Hopscotch, basketball, or hide-and-seek? Children have many choices at recess, and while making these choices they must consider and make trade-offs. The way they make these decisions is not that different from the thought processes engineers use when making design trade-offs. Engineers have to make trade-offs because a design that meets all…

The National Science Foundation's GK-12 program provides a unique opportunity for STEM collaboration between the K-12 classroom and university research. This partnership benefits students through experiential learning, exposure to research, exceptional mentorship, and preparation for postsecondary education. Additionally, researchers gain…

In this study, a follow-up analysis of the data reported in Lin et al. ("Learn Media Technol." doi: 10.1080/17439884.2011.629660 , 2011), we investigated the relationship between student use of a virtual field trip (VFT) system and the probability of students reporting wanting to visit the national park site upon which the VFT was modeled,…

The Association of Research Libraries E-Science Working Group developed a survey to "build an understanding of how libraries can contribute to e-science activities in their institution" and "identify organizations and institutions that have similar interests in e-science to leverage research library interests." The August 2009…

A vane-type low-cost laboratory model anemometer cum power meter is designed and constructed for measuring low wind energy created from accelerating fluids. The constructed anemometer is a device which records the electrical power obtained by the conversion of wind power using a wind sensor coupled to a DC motor. It is designed for its…

We present simple apparatus designed to help Thai high school students visualize the directions of frictional forces. Bristles of toothbrushes, paintbrushes and scrubbing brushes are used to demonstrate the frictional forces acting in a variety of situations. These demonstrations, when followed by discussion of free-body diagrams, were found to be…

Finding ways to demonstrate--in a high school classroom--that subatomic particles from space produce other particles capable of reaching the Earth's surface is not a trivial task. In this paper, we describe a Geiger-Muller tube-based cosmic ray coincidence detector we produced at a total cost of less than $200, using two tubes purchased used…

A laboratory experiment emphasizing the structural elucidation of organic compounds has been developed as a discovery exercise. The "unknown" compounds are the products of the pH-controlled oxidation of 4'-methoxyacetophenone with bleach. The chemoselectivity of this reaction is highly dependent on the pH of the reaction media: under basic…

RNA mediated gene interference (RNAi) is now a key tool in eukaryotic cell and molecular biology research. This article describes a five session laboratory practical, spread over a seven day period, to introduce and illustrate the technique. During the exercise, students working in small groups purify PCR products that encode "in vitro"…

GENIQUEST is a cyberlearning computer program that allows students to investigate biological data using a research-based instructional model. In this article, the authors make the case for using cyberlearning to teach students about the rapidly growing fields of genomics and computational biology. (Contains 2 figures and 1 online resource.)

Following from an earlier analysis by B. F. Skinner, the present article suggests that the verbal processes in science may usefully be viewed as following a three-stage progression. This progression starts with (a) identification of basic data, then moves to (b) description of relations among those data, and ultimately concludes with (c) the…

We describe how we use boiling-point trends of group IV-VII hydrides to introduce intermolecular forces in our first-year general chemistry classes. Starting with the idea that molecules in the liquid state are held together by some kind of force that must be overcome for boiling to take place, students use data analysis and critical reasoning to…

Introductory organic chemistry is often perceived as inaccessible by students. This article describes a method used to link organic chemistry to everyday experience, asking students to explore whether fragrant molecules are also aromatic in the chemical sense. Students were engaged in this activity, excited about their results, and performed well…

This paper describes theory and experiments, taken from biophysics and physiological measurements, to illustrate the technique of signal averaging. In the process, students are introduced to the basic concepts of signal processing, such as digital filtering, Fourier transformation, baseline correction, pink and Gaussian noise, and the cross- and…

Assessment means many things to many people. There is a plethora of terms and definitions. To measure science-learning outcomes at skills level, assessment was modified and restructured not only in form and context, but in vocabularies and nomenclatures. Thus, there emerged different forms, like alternative, authentic and performance assessments,…