The science education literature documents the benefits of student engagement with scientific practices. Lab reports could be an opportunity for developing student reasoning, but often prioritize learning terminology and genre-specific writing. There is potential for instructors to give students feedback that helps them to engage with scientific…

This paper provides glimpses of transactions in chemistry classrooms in five African countries (Burundi, Ghana, Morocco, Nigeria, and Senegal) during the COVID-19 lockdown. Members of the secondary school community in the countries including teachers, students, and school managers were unprepared for the unprecedent demand in shift from a…

Information and communication technologies are an effective means of formation of the creative potential of future physics teachers, as with their science-based application in the educational process at the university they allow fully activating learning activities of students, and provide conditions for their creative self-realization in the…

An undergraduate practical exercise has been designed to provide hands-on, instrument-based experience of advanced characterization techniques. A research experience approach is taken, centered around the concept of solid-state polymorphism, which requires a detailed knowledge of molecular and crystal structure to be gained by advanced analytical…

An increase in online education is causing science educators to evaluate student cognitive understanding after completing virtual, computer-simulated laboratories. Online education has demonstrated comparable learning gains when analysed to those of the traditional classroom, but research is mixed when reviewing students' ability to manipulate…

This paper aims to enable schools to make their own low-cost temperature logging instrument and to learn something about its calibration in the process. This paper describes how a thermistor can be integrated into a simple potential divider circuit which is powered with the sound output of a computer and monitored by the microphone input. The…

Efforts to reform undergraduate chemistry laboratory coursework typically focus on the curricula of introductory-level courses, while upper-level courses are bypassed. This study used video-stimulated recall to interview 17 junior- and senior- level chemistry majors after they carried out an experiment as part of a laboratory course. It is assumed…

The author interviewed 10 graduate teaching assistants leading lab sessions for first-year biology about how they introduce students to scientific literature. Qualitative data analysis of the interview transcripts revealed that both first-year students and graduate teaching assistants (many of whom are first-year teachers) struggle with…

There has been an increasing movement towards the introduction of inquiry based learning in undergraduate physiology laboratories. Students can however find this challenging when there is a sudden transition from traditional didactic practicals to full inquiry based activities. One reason for this could be the students' perceptions about the…

The first Australian National University (ANU) Science Extension Day was held on September 8, 2015. The ANU Science Extension Day is a project that was initiated by Theodore Primary School (ACT) and developed by Theodore Primary, Calwell High School, Science Educators Association of the ACT (SEA*ACT), and the ANU. The project was developed with a…

Static friction is an important concept in introductory physics. Later in the year students apply their understanding of static friction under more complex conditions of static equilibrium. Traditional lab demonstrations in this case involve exceeding of the maximum level of static friction, resulting in the "onset of motion." (Contains…

The concept of wave-particle duality in quantum theory is difficult to grasp because it attributes particle-like properties to classical waves and wave-like properties to classical particles. There seems to be an inconsistency involved with the notion that particle-like or wave-like attributes depend on how you look at an entity. The concept comes…

Homologous recombination, a central concept in biology, is defined as the exchange of DNA strands between two similar or identical nucleotide sequences. Unfortunately, undergraduate students majoring in biotechnology often experience difficulties in understanding the molecular basis of homologous recombination. In this study, we developed and…

We describe a 3-hour session that provides students with the opportunity to review basic lab concepts and important techniques using real life scenarios. We began with two separate student-engaged discussions to remind/reinforce some basic concepts in physiology and review calculations with respect to chemical compounds. This was followed by…

We describe how a practical instructional development process helped a first-year assistant professor rapidly develop, implement, and assess the impact on her Analytical Chemistry course caused by three changes: (a) moving the lab into the same semester as the lecture, (b) developing a more collaborative classroom environment, and (c) increasing…