Raising citizens' awareness of the importance of microbiology in everyday life is crucial, especially considering the recent societal challenges such as emerging diseases or antibiotic resistance. Integrating this awareness into secondary education is essential, yet teaching microbiology requires alignment with national curricula. To evaluate how…

The modern day is known as the "post-truth" era, characterized by the widespread dissemination of false information, as well as personal opinions and emotions taking precedence over established facts in public decision-making. For students, as future democratically engaged citizens, to make well-informed science-based decisions on…

For decades, two critical challenges have plagued school science in the years it is compulsory for students in many educational contexts across the globe: how best to identify what science is meaningful for all students to learn during their formal school science education, and how to keep these students engaged in the learning of this science.…

In this forum paper, I grapple with critical questions about our understanding of science as a discipline and the education standards formulated within that framing. My exploration is contextualized in our current socio-political climate and is presented in discourse with Charity Winburn's "Meeting the needs of the individual student in the…

The purpose of this study is to examine how and in what ways the dimensions of the nature of science are included in the 6th, 7th, and 8th grade science textbooks taught between 1926 and 2018 and to determine how these dimensions are represented in textbooks based on curricula shifts. In this study, a total of 24 textbooks allowed by the Ministry…

It has become increasingly important for microbiology educators to help students learn critical concepts of the discipline. This is particularly true in virology, where current challenges include increasing rates of vaccine hesitancy, misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic, and controversy surrounding research on pathogens with pandemic…

Departmental-level curricular redesign is a vital issue in higher education, especially as departments work to move toward more student-centered teaching and learning environments. However, there is a lack of guidance on the steps to take or potential solutions to challenges faced by faculty and departments undergoing the curricular redesign…

Scientific literacy is still being identified and recognised as one of the main goals of science education. However, this concept has multiple interpretations and its definition changes continuously depending on its social, cultural, and political contexts. In this paper, scientific literacy is conceptualised through "visions I, II and…

The aim of this study is to define epigenetic literacy and describe how it can be included in school biology. Epigenetics is a new field of research in biology with abundant societal consequences and conceptual implications on how genetics is understood. Epigenetics explains how genes are regulated, thereby clarifying cell differentiation, and…

Some researchers have questioned whether there is a causal connection between Advanced Placement (AP) STEM coursetaking and the choice of a STEM college major and a STEM occupation. Their research findings strongly suggest that if prior interest in STEM as well as other possible confounders are taken into account, the relationships of taking AP…

This research reports on implementing the integrated laboratory work to achieve effective learning in the biochemistry course. The integrated laboratory work includes three stages: pre-laboratory, lab work, and post-laboratory. In other words, the three stages include planning, implementing, and evaluating investigation activities in the…

There is growing recognition in the education community that the problem-solving practices that comprise computational thinking (CT) are a fundamental component of both life and work in the twenty-first century. Historically, opportunities to learn CT have been confined to computer science (CS) and elective courses that lack racial, ethnic, and…

Clinical anatomy education is meant to prepare students for caring for the living, often by working with the dead. By their nature many clinical anatomy education programs privilege topographical form over the donor's humanity. This inbalance between the living and the dead generates tensions between the tangible and the spiritual insofar as…

Background: Teaching and learning of nature of science (NOS) is an explicit goal in the core science curriculum in Norway. Yet there is little understanding of how the content of the current textbooks in certain educational pathways such as vocational training addresses NOS. Purpose: The aim of this study is to contribute to research on NOS in VET…

This study examines the role of Namibian secondary school science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) teachers' interest in STEM education and self-efficacy in implementing STEM education in science education curricula. Furthermore, it aimed to distinguish male and female Namibian teachers' interests and self-efficacy regarding STEM…