Demonstrating knowledge of major concepts and critical thinking are common learning outcomes for general education courses, especially in the sciences. Although numerous valid and reliable measures of conceptual understanding exist, the determination of critical thinking level is often more difficult, subjective, and domain-specific. This study…

Is it possible to teach biology without mentioning evolution? The answer is yes, but it is not possible for students to understand biology without the evolutionary context on which the meaning and intellectual value of biological concepts depend. Meaningful learning of evolution requires (1) that the students incorporate new knowledge into a…

Many students have very robust misconceptions about natural selection, stemming from intuitive theories that form a child's earliest understandings of the natural world. For example, students often imagine that species evolve in response to environmental pressures that cause a need for change and that all individuals in the population…

An overview of the relationship between educational research and teaching chemistry is presented, covering the opportunity areas between production and science popularization (dissemination of scientific knowledge). Knowledge apprehension and appropriation are also discussed in the educational context of UNAM, in Facultad de Estudios Superiores…

Developing students' creative problem solving skills should be one of the top goals in general education. One teaching model that was developed to increase students' creative problem solving abilities is the Real Engagement in Active Problem Solving (REAPS) model. This model was used as an intervention in classrooms in many studies. However, the…

There is a significant concern about students' achievement in reading comprehension. The study examined the reliability, validity, and slope of curriculum based measures in a content specific area -- science. Participants included students in 6th grade science classes. The curriculum based measures (CBM) being used consisted of vocabulary-matching…

The purpose of this study is to implement an intervention designed to develop background knowledge and investigate its effects on science proficiency for students who are at risk for failure. Pretest scores for 130 students were analyzed to identify students with prior knowledge deficits that may put them at risk for failure. Of the 44 students…

While recent studies (Donohoo, Hattie, & Eells, 2018; Hattie, 2017) have discovered that teacher collective efficacy is prominent on students' academic success, earlier research (Blackwell, Trzesniewski, & Dweck, 2007; Chan, 2012; Chen, 2014; Dweck, 2006; Ricci, 2013) has pointed to mindset as having the largest effect in elementary and…

Few studies have examined how professional learning communities (PLCs) engage in collaborative inquiry over multiple years. This dissertation describes how a PLC with high school science teachers, district-based coaches, and university researchers conducted collective inquiries over five years to improve science instruction. The PLC was situated…

Scientific data visualizations are the products, and increasingly a core practice, of modern computational science across all domains. With recent science education standards emphasizing student engagement in practices, these scientific visualizations will only increase in their availability and use for K-12 science instruction. But teacher…

Practical work may be assessed using many different forms of assessment, including coursework projects, practical exams and written questions in exams. In this article, the authors focus on the evaluation of one method for the assessment of practical science: written exam questions. Although individual syllabuses and curricula state the skills and…

Simulation educational technologies provide a convenient way to augment classroom learning in higher education. The University of Colorado Boulder has created many Physics Education Technology (PhET) computer simulations relevant to concepts in Sciences and Mathematics. There is a notable gap in the literature of simulation-based technologies,…

Concepts of molecular biology and genetics are difficult for many biology undergraduate students to master yet are crucial for deep understanding of how life works. By asking students to draw their ideas, we attempted to uncover the mental models about genes and gene expression held by biology students (n = 23) and experts (n = 18) using…

Complex global challenges and declining scientific literacy demand novel approaches to engaging students with science and the natural world. While evidence supports integrating creative and scientific modes of inquiry, these approaches are often separated in undergraduate education. We designed Ecology Through the Writer's Lens (ETWL) to allow…

The purpose of this study was to investigate gender differences in Omani 10th-grade students' perception of their science teachers' Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) in both realities and as they desired. Two versions of electronic questionnaires consisting of sixteen main items were designed to achieve the aims of this study. These two versions…