Concerns regarding students' difficulties with the concept of energy date back to the 1970s. They become particularly apparent for systems involving adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which plays a central role in maintaining the nonequilibrium state of biological systems and in driving energetically unfavorable processes. One of the most…

The floating and sinking phenomenon related to buoyant force can readily be observed in everyday life and easily demonstrated to young students. However, many students believe that the buoyant force is determined by the object's attributes, such as the shape (e.g., ship) or material (e.g., wood). As a result, students find it challenging to…

Descriptive statistics involves summarizing and organizing data so that they can be easily understood. Even though these are basic and simple concepts, many applied science students have misconceptions about their use in applied experiments in the laboratory. Students usually receive limited or no training in how to understand the meaning of the…

The concept of a sinusoidal wave traveling along a string is included in all secondary education physics books and as a result is being taught in undergraduate lectures around the globe. The didactic approach that follows is advantageous since it provides in a simplified way (through basic mathematical tools) a description of a disturbance that…

Biochemistry curricula present a particular challenge to undergraduate students with abstract concepts which can lead to misconceptions that impede learning. In particular, these students have difficulty understanding enzyme structure and function concepts. Targeted learning activities and three-dimensional (3D) physical models are proposed to…

Our exponentially increasing knowledge base creates many new technology challenges. Academia must therefore respond emphatically. Educating rising professionals to successfully confront these future difficulties requires innovative curricula challenges. A successful adaptation integrates STEM program protocols into core courses. Embracing…

The VSEPR model has well-established limitations in its ability to represent accurate molecular and electronic geometries of simple molecules, which can create a significant need for students to relearn structure and bonding concepts in organic chemistry. We present an alternate method for describing molecular geometries and electronic structures…

Understanding resonance is essential to predict chemical reactivity and explain reaction mechanisms. Despite its importance in the organic curriculum, few studies have explored students' difficulties with this concept and faculty's instructional approaches to teaching it. The goals of this study are to address this gap in the literature by (1)…

Students in chemistry often demonstrate difficulty with the principle of resonance. Despite many attempts to mitigate this difficulty, there have been few attempts to examine the root cause of these issues. In this study, students were assessed for their perception of Kekule structures based on perceptual learning theory, which is grounded in…

In this research article we explore the efficacy of a game-based learning approach to improve students understanding of the fundamental concepts of physics such as, heat and temperature. Heat and temperature are complex to learn by traditional learning methods. Students face complexities in learning such concepts of Physics. These complexities…

Ensuring undergraduate students become proficient in relating protein structure to biological function has important implications. With current two-dimensional (2D) methods of teaching, students frequently develop misconceptions, including that proteins contain a lot of empty space, that bond angles for different amino acids can rotate equally,…

Students come to science class with many ideas of how the natural world works, some of which do not match the consensus of the scientific community and can lead to misunderstandings. Because a growing body of educational research indicates that these misconceptions can serve as resources for learning, we developed a four-point plan to leverage…

In response to STEM education reform efforts, many instructors have incorporated active learning into their courses. However, the relationship between instructor justification to students about the use of active learning and student perception of why instructors use active learning is largely unknown. To investigate instructor active learning…

The Mechanical Waves Conceptual Survey (MWCS), presented in 2009, is the most important test to date that has been designed to evaluate university students' understanding of four main topics: propagation, superposition, reflection, and standing waves. In a literature review, we detected a significant need for a study that uses this test as an…

Graphs in physics are central to the analysis of phenomena and to learning about a system's behavior. The ways students handle graphs are frequently researched. Students' misconceptions are highlighted, and methods of improvement suggested. While kinematics graphs are to represent a real motion, they are also algebraic entities that must satisfy…