A perennial goal of science educators is to develop functional scientific literacy in their students, especially those who will not become professional scientists. This article provides an example of implementing a socioscientific issues approach in an undergraduate environmental science course that enables students to develop the knowledge,…

Student-centered learning broadly encompasses teaching approaches that shift the focus of instruction from teacher to student by placing an emphasis on what as well as how students want to learn. This approach allows students to become active participants in their own learning and has been shown to increase learning, autonomy, and…

Many teacher educator preparation programs do not provide opportunities for preservice teachers (PSTs) to experience and examine the use of popular fiction as a connection point to science teaching. This study explores a unit designed to support PSTs in learning and applying core concepts and processes of literacy and science by leveraging a…

There are multiple ways to put science into a case. This column provides original articles on innovations in case study teaching, assessment of the method, as well as case studies with teaching notes. This month's issue discusses different ways of presenting science in case studies.

This article aims to explore the experiences of science instructors who are active participants in the design and enactment of an interdisciplinary science course with student-centered pedagogy in a large-enrollment class. The data were collected through interviews with instructors and analyzed using the inductive thematic approach. Results show…

This paper highlights the design process and implementation for an "all majors" undergraduate course that allows students a chance to reconnect with the natural world. During this course students explore a wide range of biological and physical science based topics that seek to highlight human intervention and our impacts on the planet.…

In recent years, video-based lectures have been increasingly used in education as part of flipped classroom approaches, adult education, distance learning, and other applications. Though approaches in video-based lectures have been widely studied, less has been reported in the development of approaches to teach relevant technical skills, such as…

This column provides original articles on innovations in case study teaching, assessment of the method, as well as case studies with teaching notes. This hybrid case has three overarching and interrelated goals. First, it can be used to familiarize students with a range of ecological concepts and terms. Second, it is intended to engage students in…

Improving students' understanding of how science works requires explicit instruction. Here, we test the efficacy of a module based on two previously published activities (the "Cube Puzzle" and the case study "Asteroids and Dinosaurs") that teach how science works to college science majors. Students also use the How Science…

The "Next Generation Science Standards" explicitly endorse argumentation as essential practices for K-12 science classrooms because it can concurrently engage the learners in the coordination of conceptual, epistemic, and social goals. It is important to develop students' capacities to interpret information and data to reasonable…

The Framework for K-12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) underscore the importance of including engineering design process (EDP) within the science curriculum. The Framework and the NGSS raised engineering design to the level of scientific inquiry in an attempt to prepare a STEM-literate workforce for the 21st…

This column shares reflections or thoughtful opinions on issues of broad interest to the community. This article encourages teachers to use emerging scientific evidence to change classroom culture--accept the evidence from neuroscience and find ways to make classrooms less stressful and more successful.

This column provides original articles on innovations in case study teaching, assessment of the method, as well as case studies with teaching notes. The author shares the strategies and tools that teachers can use to manage a case study classroom effectively.

In experimenting with ways of structuring the assignment and providing guidance to students, the author developed a series of tools that may be of interest to instructors wishing to implement a case-writing assignment in their course. This assignment is more suited for instructors experienced in case writing, as their knowledge of how to design a…

Critical thinking skills are sought after in the workforce and are often included in course, departmental, and programmatic learning objectives. However, in the curriculum of many courses we tend to focus on content rather than on fostering the growth of the cognitive skills needed to improve critical thinking ability. Further, skills are…