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Central to evolution is the concept of a common ancestry from which all life has emerged over immense time scales, but learning and teaching temporal aspects of evolution remain challenging. This study investigated students’ interpretation of evolutionary time when engaging with a multi-touch tabletop application called DeepTree, a dynamic visualization of a phylogenetic tree. Specifically, we explored how interactive finger-based zooming (zooming “in” and “out”) influenced students’ interpretation of evolutionary time, and how temporal information and relationships were conceptualized during interaction. Transcript analysis of videotaped interview data from ten secondary school students while they interacted with DeepTree revealed that zooming was interpreted in two ways: as spatially orientated (movement within the tree itself), or as time-orientated (movement in time). Identified misinterpretations included perceiving an implicit coherent timeline along the y-axis of the tree, that the zooming time duration in the virtual tree was linearly correlated to real time, and that more branch nodes correspond to a longer time. Sources for erroneous interpretations may lie in transferring everyday sensory experiences (e.g., physical movements and observing tree growth) to understanding abstract evolution concepts. Apart from estimating the occurrence of dinosaurs, DeepTree was associated with an improvement in interpretation of relative order of evolutionary events. Although highly promising, zooming interaction in DeepTree does not facilitate an intuitive understanding of evolutionary time. However, the opportunity to combine visual and bodily action in emerging technologies such as Deep Tree suggests a high pedagogical potential of further development of zooming features for optimal scientific understanding. The research was also funded by Örebro University and the Open Access funding was provided by Linköping University. EvoVis: Utmana livsvetenskapernas tröskelbegrepp FontD – En nationell forskarskola i naturvetenskapernas och teknikens didaktik för lärarutbildare

Rapid developments in educational technology in higher education are intended to make learning more engaging and effective. At the same time, cognitive load theory stresses limitations of human cognitive architecture and urges educational developers to design learning tools that optimise learners’ mental capacities. In a 2-month study we investigated university students’ learning with an AI-enriched digital biology textbook that integrates a 5000-concept knowledge base and algorithms offering the possibility to ask questions and receive answers. The study aimed to shed more light on differences between three sub-types (intrinsic, germane and extraneous) of cognitive load and their relationship with learning gain, self-regulated learning and usability perception while students interacted with the AI-enriched book during an introductory biology course. We found that students displayed a beneficial learning pattern with germane cognitive load significantly higher than both intrinsic and extraneous loads showing that they were engaged in meaningful learning throughout the study. A significant correlation between germane load and accessing linked suggested questions available in the AI-book indicates that the book may support deep learning. Additionally, results showed that perceived non-optimal design, which deflects cognitive resources away from meaningful processing accompanied lower learning gains. Nevertheless, students reported substantially more favourable than unfavourable opinions of the AI-book. The findings provide new approaches for investigating cognitive load types in relation to learning with emerging digital tools in higher education. The findings also highlight the importance of optimally aligning educational technologies and human cognitive architecture. Funding: Marcus and Amalia Wallenberg Foundation [MAW 2014.0107]

Public understanding of contemporary scientific issues is critical for the future of society. Public spaces, such as science centers, can impact the communication of science by providing active knowledge-building experiences of scientific phenomena. In contributing to this vision, we have previously developed an interactive visualization as part of a public exhibition about nano. We reflect on how the immersive design and features of the exhibit contribute as a tool for science communication in light of the emerging paradigm of exploranation, and offer some forward-looking perspectives about what this notion has to offer the domain. Funding agencies: Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsradet)Swedish Research Council [2011-5569]; Norrkoping Visualization Center C (NVAB); NanoForm project organization

Modern preschool education is seen as an essential foundation for nurturing children’s digital literacy. Early childhood education environments have witnessed increased emphasis on integrating programming activities in combination with digital tablets. However, little is known about how preschool teachers implement programming as part of pedagogical strategies during practice. In Sweden, although there is a mandate to develop children’s understanding of the digital world, programming is not formally mentioned in the revised preschool curriculum. This study systematically investigates how Swedish preschool teachers implement programming activities in their teaching practice. Data was collected through a national online survey (n = 199). Findings revealed a range of apps and resources used in combination with tablets, where activity integration takes place as unplugged programming, digital programming, or as a combination of the former. Teachers markedly attributed intended learning goals around programming to tenets of computational thinking and “twenty-first century skills”. Moreover, programming was often actively linked to learning in other domains such as science, technology, mathematics, and language, approaches that show traditional Swedish preschool teaching practices being recontextualized in terms of programming. Based on the reported findings that provide insight into the implementation of programming in preschools, a logical future research avenue lies in exploring the documented programming activities from the perspective of the children., "Open Access: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made."

Whereas previous studies show that children are able to make meaningabout evolutionary concepts within read-aloud contexts, little is knownabout how semiotic resources and interaction influence children’s meaningmaking about evolution. This study investigates children’s meaning makingabout evolutionary concepts during a modelling activity conducted after aninteractive storybook read-aloud describing the evolution of a foraging traitof a fictitious mammal (the pilose). Forty children (13 groups) were videotapedas they produced a clay pilose model, while explaining how theythought their pilose would appear after inhabiting a ‘future’ environment(mountainous, snowy or forest). A multimodal analysis focused on howchildren demonstrated their meanings of seven evolutionary conceptsdescribed in the book. An eighth concept, ‘adaptation to environment’,was also often discussed. While all eight concepts emerged, the mostfrequent concerned survival and adaptation. The eighth concept appearedto serve as a synthesis of children’s interpretation of the storybook thathighlighted the visible consequences of evolution. The children engagedfive interactional resources, dominated by the interactional resource ofcommunicating the concepts in direct relation to their produced pilosemodels. The findings shed light on how children’s representational andrelational practices impact making meaning about evolution. Artikel som ingår i avhandling Enountering evolution (Frejd, 2019)

Future societal and economic impacts of nanoscience and nanotechnology raise the demand for a nano-literate public as well as a nano-competent workforce. This translates into the urgent need for nano education interventions in schools and informal learning contexts. In seeking to meet this mandate, we have developed and investigated a virtual reality environment that induces immersive presence (feeling as being ‘in’ the virtual world) and exploits bodily movements (e.g. hand gestures to control virtual objects) for students and citizens to learn nano concepts. In this article, we argue that such scientifically-informed immersive and interactive visualizations have a unique potential in communicating nanoscale ideas to students as well as the general public. Funding agencies: Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsradet) [2011-5569] Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet, grant 2011-5569)

Thermal science is a perennial obstacle for learners. Infrared camera technology provides an opportunity for pupils to confront challenging thermal ideas. From an embodied cognition perspective, sensory experiences form metaphoric relations that underpin conceptualisation and reasoning about abstract scientific phenomena. This study investigated eight groups of fourth grade pupils’ use of metaphoric relations when engaging thermal cameras to explore “heat” at a science centre. Pupils were videorecorded while collaboratively exploring thermal properties of the surroundings and during a thermos modelling exercise. Qualitative metaphor analyses of pupils’ dialogue and behaviour revealed various metaphoric and metonymic relations around spatial properties, colour, movement and change in their conceptualisation of thermal phenomena. “Heat” was almost exclusively conceptualised as a noun, manifested in utterances such as “harder for the heat to escape” and “it wants to get yellow”. In addition, pupils used colour as both a metonym and metaphor for heat and temperature. Expressions of heat as an entity were closely related to experiences of movement, indicating that spatial cognition is central to children’s conceptualisation of heat. Engagement with the cameras provided access to thermodynamic phenomena through unique sensory and nonsensory experiences. Future research will explore how these metaphoric relations can be exploited as a meaning-making resource in the classroom.

The availability of digital tablets in preschools has increased significantly in recent years. Literature suggests that these tools can enhance students’ literacy and collaborative skills. As society becomes increasingly digitized, preschool curriculum reform also emphasises the subjects of technology and science as priority areas of learning. Teachers’ knowledge and experiences are of utmost importance in carrying out this mandate. Few studies have explored the use of digital tablets to teach preschool technology and science in Sweden, and there is an urgent need to ascertain the role of digital aids as teaching tools. This survey study seeks to determine how digital tablets are used to support preschool children’s learning in general, and with respect to technology education. Preschool educators (n = 327) across Sweden responded to an online survey consisting of 20 closed and 6 open items that probed the use of digital tablets. Survey results revealed a high degree of engagement with digital tablets in preschools, with activities directed toward various subject-related, social and generic skills. Programming, invention, construction and creation, problem-solving, and design emerged saliently as tablet activities in technology subject areas. Opportunities for providing meaningful learning tasks and digital adaptability were seen as pedagogical benefits of using tablets, but increasing expectations to integrate tablet activities with an accompanying lack of digital skills were expressed as limitations. Teachers’ recommendations for future tablet use included defining clearer curriculum guidelines for tablet implementation and adequate training for acquiring digital competence.

Inquiry-based approaches to science education are central to recent South African primary and secondary school curricula, but have been found challenging to adopt in disadvantaged township contexts. It is therefore important to find ways of introducing inquiry-based approaches, where pupils are encouraged to investigate phenomena they are interested in and to engage in true dialogue, as opposed to teacher-led triadic dialogue. We typically experience thermal phenomena through the sense of touch, but infrared (IR) cameras provide an additional opportunity to experience heat-related phenomena through the visual sense. Previously, in a Swedish context, we have found that hand-held IR cameras allow for strong pedagogical affordances and inspire pupils to engage in inquiry in the area of thermal science. In the present case study, grade 7 and 8 pupils (13–14 years old) in two South African township schools were introduced to IR cameras during predict-observe-explain (POE) exercises on heat conduction. The results revealed that if pupils had a sufficient conceptual understanding of heat conduction beforehand, they were capable of engaging in true dialogue in relation to the exercises and interpreting the thermal camera visual imagery. However, if pupils did not show such understanding, it was tempting for them and the facilitator to resort to triadic dialogue. "This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. See http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/."

Recent studies on the Swedish work force show that about half of all jobs demand a high degree of self-governing. In preparing students for the future, the World Economic Forum suggests that schools should also teach social skills, creativity and critical thinking. According to the Swedish upper secondary curriculum, the subject of technology should allow students to develop entrepreneurial skills, defined as supporting curiosity, confidence, creativity and courage, resulting in the ability to act, in innovation and problem solving. This vision is related to the notion of authentic learning. Reeves, Herrington and Oliver define authenticity through nine key elements, namely, authentic context, authentic task, presence of expert performances, multiple perspectives, collaboration, reflection, articulation, metacognitive support and authentic assessment. The aim of this study is to map these key elements of authentic learning onto the development and design of a five-week innovation project for implementation in a Swedish upper secondary school context. The mapping process involved first synthesising literature in the area of authentic learning in conjunction with studying Swedish technology education curriculum materials. This was followed by describing the characteristics of each key element of authentic learning in terms of proposing activities for implementation as an innovation project (IP). The results of this study show how criteria of nine elements of authentic learning could be used in designing an innovation project (IP) module in an authentically cogent way. Thus the authenticity framework served as a valid theoretical tool to produce the authentic learning module.

The advent of nanoscientific applications in modern life is swiftly in progress. Nanoscale innovation comes with the pressing need to provide citizens and learners with scientific knowledge for judging the societal impact of nanotechnology. In rising to the challenge, this paper reports the developmental phase of a research agenda concerned with building and investigating a virtual environment for communicating nano-ideas. Methods involved elucidating core nano-principles through two purposefully contrasting nano “risk” and “benefit” scenarios for incorporation into an immersive system. The authors implemented the resulting 3D virtual architecture through an exploration of citizens' and school students' interaction with the virtual nanoworld. Findings suggest that users' interactive experiences of conducting the two tasks based on gestural interaction with the system serve as a cognitive gateway for engendering nano-related understanding underpinning perceived hopes and fears and as a stimulating pedagogical basis from which to teach complex science concepts.

In the field of biochemistry, the use of external representations such as static diagrams and animations has increased rapidly in recent years. However, their effectiveness as instructional tools can be hindered if students lack the visual literacy and cognitive skills necessary for processing and interpreting such representations. We aimed to identify and assess visualisation skills necessary for effective processing of external representations in biochemistry. We used a modified Bloom’s taxonomy to identify the cognitive skills essential for optimal visual literacy, and designed probes based on those skills to develop a test instrument. Student responses to the probes were scored and processed with the Rasch model. This approach enabled us to rate the degree of difficulty of each visualisation skill on a linear logit scale, and to generate a person–item map to measure biochemistry students’ level of visual literacy. The results showed that the identified visualisation skills could be measured reliably, and the Rasch model was effective both for ranking the skills according to level of difficulty and for estimating a student’s relative level of visual literacy. Significance: Addresses a recurring problem in biochemistry and similar fields. Identifies relevant skills to inform teaching and learning in biochemistry.

Nano education involves tackling the difficult task of conceptualizing imperceptibly small objects and processes. Interactive visualization serves as one potential solution for providing access to the nanoworld through active exploration of nanoscale concepts and principles. This chapter exposes and describes a selection of interactive visualizations in the literature, and reviews research findings related to their educational, perceptual and cognitive influence. In closing, we offer implications of interactive visualization for learning and teaching nano.

Thermal imaging cameras, commonly used in application areas such as building inspection and night vision, have recently also been introduced as pedagogical tools for helping students visualize, interrogate and interpret notoriously challenging thermal concepts. In this paper we present a system for Spatial Augmented Reality that automatically projects thermal data onto objects. Instead of having a learner physically direct a hand-held camera toward an object of interest, and then view the display screen, a group of participants can gather around the display system and directly see and manipulate the thermal profile projected onto physical objects. The system combines a thermal camera that captures the thermal data, a depth camera that realigns the data with the objects, and a projector that projects the data back. We also apply a colour scale tailored for room temperature experiments.

Integration of technology, social learning and scientific models offers pedagogical opportunities for science education. A particularly interesting area is thermal science, where students often struggle with abstract concepts, such as heat. In taking on this conceptual obstacle, we explore how hand-held infrared (IR) visualization technology can strengthen students’ understanding of thermal phenomena. Grounded in the Swedish physics curriculum and part of a broader research programme on educational uses of IR cameras, we have developed laboratory exercises around a thermal storyline, in conjunction with the teaching of a heat-flow model. We report a narrative analysis of how a group of five fourth-graders, facilitated by a researcher, predicts, observes and explains (POE) how the temperatures change when they pour hot water into a ceramic coffee mug and a thin plastic cup. Four chronological episodes are described and analysed as group interaction unfolded. Results revealed that the students engaged cognitively and emotionally with the POE task and, in particular, held a sustained focus on making observations and offering explanations for the scenarios. A compelling finding was the group’s spontaneous generation of multiple "what-ifs" in relation to thermal phenomena, such as blowing on the water surface, or submerging a pencil into the hot water. This was followed by immediate interrogation with the IR camera, a learning event we label instant inquiry. The students’ expressions largely reflected adoption of the heat-flow model. In conclusion, IR cameras could serve as an access point for even very young students to develop complex thermal concepts. As per the Springer Copyright agreement, a Postprint of the Accepted Manuscript (PDF) is available via the personal website of the author(s) at the following link:http://webstaff.itn.liu.se/~konsc/Haglund_Jeppsson_Schonborn_2015_Postprint ThermalVis

Infrared cameras can be used in science education. The technology suits open-ended thermodynamics laboratory exercises in higher education. School children engage in instant inquiry of thermal phenomena.