Energy is a critical concept in physics problem-solving, but is often a major source of confusion for students if the presentation is not carefully crafted by the instructor or the textbook. In the first three articles in this series we discussed several issues related to the teaching of energy concepts. We have saved a major single issue for this…

A simple concise relativistic modification of the standard Bohr model for hydrogen-like atoms with circular orbits is presented. As the derivation requires basic knowledge of classical and relativistic mechanics, it can be taught in standard courses in modern physics and introductory quantum mechanics. In addition, it can be shown in a class that…

This study investigates the effect of cooperative learning (jigsaw) versus individual learning methods on students' understanding of chemical equilibrium in a first-year general chemistry course. This study was carried out in two different classes in the department of primary science education during the 2005-2006 academic year. One of the classes…

Skilled scientists in all fields of study are critically needed to begin resolving ecological problems resulting from human impact. Time is an essential element in creating a proper conceptual foundation and training should begin early in a student's education. As of 2010, the California State Standards for Science for grades six through eight do…

In his article "Scientists at Play in a Field of the Lord", David Long (2010) rightly challenges our presumptions of what science is and brings forth some of the disjunctures between science and deeply held American religious beliefs. Reading his narrative of the conflicts that he experienced on the opening day of the Creation Museum, I cannot…

Employment of a data-acquisition system for data collection and calculations makes experiments with antennas more convenient and less time consuming. The determined directional patterns of the dipole antennas of different lengths are in reasonable agreement with theory. The enhancement of the signal by using a reflector is demonstrated, and a…

We investigated the effect of the context-based approach on 9th grade students' conceptions of the Periodic Table. Within a nonequivalent pretest-posttest control group design the study was conducted with 80 grade 9 students (aged 15-16) drawn from two classes (39 and 41 students) in a high school in Turkey. The experimental group was exposed to…

There is, in Greece, an ongoing attempt to breach the boundaries established between the different teaching-learning subjects of compulsory education. In this context, we are interested in exploring to what degree the teaching and learning of ideas from the sciences' "internal life" (Hacking, in: Pickering (ed) "Science as practice…

This paper summarizes the findings from a K-6 professional development program that emphasized scientific inquiry and nature of science within the theme of scientific modeling. During the 2-week summer workshop and follow up school year workshops, the instruction modeled a 5-E learning cycle approach. Pre and posttesting measured teachers' views…

The use of toys in physics teaching is common. This brief review of the physics of toys intends to show that they are not only very useful in lectures and demonstrations in order to motivate students but also very interesting from a scientific point of view. However, since their physics is sometimes too cumbersome, the effect can be the opposite.…

A ball placed on the edge of a horizontal table is hit with a pendulum and thrown over the floor. The fall time is measured by recording the sounds produced by the collisions with the pendulum and the floor. If the height of the ball with respect to the floor is known, one can determine the acceleration of gravity.

Traditional curriculum for teaching bonding often fosters the use of over-simplifications and over-generalizations. Therefore, there is a need for a presentation that is consistent with current scientific knowledge and that provides the student with the proper intellectual infrastructure for further studies. In this article, we present a general…

This article describes an approach to teaching organic chemistry, which is to have students build their knowledge of organic chemistry upon a strong foundation of the fundamental concepts of the subject. Specifically, the article focuses upon a core set of concepts that I call "the six pillars of organic chemistry": electronegativity, polar…

Animations of the particulate level of matter are widely available for use in chemistry classes and are often the primary means of representing molecular behavior. These animations may also be viewed by individual students using textbook Web sites, although without reinforcement or feedback. It is not known to what extent the material in these…

In this paper, we present a multi-dimensional study concerning Heisenberg's "gamma ray microscope", a thought experiment, which is intimately connected with the historical development of quantum mechanics (QM), and also with the most disputed interpretations of quantum theory. In this study: (a) we investigate how philosophers of science read and…