In this classroom simulation of a crime, students take on the challenge presented in the article To Catch a Thief. Students witnessing a surprising event learn to question the nature of how criminals get identified and generate ideas about how criminals can be better identified. A key component of the evidence is an unusual distinguishing…

Explains the goals of a course to teach non-science majors how scientists think. Approaches science primarily as a way of knowing rather than as a body of knowledge and conveys the scientific method as an empirical endeavor. (DDR)

Introduces the Magic in a Tube activity in which students formulate questions and practice science skills. (YDS)

Defines adaptive inquiry and argues for employing this method which allows lessons to be shaped in response to student needs. Illustrates this idea by detailing an activity in which teams of students build rockets. (DDR)

Presents an activity designed to provide students with opportunities to practice drawing atomic models and discover the logical pairings of whole families on the periodic table. Follows the format of a television game show. (DDR)

Examines the process of action research and how it contributes to the professional development of a first-grade teacher. Explores the research process experienced by the teacher as she examined whether portfolios could be used as an effective means for facilitating and assessing young children's development of science process skills. (Contains 58…

The theory that children's development of strategies-of-science experimentation is a consequence of developments in theory of mind was examined with 72 children in grades one, three, and five. Ability to predict, explain, and affect the reasoning of a doll or cartoon character predicted performance in planning controlled experiments and in…

Presents a mock interview with John Dewey in which the questions are from the present, and the answers are culled from Dewey's writings from 60-100 years ago. Questions relate primarily to the current state of education in science. (WRM)

Describes the development, preparation, and use of a medium that can select against a wide variety of Gram-negative bacteria while still allowing growth and differentiation of a wide range of Gram-positives. (WRM)

Describes a simple, inexpensive modification that changes a brightfield microscope into a darkfield microscope, allowing low-contrast samples to be examined. (WRM)

Describes the construction and use of an inexpensive, portable photometer designed specifically for estimating population sizes in yeast cultures. Suggests activities for use with the photometer. (WRM)

Investigates the practices required for reading graphs in high school textbooks and scientific journals. Discusses the role of high school textbooks in the appropriation of authentic scientific graph-related practices. Finds that scientific journals provide more resources to facilitate graph reading and feature more elaborate descriptions and…

Discusses a study that revealed that science teachers, like their students, are capable of handling positive experimental results but fail to evaluate negative results appropriately. Describes a teaching strategy designed to help teachers develop an understanding of the concept of negative results and to apply the idea to different contexts.…

Defines six types of investigations: (1) classifying and identifying; (2) fair testing; (3) pattern seeking; (4) exploring; (5) investigating models; and (6) making things or developing systems. Challenges the dominance of fair testing in school science investigations. (Author/WRM)

Describes a review of research that addresses the effectiveness of simulations in promoting scientific discovery learning and the problems that learners may encounter when using discovery learning. (WRM)