This study investigated the effects of outdoor education on a 10th grade biology curriculum in terms of the knowledge, attitudes, and retention of students compared to indoor teaching. The quasi-experimental design included three groups: experiment (OE; N = 43), control-II (indoor teaching; N = 35), and control-I (no application; N = 35). A…

This study uses a case study methodology to showcase the use of the DTSICM (Design thinking Strategy to Identify and Clear Misconceptions) model, which provides a design thinking approach to identify and clear a common misconception on photosynthesis, held by a sample of 27 A-level students. As a first stage, data collected through the…

This study has two aims. The first is to determine the effect of argumentation and epistemologically enriched argumentation on academic achievement. The second is to determine students' opinions about the effect of the integration of argumentation and epistemologically enriched argumentation into the teaching process on academic achievement. In…

A feature of student--teacher--scientist partnerships (STSPs) involves students working with scientists for the purpose of helping them learn more about how scientists work and think. Previous research on STSPs has generally focused on identifying the best practices of partnerships and on identifying challenges of these partnerships. The study…

The purpose of this study is to compare the effects of inquiry-based learning and the regular science curriculum on students' learner autonomy and conceptions of learning. The students in the experimental group engaged in inquiry beginning with structured, continuing with guided and ending with open, while the students in the comparison group…

While helping students develop informed views about nature of scientific inquiry (VNOSI) has been emphasised in science education, little is known regarding students' current VNOSI at a certain grade level and whether there was evidence of higher attainment of VNOSI in students in higher grades as compared to lower grades? The purpose of this…

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…

The purpose of this study was to analyze the effectiveness of scripted biology curriculum as a means of providing students with the information required to increase content knowledge, while comparing curriculum developed by the teacher that utilizes the Understanding by Design (UbD) framework (2005). The study is guided by two research questions:…

Learning about heredity is important across the K-12 continuum. However, these ideas may be challenging for students. We examined third-grade students' ideas about heredity in the context of a new, six-week, model-based science unit that uses corn as a model organism to support students' ideas about heredity. We analyzed data collected during…

Studying nature from the atomic and molecular perspective gives students access to modern scientific paradigms and could improve achievement and motivation towards science learning. A visual and tactile approach to chemistry can form the foundation for a child-friendly but high-level chemistry curriculum and could be a powerful tool to invigorate…

Students majoring in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) are in high demand. Over 1 million STEM graduates will be needed by 2022 to meet the projected workforce needs (The Progress Report on Coordinating Federal Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education, 2016). If students are needed to fulfill jobs in areas…

Over the last fifteen years, engineering has made its way into science curriculum at all levels, elementary, middle, and high school. A need to analyze students' perception the field of engineering is warranted. Previous techniques for studying representations of scientists and build on what researchers in the science field have learned from…

In this research, after extracting the pre-inquiries (student-level question) for which students had curiosity in the elementary science and analyzing their correlation with the elementary science curriculum, highly correlated inquiries (meaningful pre-inquiries) were selected and applied in class. After organizing an experiment group and a…

We evaluated the effectiveness of two alternative middle-school science curriculum sequences, namely, a general science model and a topic-specific model (i.e., physics, chemistry, etc.). We also investigated the differential effectiveness of the alternative sequences for two ethnic groups. The sample consisted of 367 grade 8 science students from…

The ability to use a chemical structure to predict and explain phenomenon is essential to a robust understanding of chemistry; however, previous research has shown that students find it difficult to make the connection between structure and properties. In this study we examine how student recognition of the connections between structure and…