Over the past decades, genetics has remained a difficult topic in school science. This paper presents an interactive multimedia program, "BioLogica", used to teach Grade 10 (14- and 15-year-olds) Australian students about genetics. Over six weeks, the teacher used different representations in the teaching and engaged students in computer…

Many have called for reform of the science curriculum to incorporate the process of inquiry: this has been shown to improve student understanding of biological concepts. Laboratory activities provide excellent opportunities to incorporate inquiry in to the curriculum. This study used a modified version of the Laboratory Task Analysis Instrument…

The paper describes a national survey of biology teachers visiting Field Studies Council (FSC) centres in England and Wales. It provides data on levels of biology fieldwork at ages 11-16 (Years 7-11), and factors affecting A-level biology fieldwork provision at ages 16-19 (Years 12 and 13). The results are compared with similar data from geography…

In educational research, investigators in one field are often ignorant of similar research in other fields. Physics education in particular has undergone dramatic reforms in recent years, all based on insights gained from conducting educational research. Often, pedagogical methods resulting from research in one field can be revised and transferred…

The purpose of this study was to investigate 8th graders with different learning styles their motivation outcomes after implementing 10 weeks (40 hours) inquiry-based teaching. Two hundreds and fifty four 8th graders were involved in experimental group, this group of students experienced inquiry instruction. Two hundreds and thirty two 8th graders…

This study investigates conditions and factors that affect preservice teachers' decisions to use handheld computers in scientific investigations and explores aspects of student learning and classroom practices that would be affected by handheld-based science activities. A Handheld-Based Laboratory (HBL) was designed to model strategies for…

This paper reviews a series of formative assessment studies that were conducted to inform and evaluate a large-scale instructional software development project at the University of Missouri-Rolla (UMR). The three-year project, entitled "Taking the Next Step in Engineering Education: Integrating Educational Software and Active Learning,"…

The Nation is ill-equipped to meet the future demands for scientists to sustain scientific disciplines and the scientific literacy required in this technological era. In response to this state of affairs, reforms promote quality science for all but provide little guidance on how to achieve it. This study describes an approach that uses cultural…

Undergraduate biology curricula are being modified to model and teach the activities of scientists better. The assignment described here, one that investigates protein structure and function, was designed for use in a sophomore-level cell physiology course at Earlham College. Students work in small groups to read and present in poster format on…

In the first of two National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded workshops, 30 professors of biology and computer science from 18 institutions met at Wheaton College in Norton, Massachusetts, on June 6-7, 2002, to share ideas on how to incorporate genomics research into undergraduate curricula. The participants included nine pairs or trios of…

This article describes the outcome of an exercise carried out with one hundred undergraduate student teachers (preservice teachers) enrolled in a Biology Teaching Methods course, a third year course in a four-year Teacher Education Programme. The students, working in groups of three to four, were assigned to construct a concept map showing their…

Multimedia has the potential of providing bioscience education novel learning environments and pedagogy applications to foster student interest, involve students in the research process, advance critical thinking/problem-solving skills, and develop conceptual understanding of biological topics. "Cancer Cell Biology," an interactive, multimedia,…

The purpose of this study is to analyse science and mathematics lesson plans prepared in the light of drama based instruction by preservice elementary teachers. For this purpose, 12 female participants were chosen volunteerly. They gained basic knowledge and experience about creative drama by involving sample creative drama activities and lesson…

This article describes an extended collaboration between a development team and an evaluation team working with GenScope, an open-ended exploratory software tool. In some respects, this was a routine evaluation, documenting substantial gains (of roughly 1 SD) in genetics reasoning ability in all but 1 of 17 classes, despite challenges presented by…

A communicating science module was introduced into an advanced undergraduate physical chemistry laboratory course. The module was integrated into the course such that students received formal instruction in communicating science interwoven with the chemistry laboratory curriculum. The content of the communicating science module included three…