In an era of socio-ecological challenges and uncertain times, it is imperative that student voice is supported to enable student transformative agency and desired positive change in their lives and community. Although international policy, the Australian Curriculum, School Strategic Plans, communities, teachers, and students often advocate for…

Since inquiry was first introduced to science education, a lot of inquiry-based tasks have appeared in textbooks for supporting an inquiry-based approach. These tasks have great potential to direct the implementation of an inquiry-based approach, as teachers rely heavily on the use of existing instructional materials in most K-12 classrooms.…

The present study examined changes in high school biology and technology education pedagogy during the first year of a three-year professional development (PD) program using the INSPIRES educative curriculum. The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) calls for the integration of science and engineering through inquiry-based pedagogy that shifts…

Over the past 20 years research on reform efforts aimed at the chemistry laboratory has focused on different aspects of students' experiences including increasing content knowledge, improving student attitudes toward chemistry, incorporating inquiry activities, and providing students a hands-on experience related to the chemistry concepts learned…

As part of a campus-wide effort to transform introductory science courses to be more engaging and more accurately convey the excitement of discovery in science, the curriculum of an introductory physical geology lab course was redesigned. What had been a series of ''cookbook'' lab activities was transformed into a sequence of activities based on…

The first author re-entered the middle grades classroom to teach a new National Science Foundation (NSF) physical science curriculum that was designed to foster conceptual change through a scientific approach. The curriculum design met the need and call for reform in science education through its focus on inquiry, evidence-based reasoning, peer…

This literature review intends to highlight some of the critical research that has been synthesized on the perspectives of both teachers and students and their attitudes to teaching and learning in an STS-themed learning environment. The first portion draws on the perspectives of elementary and secondary school teachers both locally and abroad.…

Current educational reform calls for increased integration between science and mathematics to overcome the shortcomings in students' quantitative skills. Data Nuggets (free online resource, http://datanuggets.org) are worksheets that bring data into the classroom, repeatedly guiding students through the scientific method and making claims…

These proceedings contain papers of the 3rd International Baltic Symposium on Science and Technology Education (BalticSTE2019) held in Šiauliai, Lithuania, June 17-19, 2019. This symposium was organized by the Scientific Methodical Center "Scientia Educologica" in cooperation with the Institute of Education, Šiauliai University. The…

A student-centered learning technique, process-oriented, guided-inquiry learning (POGIL), has been developed as a pedagogical technique that facilitates collaborative and cooperative learning in the chemistry classroom. With the use of this technique, students enhance their higher-order thinking skills and process skills synergistically. In…

Within middle school classrooms a diverse body of students require specialized instruction and science teachers with unique abilities to implement a reform-based science curriculum. To achieve the goal of success for all, students who are English language leaners and with exceptionalities, such as learning disabilities, and emotional and…

Scientific inquiry involves a variety of abilities scientists use to investigate the natural world. In order to develop students' scientific inquiry, researchers and educators have developed different curricula and a variety of instructional resources, which make features and descriptors of scientific inquiry in teaching and learning even more…

Much effort over many years has been devoted to the reform of the teaching of physics. This has led to many new and imaginative approaches in the content and delivery of material. Great strides have been made in the delivery, and the content has been continually supplemented. However, attempts to modernize the basic structure of the presentation…

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of inquiry-based science instruction for five elementary students with learning disabilities (LD). Students participated in a series of inquiry-based activities targeting conceptual and application-based understanding of simple electric circuits, conductors and insulators, parallel circuits, and…

This case study examined the impact of the application of an inquiry-based concept related physics curriculum on student attitudes and learning in a secondary physics classroom in southern New Jersey. Students who had previously used a traditional physics curriculum were presented with a 10 week inquiry-based concept related physics curriculum on…