Potassium is the main intracellular ion in prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells and is essential for their functions, making potassium one of the most important electrolytes in physiology. In humans, potassium plays a vital role in several physiological functions, including the maintenance of fluid balance, generating the membrane potential of cells,…

Despite being established as genuine physical features of the universe, black holes are not well understood at a non-technical level. Basic features of black holes are outlined, a few of the more popular misconceptions surrounding them are listed and their errors identified.

Heating a fluid causes a local expansion and the resulting buoyance of the rarefied fluid drives it upward. This phenomenon roughly defines heat convection. Convection is fairly well known due to our familiarity with a large number of convection systems in open air like candles, bonfires, barbecue grills, boiling pans, hot air balloons, etc. Most…

The Arduino is a popular and useful tool in STEM and physics education. Teacher demonstrations, laboratory and home work are supported by an incredibly wide range of application examples for a low cost. Since the heart of the Arduino board is an industrial microcontroller, it is a good chance to teach the basics of the related rules, standards and…

In anticipation of "AstroNotes" articles planned for the near future, a short primer on certain fundamental aspects of the celestial sphere and its associated geometry is in order. While astronomers proper and longtime astronomy faculty will already be familiar with this topic, newer faculty and perhaps those from other disciplines, but…

One of the most consequential inventions of modern times is the telescope. Almost immediately upon turning it to the skies, Galileo made discoveries that altered our perceptions of our place in the cosmos forever: features on the Moon, the rotation of the Sun, the composition of the Milky Way, the phases of Venus, and the four large moons of…

The implementation of context-based chemistry programs has been started before 40 years ago since 1980s in an attempt to make the learning of chemistry more meaningful for students. Consequent to its lengthy, there has been a steady increase in the number of interventional context-based (ICB) approach chemistry studies investigating the effect of…

Science education reform efforts have emphasized the incorporation of more authentic and meaningful scientific practices into formal learning environments. With this focus on practices, such as scientific modeling, a powerful tool for sense-making and reasoning, comes a need to observe and understand if and how it is actually occurring,…

The feelings of difficulty and familiarity (FOD and FOF) are two types of metacognitive experiences. Both may influence student engagement and the application of metacognitive strategies, but these relationships are not well understood, in part because many studies have relied on self-report measures of behaviors that may not accurately reflect…

Many studies have characterized students' difficulties in understanding and reasoning about scientific mechanisms. Some of those studies have drawn implications on teaching mechanisms and how to guide students while reasoning mechanistically. In this theoretical article, I claim that one component that has not garnered much attention in the…

How might fourth graders address the problem of measuring the size of a leaf? And why might their classroom teachers choose such a shape to measure? One group of fourth-grade students in an urban Australian school were interested in knowing the sizes of leaves on a passionfruit vine growing at their school. The children were excited after a visit…

This study aims to reveal the effectiveness of the use of an augmented reality-assisted physics e-module based on the local wisdom of the pedicab in improving mathematical communication and critical thinking abilities. The study used the 4D model. Empirical trials were conducted involving 255 grade XII students. The effectiveness test was…

In group activities, students work collaboratively to accomplish specific objectives. Students have to engage and interact with each other in order to complete collaborative assignments. One way that students stay engaged is through asking questions. In the research reported here, we looked at peer-to-peer questions in the context of a…

Circus art excites amazes and delights. Most of circus genres are based on the principles of classical physics. Dialogic discussions are known as an instrument to identify conceptual barriers (misconceptions) and facilitate their further revision. The present study integrates the three worlds: physics education, dialogic teaching and circus art;…

Cell division is one of the most relevant processes in Biology, for instance, to understand the reproduction of species or the development of tumours. Learning this content requires not addressing it out of context but integrating it into real-life problems that demand students apply their knowledge about cell division. In this study, the authors…