We present an analysis of the new French curriculum on chemical changes describing the underlying models and highlighting their relations to the empirical level. The authors of the curriculum introduced a distinction between the chemical change of a chemical system and the chemical reactions that account for it. We specify the different roles of…

This study examines students' use of proportional reasoning in high school physics problem-solving in a West African school setting. An in-depth, constructivist, and interpretive case study was carried out with six physics students from a co-educational senior secondary school in Nigeria over a period of five months. The study aimed to elicit…

The present paper describes a four-year project involving the development of a new instrument, the "Attitudes to School Science and Science" instrument, and its use to collect baseline attitudinal data from 280 students aged 11, 14, and 16 years. A key feature of the instrument is that it collects both descriptive and explanatory data in…

A research study, mainly based on the notion of "scientific literacy" from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2003 assessment framework, was carried out obtaining data from the administration of an open written questionnaire with items covering three central scientific processes--"describing, explaining and…

Over 20 years of research into the use of cross-curricular drama in secondary science has indicated that this medium enables learning of affective, cognitive and procedural knowledge. To date, academic research has tended to frame successful drama pedagogy as resulting from a Drama-in-Education approach, incorporating extended role plays and…

The present paper reports on a study that examined whether practical work can be said to have affective outcomes, and if so in what sense. The term "affective" is used here to refer to the emotions, or feelings, engendered amongst pupils towards school science in general, or one of the sciences in particular. The study is based on 25 multi-site…

When most materials are heated they expand. This concept is usually demonstrated using some type of mechanical measurement of the linear expansion of a metal rod. We have developed an alternative laboratory method for measuring thermal expansion by using a Michelson interferometer. Using the method presented, interference, interferometry, and the…

Discussions are important classroom tools--and those that focus on science in society have the potential to interest and engage students. However, a conversation can quickly veer out of control if expectations are not clearly set by the teacher and if the discussion is not structured appropriately. This article describes the use of Socratic…

Science literacy for all students is an education goal in the United States, as well as in many other parts of the world. Habits of mind are the skills and attitudes that students need to develop in order to understand science as a way of thinking. In this standards-based era, habits of mind can be readily incorporated to teach multiple content…

Recently, senior-level physics students joined thousands of scientists from over 60 nations to examine a wide range of physical, biological, and social research topics as part of the International Polar Year (IPY). Through a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded research project, these students applied physics concepts to the study of Arctic…

Efficient glow-in-the-dark materials are usually difficult to synthesize and need complex experiments with long reaction times that are not appropriate for conventional lab teaching. Therefore, we describe a new experimental procedure that allows the production of one of the most efficient "glow-in-the-dark" materials (SrAl[subscript 2]O[subscript…

Although the scientific inadequacy of Le Chatelier's principle has long been documented in the literature, the principle is still treated as a central concept of chemical equilibrium by textbook writers and teachers in many countries. In the past, researchers' interest has focused on student misconceptions about chemical equilibrium and has…

Building on Shulruf, Hattie and Tumen (2008), this work examines the capacity of various National Certificate in Educational Achievement (NCEA)-derived models to predict first-year performance in Biological Sciences at a New Zealand university. We compared three models: (1) the "best-80" indicator as used by several New Zealand…

According to many documents, there is a strong need to renew science education. One way could be to work with SSI (socio-scientific issues). This paper reports on both students' and teachers' experiences and learning when working with socio-scientific issues in science education in secondary school (aged from 13 to 16). The approach is…

This study was conducted to explore the effectiveness of conceptual change oriented instruction over traditional instruction on students' understanding of acids and bases concept. Besides, effects of gender difference and science process skills on students' understanding of acids and bases were also investigated. Analysis of the results showed…