A systematic review of Threshold Concepts provides a thorough and structured analysis of the existing literature related to these essential and transforming concepts in education. Threshold Concepts represent ideas or knowledge that, once understood, allow the student to access deeper levels of understanding of a discipline. These concepts are…

Mechanistic explanations, aiming to disclose details of entities and their activities, employ the act of unpacking which, inherently and paradoxically, produces explanatory gaps--pieces of undisclosed, undetailed mechanistic information. These gaps, termed explanatory black boxes, are often perceived as counterproductive to the teaching of…

Peer Instruction gives practice in the abstract language of physics, addresses common misconceptions among students, and is more effective than traditional lecturing. However, it is not clear what makes Peer Instruction effective nor how we might improve the method. An emerging perspective is that what makes Peer Instruction effective is how it…

The alternative conceptions that students hold put a brake on subsequent meaningful learning, and therefore, the identification of these wrong ideas is crucial for effective teaching and academic success. Undergraduate STEM students often perceive Chemical Thermodynamics as a difficult subject, in which entropy has been pointed out as a threshold…

In this study, we have explored the effectiveness of two instructional approaches in the context of the motion of objects falling at terminal speed in the presence of air resistance. We ground these instructional approaches in dual-process theories of reasoning, which assert that human cognition relies on two thinking processes. Dual-process…

Two generative approaches to reaction mechanism instruction for novice students were compared to lecture instruction. In both approaches, students were coached to propose selected reaction mechanisms based on prior knowledge. New instructional methods were correlated with increased skill in representations of electron movements and other gains.…

Even after research-based instruction, students who demonstrate the ability to assemble relevant conceptual knowledge on one physics question may have difficulty assembling that same knowledge on a closely related problem. Recent research has suggested that reflexive, bottom-up reasoning processes seemingly unrelated to the physics concepts…

"Complex systems" is a general-purpose reasoning scheme, used in a wide range of disciplines to make sense of systems with many similar entities. In this paper, we examine the generality of this approach in learning chemistry. Students' reasoning in chemistry in terms of emergent complex systems is explored for two curricula: a normative…

Movies have long been used for teaching in undergraduate science courses. However, embedding movie references (EMR) in science videos is a new trend. This study explored how EMR in YouTube science videos might affect the nature of comments and the process of learning science. Using constructivist grounded theory, we compared comments on two…

The present study contributes to the understanding of physics students' representational competence by examining specific bodily practices (e.g. gestures, enactment) of students' interaction and constructions of representations in relation to a digital learning environment. We present and analyse video data of upper-secondary school students'…

Research has explored the use of simulations for education and training, and attention is turning to how they might support learning in school subjects such as mathematics and science. However, existing studies have mostly concentrated on older students, and if simulations help build knowledge useful for solving problems "within" the…

The objective of this study is to compare the effectiveness of EMBE-R and verification strategies in eliminating the rate of reaction (RR) misconceptions on different scientific reasoning capabilities (SRC) and improving students' understanding of concepts in chemical equilibrium (CE). This quasi-experimental design involved two homogeneous…

Mobile devices (smartphones or tablets) as experimental tools (METs) offer inspiring possibilities for science education, but until now, there has been little research studying this approach. Previous research indicated that METs have positive effects on students' interest and curiosity. The present investigation focuses on potential cognitive…

Students often use incoherent strategies in their problem solving involving force and motion, as revealed, e.g. when they are asked to draw force diagrams for amusement rides involving circular motion, whether in horizontal or vertical planes. Depending on the questions asked, assignments involving circular motion can reveal different types of…

Teachers face challenges when building the concept of substance with students because tensions of meanings emerge from students' daily life and canonical ideas developed in classrooms. A powerful tool to address learning, pedagogical, and research challenges is the conceptual profile theory. According to this theory, people employ various ways of…