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The article examines the relation between traditional and paper-and-pencil formal operations tasks in the U.S. The aim of the study was to provide information based on high school students' performance on both the Tomlinson-Keasey and Campbell measure and a set of traditional, individually administered tasks. The subjects used were 27 children from 9th- and 10th grade. The results of the study indicates that Pearson correlations between the traditional formal operations tasks and their paper-and-pencil analogs were generally low and nonsignificant.

The article presents a response to the commentary made by Joseph S. Kracjik, Patricia E. Simmons, and Vincent N. Lunetta on the improvement of research on Computer Aided Instruction (CAI) in learning science, which criticizes the papers presented during the 1985 National Association for Research in Science Teaching convention at French Lick Springs, Indiana. The reaction paper will attempt to examine the validity of the criticisms made by Kracjik, Simmons, and Lunetta. The comment that personal interviews provide rich data sets on individuals are deemed correct, however, if the questions chosen by the researcher are addressed, why must the study collect data for other questions. The research involving CAI will need much analysis and further study to prevent naive research agenda.

The article presents a commentary on the improvement of research on Computer Aided Instruction (CAI) in learning science, which criticizes the papers presented during the 1985 National Association for Research in Science Teaching convention at French Lick Springs, Indiana. It has been observed that the conclusions in some of the papers were excessively broad given the limitations in experimental treatments, in the software, and in the criterion measures used. The study subsequently failed to show the differences in enhancement of logical thinking skills for the students who had been taught to program, when compared with students in a control group. CAI should enable science teachers and their students to perform activities that complement elements of traditional instruction.

This study reports on an innovative version of adaptive primary literature (APL) that we call Science Behind the Scenes used during a summer professional development (PD) program. Classroom teachers read and discussed papers from the primary literature, and created translations of these papers relevant to their own classroom needs. We randomly selected 31 teacher-created Science behind the Scenes products for evaluation with a rubric that was aligned with the K-12 Science Education Frameworks (2012). In addition, we interviewed groups of teachers at follow-up sessions and individual teachers who used the APL in their classrooms. We used frameworks for grounded theory to sort the interview text and descriptive statistical measures for quantitative data. Our analysis reveals two key findings: (i) the teachers created respectable adaptations of primary scientific literature into APL; and (ii) the teachers used the APL products in their classrooms to support the discourse of science and disciplinary literacy, and to create a bridge to the scientific enterprise. Our findings have implications for instructional design, curricular materials, professional development, and science education. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 53: 847-894, 2016 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on the effect of method and format on the responses of subjects to a Piagetian reasoning problem. Piagetian reasoning patterns are an important variable in research in science teaching, and inaccurate measurement of such reasoning patterns threatens both internal and external validity of studies in which reasoning level is a variable. Further, science teachers often wish to conduct reasoning assessments via the more efficient and practical group method and then draw conclusions regarding individuals within the groups. Thus, it is critical that the effects of method and format be empirically evaluated. Piagetian reasoning assessments, done by clinical or alternative methods, are most useful when several tasks pertaining to a specific reasoning pattern are used. Further, science teachers now seem to have a choice among several methods and formats. Those teachers who have videotape players can use that method, whereas others may decide to demonstrate the tasks or use only a paper-and-pencil method.

The article discusses paradigms in science education research. The prevailing paradigm for science education and research is the agricultural-scientific paradigm in the U.S. and Australia. Originally, this paradigm is applied in agricultural and scientific research. Another is the anthropological paradigm which views education from an anthropological perspective and uses approaches based on ethnography rather than psychometry. The author emphasizes that science teachers and philosophers should assist in judging whether problems selected by research teams are nontrivial.

Abstract: Inclusive STEM high schools (ISHSs) can be viewed as opportunity structures for students underrepresented in STEM. By opportunity structures, we mean an education that provides not only access to high quality STEM curriculum and instruction or “opportunity to learn,” but also the capacity to create learning environments where students can build STEM social capital and the dispositions, knowledge, skills, and networks to be successful in STEM college majors and careers. This is a cross‐case analysis of case studies that describe the design and implementation of eight “exemplar” ISHSs. Beginning with 10 hypothesized critical components, we found evidence for all 10, but present in unique patterns of prominence, depending on the school context. Further inductive analysis located an additional four emergent critical components that complete the picture of how these successful ISHSs were able to achieve their goals. Importantly, across schools, four components stood out as foundational: a flexible and autonomous administrative structure; a college‐preparatory, STEM‐focused curriculum for all; well‐prepared STEM teachers and professionalized teaching staffs; and supports for students in underrepresented groups. Although many of the critical components found in the ISHSs are also found in the school reform literature, these schools also had characteristics unique to STEM education. This paper is important in understanding STEM high schools as opportunity structures and as a school reform alternative that can help solve equity and social mobility gaps in STEM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent calls for reform in education recommend science curricula to be based on central ideas instead of a larger number of topics and for alignment between current scientific research and curricula. Because alignment is rarely studied, especially for central ideas, we developed a methodology to discover the extent of alignment between primary literature (a proxy for current research) and textbooks (a common curricular resource that often drives curriculum). We illustrated the use of this methodology by applying it to the discipline of animal behavior based on the central ideas identified by Tinbergen (1963, Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie 20:410-433): causation, ontogeny, survival value, and evolution. We utilized deductive content analysis (both manual and automated) to collect data on how often these four ideas are addressed in animal behavior journal articles and the four most commonly used textbooks in the United States, identified by syllabi collected via a stratified random sample of U.S. post-secondary institutions ( n = 99). We observed an overall alignment between primary literature and textbooks in the use of the four central ideas-which suggests that the authors of animal behavior textbooks are meeting the suggestions provided by recent calls for reform that curriculum portrays current research. This paper illustrates the use of a methodology for evaluating the extent to which central ideas employed in primary research within a discipline are reflected within curricular resources. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 9999:1097-1118, 2017 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research and reform efforts frequently identify evidence as an essential component of science classroom instruction to actively engage students in science practices. Despite this agreement on the primacy of evidence, there is a lack of consensus around what counts as 'evidence' in k-12 classrooms (e.g., ages 5-18): scholarship and standards in science education define evidence in a variety of ways including empirical data, analogy, personal experience, and scientific theories. We argue that this disagreement results in a wide range of classroom activities around evidence, including ones that recapitulate traditional science instruction focused on final form science and teachers as disseminators of information. In this paper, we develop design heuristics to inform the design of classroom learning environments that productively use scientific evidence for student sensemaking about the natural world by (i) selecting from the range of information a subset to use as scientific evidence; and (ii) designing classroom activities that support students collaboratively making sense of the natural world. In particular, we argue for three design heuristics that could potentially shift science classroom activities away from traditional 'problems of practice' to align more closely with the vision of science as a set of practices including: phenomena-based, transformable, and used dialogically. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 54:672-689, 2017 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses about Bergamo Conference and provides information about events that happened during the current year's conference in the U.S. The Bergamo Conference, which is organized each year by the editors of "JCT: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Curriculum Studies," promotes critical discourse in curriculum theory and practice. The event includes presentation of research papers that are often playful and metaphorical rather than literally descriptive of the papers' contents.

The article comments on a paper by R. T. White about the nine-step process for developing a validated learning hierarchy for any given intellectual skill. He points out the that White's paper is implying a suggestion that such process should be used by professional curriculum developers in designing classroom instructional programs in science education. He argues that the author's opinion in his article does not vitiate the fact that the learning hierarchy model is a potentially efficient and easy to apply strategy for developing relatively effective instructional sequences, if it is viewed for a development strategy of working.

The article assess the inquiry skills and inquisitive abilities of child. Significantly, educational goals can be divided into four areas: knowledge, cognitive skill, attitudes, and psychomotor skills. Furthermore, such outcomes are measured using paper and pencil tests, and consequently only outcomes which can be described as knowledge have been measured. Moreover, test literature is practically void of tests which are not paper and pencil tests, which measure the science processes purportedly developed in children as a result of experiencing the newer science curricula.

This article presents a response to researcher W. Holliday for his comments on the paper by the authors related to teaching programs for children. The purpose of the Project 2061 curriculum analysis procedure is to examine how well curriculum materials are likely to support the teaching and learning of important science ideas and skills when measured against specific research-based criteria. Although questions such as whether teachers like their textbooks and what influences their selection of texts may be worth asking, these questions were not part of the study reported by the authors. Instead, the authors say they were interested in different questions: that is, whether the textbooks' content actually focuses on a coherent set of important, age-appropriate science learning goals, and what the quality is of instructional support these learning goals receive in the textbooks. Project 2061's curriculum materials analysis procedure takes a learning goal-based approach by first determining how consistent the content in the curriculum material is with each specific learning goal that serves as the basis of the analysis.

The article presents a study that examines the new instrument "Processes of Biological Investigations (PBIT)" to measure the outcome of various treatments and to improve the learning of science process skills. The goal of this study is to develop and validate an easily administered, reliable, paper-and-pencil test for high school biology students that would measure the science process skills of interest. In this study, the PBIT was developed using examples taken from biology to measure skill achievement. The results show that the PBIT appears to be a valid and reliable instrument to be used in the biology classroom by teachers and researchers interested in determining the effectiveness of inquiry instruction.

This article evaluates the instruction of science education in the U.S. Twenty–four second grade students were randomly selected from each of two second–grade classrooms in a large rural school district. The content domain for the program was established by two researchers who analyzed the program script and the actual program. Comparisons of the pretest and posttest interviews revealed a different picture of the impact of the instruction. The results of the clinical interview indicated that the tenets of the instructional design, the actual instruction, and the expenditure of resources for additional similar instruction were warranted.

The article presents a study which investigates the nature of food webs as an important topic in recent biology curricula. It was stated that the relationships represented in a food web are rule-like so it is possible to construct a learning hierarchy. The paper is concerned with the development and validation of a learning hierarchy relating to the concept of food web. It also considers the use of the learning hierarchy model as a tool to aid identification of students' misconceptions in science. Particular misconceptions relating to the concept of food web are reported.

The article discusses the need to teach the processes of science as a part of school curriculum with reference to a paper presented on the same issue by Robert Gagne, a scholar, to the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Although many science educators have written about science processes, the view established by Gagne has been the most influential. Gagne argues that students must be able to make inductive inferences and to judge when those inferences are valid. These caps abilities are dependent upon students having learned a great deal of conceptual knowledge, including broad generalizable principles and the constituent concepts of those principles. The conceptual knowledge of researchers determines what constitutes a problem for a discipline, what hypotheses will be entertained, what experiments will be conducted, what data will be sought, how observations will be organized and classified, and, to a great extent, what perceptions the observer will select as relevant facts. This view of science as conceptually driven is consistent with the logical empiricist view of science as hypothetical deductive rather than inductive.

The article presents a study which compares urban children with the suburban ones, testing them with various tasks on basic skills of primary learning particularly on science education. The null hypothesis of the study states that there is no difference between the children from low-income urban families and those from higher-income suburban families. An investigation of the effect of the Science Curriculum Improvement Study program on children of low-income urban families has been initiated. The program is proposed to help urban children attain the same capacity to learn as the children from higher-income suburban homes.

The article presents a paper which was read at the Conference on Science Instruction in Elementary and Junior High Schools in the U.S. with a focus on a psychologist's counsel on curriculum design. It was speculated that there is no other discipline has been so profoundly concerned with its own basic philosophy or scientific rationale as has psychology. There was found to be a deficiency with psychologists who are educators, particularly in the college level. The accomplishment by means of the science curriculum is a change in behavior of human individuals, and this is the technical content of the discipline of psychology.

The article explores the issues detected during the illustration of the potential of the history and philosophy of science. One issue is with regards to the use of the philosophical terminology "enquiry." The ambiguity arises when enquiry has been used in the psychological sense and at the same time in the epistemological sense. The second issue deals with the appropriate philosophic position. It is suggested that the selection of philosophic statements should be made in a manner appropriate to creating a fruitful mix of the many factors underlying the determination of curricula and curricular methodology.

The article comments on a paper by Glen S. Aikenhead which proposes a procedure to facilitate curriculum evaluation. The author points out that Aikenhead's test development strategy will lead to tests that provide general information about the areas where students progressed during the school year. Aikenhead's test development method is not sensitive to the changes in curriculum materials and methods which influence the skills learned by the students. Aikenhead comments that they have different basic assumptions with the author regarding on curriculum evaluation.

The author reflects on cognitive consequences of technology for science education as discussed at the meeting of the National Science Teachers Association in the U.S. The speakers inspired attendees to expand their views to the potential used of technology in science teaching. On the other hand, the author evaluates the computer-generated information from experiments involving the use of technology to teach science courses. Moreover, the advances in learning and instruction in terms of technological advances is discussed.

This article discusses a study on transversal traits in science education research relevant for teaching and research. Global practical relevance, curriculum design and formative situation are concepts central to the study. The researchers analyzed studies published from 2000 to 2001 in three journals and used a replicable methodology developed specifically for the study. They found evidence of s clusters of variables that suggest the existence of transversal traits. They concluded that the results form a reference framework of theoretical and practical knowledge relevant for research and practice pertaining to teaching and learning science.

The article looks into the abilities of students to perform science inquiries using hands-on performance assessments. The study involved 1,000 fifth grade students from 41 classrooms in nine U.S. school districts. The study showed that there was only a minimal curricular effect or none at all. A standard multiple-choice measurement revealed that there was a strong dependence on students' cognitive ability. The study also found that there was no significant difference between fifth graders in hands-on and text-based classes on three of four investigative tasks. However, there was a significant difference favoring hands-on students in one activity. On the said activity, hands-on students performed 11 percent better than text students.

The article presents a study that examines the effects of instruction on college nonmajors' conceptions of respiration and photosynthesis. Students in a college nonscience majors' biology course took tests designed to reveal their conceptions of respiration and photosynthesis before and after course instruction. Results show that course instruction did improve student's understanding, but misconceptions persisted for many students. This result raise fundamental questions about the effectiveness of curriculum and instruction in current high school and college biology courses.

The article presents a study on the different preconceptions of students about studies in science. Student opinions in science varies in subject areas and is contributed to the presentation of explanatory models recommended for teaching strategies. Descriptive studies aims to illustrate the student's preconceptions. The explanatory studies explains the conceptual stability of the study while the study that foster conceptual change aims to tests the explanations of the research. Areas in descriptive research should cater on the student's response on the final propositional knowledge that described the student's preconceptions.

The article presents a study on the parameters of a science professor who provides information concerning his analysis on scientific observation which points human senses as secondary to instrumentation. His research was being supported through his illustration using the elementary curricula as well as the secondary syllabuses. Furthermore, the article has been critical on the arguments of the professor about Cognitive Psychology and the science philosophy in which he employed as his perspective. Thus, the author states that the professor's criticism against some curriculum activities implemented in classroom instruction are examined.

The article investigates the results of grade placement of biology in the high school curriculum in science education in the U.S. This article speculates that the conflicting results or earlier investigations were due to the fact that the subjects were specially selected. This study indicates that schools can effectively offer biology in the ninth grade. In addition, this paper points out that it was advantageous for students because it will allow them to take more courses of their own choosing.

The article presents a research that evaluated science interest and attitudes of students subsequent to the study of chemistry at the Ordinary Level of the English General Certificate of Education. The paper also focused on the dependence of the affective behavior of students on academic achievement. The differential effects of curricular approaches including the Nuffield chemistry program and the non-Nuffield study schemes were evaluated. Attitude traits directly affected by curricular influences proved that the non-Nuffield chemistry course elicit positive science interest traits. Furthermore, the study showed that science interest and attitude profiles diverge with academic attainment. Factual information is consequently vital as it affects the morale and attitude of students.

The article presents a study which examines the performance of students who are taking up the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study in the U.S. The curriculum was established in 1959 for the purpose of upgrading the teaching methods in biology and enhances the student's understanding of the theories and its application for practical purposes. The actual examination performances in the laboratory revealed significant information regarding the technical skills and problem solving abilities of the students. Some students revealed high standards of work.

The article focuses on the evaluation of the conceptual schemes approach to science curriculum development. The evaluation of the validity of conceptual schemes approach lies more within the competence of a philosopher of science, although some psychological considerations are pertinent to the consideration of the validity of such approach to the development of a science curriculum. In this manner, considerable sophistication in a wide variety of sciences and in the history of science is required before one can understand or formulate its philosophy. As explicitly specified, conceptual schemes are not thought of as topics for individual units or courses, however, their curriculum derivatives must be of such a general nature as to be philosophical rather than substantive in character.

Students' difficulties in interpreting what counts as knowledge have been addressed in past research on science education. The implementation of progressivist pedagogy in terms of more student‐active classroom practice and the introduction of a variety of discourses into the science classroom deepens students' difficulties. The integration of different forms and demands of knowledge and discourses typified by Science‐in‐Context initiatives, such as within the socioscientific framework, exemplifies this development in science education. Here, the diffuse boundaries between school subjects and other silos of knowledge lead to considerable difficulties for students to interpret what is expected from them. Such contexts having diffuse boundaries between, for example, subject discourses and other forms of knowledge, have been describes as contexts with weak classification. The present study aims to explore students' interpretation of what knowledge or meaning they are requested to produce in contexts with weak classification, here exemplified within an SSI‐task. We use Bernstein's concepts of recognition rules and classification to analyze how 15‐ to 16‐year‐old students develop their discussions in groups of 4–6 students. This study reports how students' recognition of the educational demands enabled integration of different discourses in their discussion, and that the use of both universalistic and particularistic meanings can produce new understandings. Students who had not acquired recognition rules were found to keep discourses apart, expressed either as rejection of the relevance of the task, answering questions as in a traditional school task, or just exchange of personal opinions. Furthermore, they included discourses irrelevant to the issue. An important outcome of the study was that socioscientific thinking was hampered when students kept universalistic and particularistic meanings apart. This hampering results from the inhibition of dynamic exploration during SSI discussions. The results provide new insights with relevance for teachers' guiding students toward a fruitful SSI‐discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines factors influencing elementary science teacher learning as they participate in professional development with and enactment of educative curricula in comparison with learning following limited professional development and enactment of traditional curricula. Using a randomized cluster design (125 teachers and 2,694 students in 4th—5th grades) that met the What Works Clearinghouse standards without reservations, teacher learning was conceptualized using four outcomes. Data were analyzed using standard single‐level multiple regression models and possible mediation models for the teacher outcomes were considered using piecewise multiple regression and path analytic approaches. Treatment group teachers experienced greater increases in content knowledge, views of science inquiry, beliefs about reform‐based teaching, and teaching self‐efficacy than comparison group teachers. The findings indicate that what teachers learn from the combination of professional development and teaching with educative curriculum varies according to what their knowledge and beliefs are on entering the experience. Surprisingly, high entry‐level self‐efficacy was associated not only with lower learning gains for the teachers, but also for their students. Finally, teachers' space science learning and that of their students are implicated as mediators of the positive effect of the professional development and educative curriculum enactment on teacher beliefs about reform science teaching. This work refines and extends a theoretical framework of teachers' participatory relationship with curricula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This article presents the findings of an ethnographic interview study that examined the ways students experienced a justice‐centered AP chemistry course at an urban neighborhood high school. Justice‐centered science pedagogy is an approach to teaching science that treats inequity in science education as one component of larger systems of oppression. The analysis of interview transcripts, which included pattern matching and coding, revealed variation in the ways students' viewed the relevance of the curriculum, the goals of science education, and science itself. These results underscore the importance of researchers and teachers taking seriously students' ideas about the means and ends of their own science education. Three standpoints with respect to science curriculum are proposed to explain the variations in students' perspectives and suggest implications for science educators. These standpoints trouble recent research that examines motivation in high school science classes and add nuance to research that investigates relationships between science learning and social agency by reframing these problems in terms of curriculum and issues of oppression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an inquiry-based, aquatic science professional development (PD) for upper-elementary, middle, and high school teachers and examine changes in student outcomes in light of participating teachers' characteristics and the grade band of the students. Our study lends support to the assertion that inquiry- and content-focused PD, paired with classroom implementation, can effectively improve student learning. Our findings indicate that students improved in their nature of science (NOS) and aquatic science content knowledge and that these changes depended in some ways on the participating teachers' characteristics and adherence to the program. The students' improvements were amplified when their teachers adhered more closely to the PD activities during their classroom implementation. The teachers' previous science PD experience and pre-PD understanding of inquiry-based teaching also explained some of the variability in student growth. In both NOS and content, students of teachers with less prior science-PD experience benefited more. Grade band also explained variation in student outcomes through interactions with teacher-characteristic variables. In high school, students of teachers with lower pre-PD inquiry knowledge appeared to learn more about NOS. Our results suggest that inquiry and content training through PD may minimize disparities in teaching due to inexperience and lack of expertise. Our study also demonstrates the value of PD that teaches a flexible approach to inquiry and focuses on underrepresented, interdisciplinary content areas, like aquatic science. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 54:1219-1245, 2017 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This mixed-methods research investigated teachers' perceptions of intrinsic factors (personal attributes of the teacher) and extrinsic factors (environmental) influencing the implementation of inquiry-based science learning at township (underdeveloped urban area) high schools in South Africa. Quantitative data were collected by means of an adapted version of the Science Curriculum Implementation Questionnaire (SCIQ) (Lewthwaite, 2001). The adapted version was renamed the Scientific Inquiry Implementation Questionnaire (SIIQ) and was administered to 186 science teachers at township schools in South Africa. The teachers at a township school were then interviewed in order to solicit in-depth information on the findings that emerged from the questionnaire analysis. The findings highlight a lack of professional science knowledge (content knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, knowledge of students, educational contexts, curricular knowledge, and educational purposes) that contributes toward teachers' uncertainty in inquiry-based teaching. Also, extrinsic factors such as school ethos, professional support, resource adequacy, and time serve as significant constraints in the implementation of inquiry-based education at the school. The data collected from SIIQ provides a foundation for understanding at a high school level how factors influence the delivery of a curriculum underpinned by inquiry. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 53: 598-619, 2016 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study was to identify evidence in student work of teachers' uptake of educative features in educative curriculum materials. These are features in curriculum materials designed with the specific intent of supporting teacher learning and enactment. This study was prompted by previous work on educative curriculum materials and the need to determine howteachers' use of educative curriculum materials can influence student learning. Student work from two fourth-grade teachers' enactment of an electric circuits unit was analyzed for evidence of teachers' uptake of educative features, which included characteristics of quality for particular science practices. Findings from the student work revealed that the teachers used many of the supports in the educative curriculum materials, especially those that could be used directly with students. The student work also reflected characteristics of high-quality science practices, which were only supported within the educative features. This study supports and extends other work related to how teachers' use of educative curriculum materials may influence student learning and has implications for supporting teachers' productive engagement in teaching that supports the integration of science content and scientific practices, as emphasized in current reform efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If we truly wish to promote science or STEM education, then it would seem that the joining of resources and expertise from the communities of formal schooling and informal science education institutions or ISEIs (museums, aquariums, and the like) would be an important early step. Yet creating such connections between teacher and museum remain a challenge for both teachers and informal educators. This study employs a communities of practice lens (Wenger, 1998) to provide a deeper explanation for the challenges inherent in those programs and experiences (field trips, outreach programs, teacher professional development) where schools and informal science institutions interact to create unique learning opportunities. To better understand the expectations and perceived challenges of these boundary activities, questionnaires, focus groups and interviews were used to gather information from over 200 teachers and informal science institution staff in southern California. Several factors, identified by both groups, were found to influence these shared experiences, including issues of authority, capacity, communication, and complexity. By considering both educators' perspectives, we gain a clearer understanding of the practice of these communities and how such practices influence the activities at these boundaries. Furthermore, a closer look at avid users-those teachers who do successfully and regularly make use of ISEIs-reveals possible avenues for strengthening such boundary activities and potentially creating a more effective merging of learning and teaching resources. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 51: 342-367, 2014 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Set in the context of today's globalized approaches to curriculum reform, the purpose of this study was to compare the teaching and learning of science in Chinese and Australian Grade 6 classrooms. A conceptual framework based on notions of culture and socioeconomic status informed the research design. Case study participants were three teachers of science and 140 students from three elementary schools of high, medium, and low socioeconomic status in Hunan Province, China; and three teachers and 105 students from paired schools in Western Australia. The formal curriculum, the curriculum-in-action, and the experiential curriculum in all case studies in each country were examined. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected with student questionnaires, lesson observations, teacher interviews, a school tour, and document collection. Findings indicated that participating Chinese students reported a greater proportion of their science lessons involved activities such as reading textbooks and memorizing facts, activities that are consistent with Confucian educational culture. In Australia, where there has been a longer historical influence from social-constructivist theorists such as Bruner and Vygotsky, students reported their lessons involved a greater proportion of activities such as designing and doing science experiments, and working in small groups. The findings also indicated that in both countries, socioeconomic status was an important factor impacting the implementation of the science curriculum with students in higher socioeconomic status schools participating more frequently in classroom activities consistent with reform curriculum documents. This phenomenon was more apparent in China possibly due to the Confucian educational tradition supporting culturally viable alternative approaches to the teaching and learning of science. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 50:33-61, 2013 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this exploratory case study, we sought to understand teacher's integration of multicultural curricula in science curriculum units, and how personal experiences influenced the level of integration in light of Bank's typology of ethnic content integration into school curricula. Five research participants volunteered and were selected so as to be representative of the demographic of pre-service and in-service teachers in the southern United States. The aim was to explore teachers' personal experiences with cultural others that either facilitated or impeded their adoption of multicultural curricula strategies in science curricula units. Case narratives present and discuss interview data and assigned curricula projects. Findings suggest that participants who had transformative cultural experiences and who identified as the marginalized cultural other, transformed science curricula at higher levels of Bank's typology for curricula' multicultural approaches. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 49: 1271-1295, 2012 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article provides an extended, comprehensive example of how teachers, schools, districts, and external factors (e.g., parental pressure and policy mandates) shape curriculum research in the U.S. It retrospectively examines how three different middle school curriculum units were implemented and scaled-up in a large, diverse school system. The curriculum materials were cognitively based, hands-on, guided inquiry units; each focused on a different 'big idea' in science. The units met some criteria for instructional strategies rated by the Project 2061 Curriculum Analysis. Using evidence-based decisions, two of the units were found to be effective and equitable, and went to scale, but one was not effective. However, the course of scale-up was also affected by a changing policy climate, and proceeded in unpredictable ways, with small scale effects not found at large scale, and experienced teachers less effective than inexperienced teachers. Four years after funding ended, none of the units were sustained within the school district. The interactions between the demands of the units and of the school district's policy environment suggests reasons why this occurred, despite evidence that two of the units were successful with diverse learners. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 49: 305-332, 2012 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are well-designed computer simulations an effective tool to support student understanding of complex concepts in chemistry when integrated into high school science classrooms? We investigated scaling up the use of a sequence of simulations of kinetic molecular theory and associated topics of diffusion, gas laws, and phase change, which we designed and experimentally tested. In the two effectiveness studies reported, one in a rural and the other in an urban context, chemistry teachers implemented two alternate versions of a curricular unit-an experimental version, incorporating simulations, and a control version, using text-based materials covering the same content. Participants were 718 high school students (357 rural and 361 urban), in a total of 25 classrooms. The implementation of the simulations was explored using criteria associated with fidelity of implementation (FOI). Each context provided insights into the role of FOI in affecting the effectiveness of the interventions when working with groups of teachers. Results supported the effectiveness of this sequence of simulations as a teaching tool in a classroom context, and confirmed the importance of FOI factors such as adherence and exposure in determining the specific environments in which these materials were most effective. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 49: 394-419, 2012 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reviews current scholarship about how to promote change in instructional practices used in undergraduate science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. The review is based on 191 conceptual and empirical journal articles published between 1995 and 2008. Four broad categories of change strategies were developed to capture core differences within this body of literature: disseminating curriculum and pedagogy, developing reflective teachers, enacting policy, and developing shared vision. STEM education researchers largely write about change in terms of disseminating curriculum and pedagogy. Faculty development researchers largely write about change in terms of developing reflective teachers. Higher education researchers largely write about change in terms of enacting policy. New work often does not build on prior empirical or theoretical work. Although most articles claim success of the change strategy studied, evidence presented to support these claims is typically not strong. For example, only 21% of articles that studied implementation of a change strategy were categorized as presenting strong evidence to support claims of success or failure of the strategy. These analyses suggest that the state of change strategies and the study of change strategies are weak, and that research communities that study and enact change are largely isolated from one-another. In spite of the weak state of the literature, some conclusions related to the design of change strategies can be drawn from this review. Two commonly used change strategies are clearly not effective: developing and testing 'best practice' curricular materials and then making these materials available to other faculty and 'top-down' policy-making meant to influence instructional practices. Effective change strategies: are aligned with or seek to change the beliefs of the individuals involved; involve long-term interventions, lasting at least one semester; require understanding a college or university as a complex system and designing a strategy that is compatible with this system. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 48: 952-984, 2011 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study on the impact of reflective discussions after inquiry-based laboratory activities on the views of students on the different aspects of the nature of science (NOS). The researchers observed 38 students enrolled in a Lebanese school that offers all students an international science curriculum. They used a pretest-posttest control-group design for the study and all the lessons were held in the laboratory. They found that the implicit approach in the science laboratory was ineffective in improving the NOS views of students.

The article presents a study on how natural sciences were represented in a laboratory preschool inspired by the Reggio Emilia approach. The researchers chose children for enrollment in order to create a heterogeneous population, which included 10 boys and eight girls whose ages ranged from 3 to 5 years. They also achieved the confidentiality of the participants by concealing their true names with the use of pseudonyms. They found that science was embedded in the classroom culture although science education was not planned as part of the curriculum.

The article describes the impact of professional development featuring evidence-based customization of technology-enhanced curriculum projects on inquiry science teaching and student knowledge integration in earth science. Based on the results, curricular and pedagogical customizations were made through the detailed information on the learning activities of students provided by the assessments embedded in the online curriculum and led to both teacher and student learning. The customizations by teachers involved investigations and teaching strategies.

The article discusses research on curriculum design and how preservice elementary teachers can effectively mobilize and adapt science curriculum materials for engaging students in science inquiry. The study used the quantitative method in determining the decisions of teachers in influencing students on their science lesson inquiry. The findings showed that pedagogical design capacities of teachers in developing inquiry-based materials can be used to support an effective teaching practice in science

The article presents a laboratory-based randomized control study that examined the effectiveness of inquiry-based instruction and commonplace teaching strategies. The study involved 58 students ages 14 to 16 years old who were randomly assigned to one of two groups. Results showed students in the inquiry-based group reaching higher levels of achievement in terms of knowledge, reasoning, and argumentation. Implications of the findings for the effectiveness of teaching science as inquiry are examined.

The article presents a study on the methods used in the preparation of books used in science subjects. It describes the process involved in developing a method for analyzing content coherence. It was found that the study method produced consistent results across reviewers and textbooks and can serve those who evaluate, design, and use science curriculum materials.

This article examines how effectively a curriculum designed for a sixth grade classroom in a low income urban middle school was adapted utilize the funds of knowledge that existed among the students. The author discusses how all students draw on information that they obtain from their environment in the classroom and that this is often difficult for students in science classrooms in urban areas. The curriculum that is examined was for a unit that explored food and nutrition. The authors examine what funds of knowledge the students did bring into the classroom and how they were able to utilize this knowledge in the food and nutrition unit.