Science education policies and standards have called for educators to teach students about the Nature of Science (NOS) and engage them in Culturally Relevant Science Teaching (CRST), which requires critical shifts away from traditional science teaching. As such, teachers are being asked to possess or take up conceptions of science that challenge…

There is an increasing focus across all educational sectors to ensure that learning objectives are aligned with learning activities and assessments. An attractive approach previously published is that of curriculum alignment projects. This paper discusses the use of the fun and famous "Elephant's Toothpaste" experiment as a customizable…

As worldwide energy shortages and environmental degradation increase, along with steady increases in population, current science and technology are confronted with many challenges to successfully sustain our society. Among the existing promising choices, photocatalysis has been widely considered as a potential solution to energy and environment…

The burgeoning knowledge of the human brain generated by the proliferation of new brain imaging technology from in recent decades has posed questions about the potential for this new knowledge of neural processing to be translated into "usable knowledge" that teachers can employ in their practical curriculum work. The application of the findings…

Describes general characteristics of enquiry - principle of enquiry, fact, problem, hypothesis, interpretation and outcome. These characteristics of enquiry give rise to five general characteristics of knowledge. (LS)

Describes a method for teaching advanced ecology to juniors and seniors at an independent high school. Uses questions as the primary organizational tool to organize the curriculum. Facilitates teaching science in a manner closer to how it is practiced by scientists and helps students understand and appreciate science itself. (SAH)

Urges science teachers and their students to gain an understanding of the nature of science. Describes this field as a blending of various aspects of the social studies of science such as the history, sociology, and philosophy of science. Contains 118 references. (DDR)

This paper reports on the evaluation of an 11-week curriculum created to foster seventh grade students' understanding of scientific modeling. In the curriculum, students engaged in model-oriented activities such as creating non-Newtonian computer microworlds to embody their conceptual models, evaluating their models with criteria, and reflecting…