The concept of structure and function is a fundamental example of a crosscutting concept found in the educational reform documents in multiple STEM disciplines. However, the terms structure and function are words used in everyday language, and their use in various disciplines may be a source of lexical ambiguity for students. Discipline-specific…

In this chapter, eight foci relevant for science educators are presented and illustrated by paradigmatic examples and discussed in two parts. The first part "from science education to practice and authorities" discusses the four foci of: (1) developing concepts for instruction; (2) responding to the needs of schools; (3) connecting…

This article emerges from the experience of incorporating doctoral students into our Contextual Education (CXE) Program at Emmanuel College (Toronto). This change, I argue, helped us to distinguish more clearly among and thus distinctly orient the different kinds of relationships and theological practices that make up our program towards the…

An understanding of learning theories can help adult educators become more effective practitioners and meet the needs of the learners they serve. Adult educators who understand how individuals learn can be better prepared to use effective strategies during the learning process. This article addresses the use of concept maps as a strategy to engage…

The Larnaca Declaration on Learning Design arose from a 2012 meeting of experts in Larnaca, Cyprus who sought to provide a new theoretical foundation for the field of Learning Design, based on a synthesis of research and practice in the field to date. It begins by acknowledging the vast benefits that would arise from wider sharing of effective…

This column provides ideas and techniques to enhance your science teaching. This month's issue discusses planning and using interactive word walls to support science and reading instruction. Many classrooms have word walls displaying vocabulary that students have learned in class. Word walls serve as visual scaffolds to support instruction. To…

Inaugurated in 2013, this collective research programme aims to construct an international mapping of the history of education that accounts for recent developments in the field. Our goal is to create a current and retrospective assessment of the discipline's institutional grounding and of the knowledge produced by its practitioners,…

Many studies suggest that students have difficulties in learning acid-base concepts. This study presents some conflicts in the textbook descriptions of these concepts and proposes these to be the cause of the students' difficulties. This is especially true regarding the description of the relationship among the Arrhenius, Brønsted-Lowry, and Lewis…

In social justice education a tension sometimes emerges between the complex ideas we want participants to grapple with and the relatively straightforward activities we use to communicate those ideas. We adapt learning activities to meet participants' evolving needs and to communicate emerging theories and analyses, but sometimes adjusting an…

The purpose of this paper is to present a theoretical model to address design and assessment of accounting practice sets that will enhance learning and provide clearer learning outcomes for first year accounting students. The paper explores extant literature in developing an action plan that can be followed to maximise learning outcomes for first…

Librarians designed a biology tutorial not only to address an assignment, but also to make tutorials more accessible to students with various learning styles. The Science Librarian created the content by using aspects of the Information Literacy Standards for Science and Technology/Engineering, an informal survey of biology faculty, and…

Teacher networks are an important lever for helping schools make change. In order to take advantage of teacher networks, principals must map the existing networks in their schools, identifying teachers and others who serve as experts or advice givers, brokers, and advice seekers. Once these are known, principals can decide on a strategy for…

This essay contributes to the construction of a critically informed toolbox of diverse concepts for education policy analysis. Focusing on the context(s) of practice of the policy cycle, the article outlines an interpretative framework to grasp policy enactment across different localities, the influences bearing upon those enactments as well as…

The paper suggests that the idea of quality in higher education is ideologically constructed and conducted. In a spiral of mutual reinforcements, quality regimes naturalise experience, while the theories of that practice legitimise the naturalness of "quality". I shall suggest that quality regimes provide too narrow readings of higher education.…

The notion of the road map, advocated by Black, Wilson, and Yao (2011), and the associated minutiae of the construct map have several powerful features. At one level these notions assist the teacher to select and embody a suitable sequence of constructs within a specified curriculum. Whatever disparate sequenced pathways individual learners may…