This study aims to establish a viable structural model of prospective science teachers' nature of science (NOS) views, which could be used as an analytical tool for understanding the complex relationships between prospective teachers' conceptions of NOS and factors possibly affecting their conceptions. In order to construct such a model, likely…

There exists a general consensus in the science education literature around the goal of enhancing learners' views of nature of science (NOS). An extensive body of research in the field has highlighted the effectiveness of explicit NOS instructional approaches in improving learners' NOS views. Emerging research has suggested that engaging learners…

Making chemistry both accessible and interesting to middle and high school students can be difficult. Convincing middle and high school teachers that they will learn something new and applicable from a professional development workshop in chemistry can be equally challenging. This paper describes the use of material science as a means to enhance…

Scholarship that addresses teaching and learning about evolution has rapidly increased in recent years. This review of that scholarship first addresses the philosophical/epistemological issues that impinge on teaching and learning about evolution, including the proper philosophical goals of evolution instruction; the correlational and possibly…

Wenger's (1998) concepts "community of practice," "brokering," and "transfer" explain the challenges co-operative (co-op) education students face in relating the knowledge learned in school with what they learn while participating as members of a workplace. The research for this paper is set within the contexts of the knowledge economy and…

One means of preventing the top of a pond from freezing involves running a circulating pump near the bottom to agitate the surface and expose it to air throughout the winter months. This phenomenon is similar to that of the flowing of streams in subzero temperatures and to the running of taps to prevent pipe bursts in winter. All of these cases…

We've all seen (in movies, newscasts, or perhaps in person) the violent effect of the downwash that occurs when a helicopter hovers over the ground. Leaves, grass, and debris are dramatically blown about. We've also sat in front of circulating room fans and felt a large draft, whereas there seems to be very little air movement behind the fan. The…

In a recent article, Iain MacInnes analyzed the static equilibrium of a system consisting of a wine bottle and a wine butler. After discussing that composite system, students can be asked to consider only the bottle (and its contents) as the system. An interesting challenge for them is to describe the forces on the bottle in static equilibrium.

As an astronomy instructor, I am always looking for commonly observed Earthly experiences to help my students and me understand and appreciate similar occurrences elsewhere in the solar system. Recently I wrote a short TPT article on frost. This paper is on the related phenomena of precipitation. Precipitation, so common on most of the Earth's…

One of the rewards of walking up the scores of steps winding around the inside of the shaft of a lighthouse is turning inward and examining the glass optical system. This arrangement of prisms, lenses, and reflectors is used to project the light from a relatively small source in a beam that can be seen far at sea.

The underlying assumption to this paper is that learners' ability to appreciate the relevance of school science and its importance to socio-economic development of their communities to a large extent depends on the quality of instruction they receive from their teachers. A popular conundrum is that no country is greater than the calibre of its…

Children's mental representations about physical concepts and phenomena play a vital role in the learning process. This is confirmed by the data derived from relevant researches which demonstrate that the students formulate incompatible ideas compared with the scientific ones. In this research we investigate the representations of 14-15 years old…

There has been much attention about improving the skills and abilities of students in Science. One critical factor is the quality of teacher education programs for preparing science teachers. There has been little research and much debate about what constitutes an effective science teacher education program. Teacher beliefs are thought to be…

Secondary school chemistry teachers' understanding of chemical equilibrium was investigated through interviews using the think-aloud technique. The interviews were conducted with twelve volunteer chemistry teachers in Hong Kong. Their teaching experience ranged from 3 to 18 years. They were asked to predict what would happen to the equilibrium…

An original study about beliefs, conceptions and discourse analyses of organic chemistry teachers is presented. We used Likert questionnaires and discourse analysis to examine conceptions of the nature of science, learning and teaching at university level. A case study of four female teachers with varying experience and teacher training was…