The National Curriculum for 14-16 year old students in England contains a mandatory element called "How science works". Included in this material is interpretation of data, collecting data from primary sources, using ICT tools, and developing an argument and drawing conclusions. What follows is an activity, based on magnetic braking,…

Noncovalent interactions and physicochemical properties of amino acids are important topics in biochemistry courses. Here, we present a computational laboratory where the capacity of each of the 20 amino acids to maintain different noncovalent interactions are used to investigate the stabilizing forces in a set of proteins coming from organisms…

We engage in a metalogue based on eight papers in this issue of "Cultural Studies of Science Education" that review the state of conceptual change research and its possible affect on the teaching and learning of science. Our discussion addresses three aspects of conceptual change research: theoretical, methodological, and practical, as we discuss…

The purpose of this study is to determine the alternative conceptions of elementary school pre-service science teachers regarding DNA and DNA technologies. The questions asked in the study related to subjects including the structure and role of DNA molecule, structure of genes, some genetic technologies, Genetically Modified Organism (GMO) plants,…

In order to fully understand student learning, we science teachers need to know the ideas that students bring into the classroom. Plus, good assessment calls for ongoing evaluation of students' progress and difficulties with learning on an everyday basis. Cartoons are one tool that has been used successfully as a means of assessing student…

In this paper we describe a diagnostic study to investigate students' understanding of two basic formulae in physics. Based on the findings of the study, we have developed a classroom activity focused on the interpretation of formulae. The activity was developed cooperatively by physics education researchers and high-school physics teachers and…

We present an experiment, well adapted for students of introductory optics courses, for the visualization of the impact of spherical aberration in the point spread function of imaging systems. The demonstrations are based on the analogy between the point-spread function of spherically aberrated systems, and the defocused patterns of 1D slit-like…

This paper revisits the demonstration of Lenz by dropping magnets down a non-magnetic tube. Recent publications are reviewed and ideas for undergraduate laboratory investigations are suggested. Finally, an example of matching theory to observation is presented. (Contains 4 tables, 5 figures and 3 footnotes.)

Using an easy-to-make cylindrical resonator, students can measure the speed of sound in a gas, u, with sufficiently high precision (by locating standing-wave Lissajous patterns on an oscilloscope) to observe real gas properties at one atmosphere and 300 K. For CO[subscript 2] and SF[subscript 6], u is found to be 268.83 and 135.25 m s[superscript…

This study aims to analyse university students' reasoning regarding two laws of electromagnetism: Gauss's law and Ampere's law. It has been supposed that the problems seen in understanding and applying both laws do not spring from students' misconceptions. Students habitually use reasoning known in the literature as 'common sense' methodology that…

Normal mode solutions for the perfectly flexible hanging cord problem have been known for over 200 years. More recently, theoretical results for a hanging cord with a point mass attached were presented. Here the theoretical results are tested experimentally using high-precision techniques which are accessible for use in an introductory laboratory.…

This article describes the "Physics and Theatre," a seminar developed by Rosa Alejandra Lukaszew. Lukaszew developed this seminar to merge students majoring in theatre and physics and let them find out what they have in common. Lukaszew's seminar aims to integrate these students' different viewpoints through discussions of the role of…

Consideration of the property of action is proposed to provide a more meaningful definition of efficient energy use and sustainable production in ecosystems. Action has physical dimensions similar to angular momentum, its magnitude varying with mass, spatial configuration and relative motion. In this article, the relationship of action to…

We examined gender differences in the association between body mass index (BMI) and psychological well-being. Regression analysis involving 3,251 adults indicated that gender moderated the BMI-psychological well-being link. In follow-up analyses, higher BMI predicted lower psychological well-being only among women. When participants were…

This study investigates the effect of cooperative learning (jigsaw) versus individual learning methods on students' understanding of chemical equilibrium in a first-year general chemistry course. This study was carried out in two different classes in the department of primary science education during the 2005-2006 academic year. One of the classes…