Reports on a process which allows active study of mutating the characteristics of a population of organisms. States that the program, written in C, should run on a MS/DOS system with 640K; CGA is required for graphics output. Describes implementation procedures and two examples using the program. (RT)

Deals with a fungus that plays an important role in the forests of Asia as a decomposer of recently dead trees and in agriculture as an important edible mushroom. Describes how to culture these mushrooms including materials, conditions, and troubleshooting. Gives ideas for classroom activities. (CW)

Describes the Oxford Certificate of Educational Achievement (OCEA) and the principles on which it is based. Discusses ways in which biology teachers can develop their confidence and proficiency in making assessments of process-based work. Stresses the advantages that a scheme such as OCEA can bring to a biology department. (Author/CW)

Contains a glossary designed to provide an accurate and consistent teaching terminology for genetics. Includes the adaptation of the glossary from a British genetics textbook, revising it for high school and undergraduate college use. (TW)

Encourages teachers to take advantage of the natural curiosity of young children in enhancing their interest in science. Describes four simple activities involving water, living and non-living things, air pollution, and food. (TW)

Examines the image production and management of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the Eastern and Western blocs during and immediately after the reactor accident in April 1986. (JK)

Studies the effect of intellectual development, degree of field independence, mental capacity, amount of prior genetics knowledge and amount of fluid intelligence on reading comprehension and/or genetics achievement of students enrolled in a nonmajor biology course. Concludes that developmental level was the most consistent predictor of…

Explores the issue of the consistency of use of students' conceptions across different tasks which probed understandings of aspects of pressure, heat, and biological evolution. Findings indicate that children have alternative frameworks for all investigated areas. (ML)

This study examined 12th-grade biology students' opinions and beliefs on the desirability of the use and/or development of various biotechnologies. Describes the development of and presents results from the three questionnaires employed in the study. Includes a listing of the 15 biotechnology topics investigated in the study. (ML)

Describes a technique which gives an automatic and accurate assessment of photosynthetic oxygen liberation with graphical results available immediately. This program takes readings from an oxygen electrode and a photocell simultaneously. The types of results and unique features of the technique are discussed. (ML)

Examination results from 1146 Jamaican high school students in single-sex and coeducational schools indicated students from coeducational schools had lower performance on all measures. A subsample provided more information on sex differences, performance in individual subjects, and students receiving grades of A or B. (DH)

Determined if junior high school students prefer to study plants or animals and if their preferences are related to variables of grade level and/or sex. Findings show that, overall, students prefer animal study over plant study. Other findings (such as girls having a greater interest in biological topics than boys) are discussed. (JN)

Reports on the development of a paper-pencil instrument which consists of five concrete experiences related to environmental concepts. Results indicate an acceptable level of validity. Results also show that the reasoning level of adolescents was well below the theoretical levels predicted for them by theory. (Author/JN)

Explains plausible strategies for introducing biotechnology into a science curricula through a microbiology course. Teaching strategies for large mixed-ability groups are presented. Concept maps, games, activities and materials references are included. (ML)

Investigated the consequences of teacher-student cognitive style (field dependence- FD and independence- FI) matches and mismatches on student achievement in biology. Results suggest that whereas FI students may be taught by and achieve equally well with either FI or FD teachers, FD students are more successfully taught by FI teachers. (JN)