Teacher education needs to combine training in content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK). One important part of PCK in science education is knowledge about school science practical work to promote learning by scientific inquiry and about the nature of science. In Germany, practical seminars and lab sessions…

Course selection can be a daunting task, especially for first year students. Sub-optimal selection can lead to bad performance of students and increase the dropout rate. Given the availability of historic data about student performances, it is possible to aid students in the selection of appropriate courses. Here, we propose a method to compose a…

This article draws on European approaches to differentiation that do not entail fatalistic determinism. It describes two challenging initiatives in Denmark, where democratic learning and learning for democracy are enshrined in law. Other examples come from Germany, from the Bielefeld laboratory school and a sixth form college, where planning for…

Curricula authoring is a complex process, involving different actors and different kinds of knowledge. Learners aim at acquiring expertise about some topic of their own interest, and need to perceive that the curriculum they attend will lead them toward their goal; when this does not happen, they become demotivated. Learners are all different, not…

School segregation continues to be understood as legitimate in Germany. To explain why, we chart the development of the learning disability discourse and the special education profession, providing insights into the ongoing expansion of segregated special schooling. The discourse analysis of articles published between 1908 and 2004 in the special…

Surveys various forms of Individualized Instruction (II) at German universities, describes the development of an II program at the University of Koln, and reports the results of a project in which II was transferred to several other universities. (CS)

This paper describes the architecture and discusses implementation issues of a scalable Internet-based teaching and learning system (SKILL) being developed at the University of Essen (Germany). The primary objective of SKILL is to cope with the different knowledge levels and learning preferences of the students, providing them with a collaborative…