluable yet…

Students often learn about measurement uncertainty as an isolated topic, with a focus on generalizable strategies to manage uncertainty in scientific investigation. In this study, we report and analyze a case of emergent learning about measurement and uncertainty, in which students in a Chinese elementary school science class explored and…

Engagement with socioscientific issues (SSI) has emerged as an important focus for science education. SSI have been successfully used to teach science concepts, but they also serve a role in helping learners develop a capacity to engage with science in everyday life. Here we present an epistemic framework for characterizing socioscientific…

In this study, we investigated the construction of science learning opportunities focusing on space-time relationships. Guided by ethnography in education, we followed the everyday life of a classroom over their three first years at elementary school. Based on macroanalysis, we examined discursive interactions in temporally distant events and how…

Most of the tools developed in the area of "Science Education" aimed at analyzing either the product or the process of argumentation do not consider the following: (1) arguments are a part of dialogues; (2) dialogues present different objectives; (3) dialogues start from different assumptions; and (4) dialogues shape the roles and moves…

In science education, there has been a sustained focus on supporting the emergence of science practices in K-12 and field-based settings. Recent work has elevated the integral role of emotion in sparking and sustaining such disciplinary practices, deepening the field's understanding of what is entailed in "doing" science. Yet even as we…

Mechanistic reasoning is a powerful form of reasoning central to scientific explanations. Despite mechanistic reasoning being an important dimension of scientific practice and a central dimension of science curricula, students face difficulties in developing such type of reasoning. Many authors have been proposing tools for supporting its…

Uncertainty is endemic to scientific research practices; therefore, it is also an important element in learning about science. Studies have shown that experiences and management of uncertainty regarding the epistemic practices of science can support learning. Whereas the common strategies of supporting students in handling uncertainty rely on the…

In this study, we aimed to characterize students' inquiry skill profiles and investigate whether students' gender, major, school location and type, and household registration are related to their inquiry skill profiles. By providing an animation-based activity, we engaged students in a scientific inquiry on the atmospheric chemistry of climate…

Science education researchers have highlighted how uncertainty can foster meaningful scientific sense-making, supporting students to re-evaluate their understandings of scientific phenomena and pursue deeper causal accounts. However, facilitating whole-class conversations motivated by uncertainty is complex and challenging, calling for further…

Is public engagement with science deliberative and evidence-based? The public is often perceived as underprepared to use data and susceptible to partisan and emotional manipulation. Consequently, educational efforts focus on the ability to identify reliable information. We posit that effective engagement with science goes beyond this and hinges on…

With the shifts in science education emphasizing the integration of science practices with science content, there is a need to know how teachers understand those science practices within their teaching practice. Our primary research question was, "What do novice elementary teachers know about the science practices, in terms of what the…

This qualitative case study delved into students' understanding and positioning while they participated in solving an authentic, conceptually-based problem in a high-school chemistry class. Verbal and nonverbal cues, particularly gestures, offered broader awareness of students' engagement in sensemaking during the learning experience. The…

This study addresses intergenerational learning processes in informal settings by investigating families engaging in science talk and practices during a water quality science workshop led by local science experts. As part of a larger design-based research study, this analysis examines how modified Think-Pair-Share discussion prompts within the…