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As a real time socio-scientific issue, the COVID-19 pandemic has clearly shown us the need for the public to understand science. As experts have repeatedly stressed in recent years, science education plays an important role in developing scientifically literate societies. In this context, it is critical to consider which subjects science educators frequently concentrate on and the messages they give to researchers, policymakers, and other stakeholders. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to use bibliometric data to understand the topics that the articles in the Journal of Research in Science Teaching (JRST), one of the flagship journals about science education and teaching, focused on over the last 20 years. This study employed both descriptive and bibliometric analysis. Based on data from the Web of Science (WoS), descriptive analyses are presented as frequencies and percentages and we used VOSviewer software for bibliometric analysis. Findings showed that more than 80% of the authors of the JRST are from the United States, Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Moreover, results of these analyses demonstrate that the researchers publishing in the JRST focused on two main ideas over the past 20 years: "Which science teaching methods and strategies are most effective?" and "What can be done to make science teaching more inclusive?" As a result, it can be clearly seen that JRST has special attention on inclusive approach in science education which should be designed to include traditionally underrepresented groups.

Teachers' educational beliefs influence their decisions and actions before, during, and after class. Classroom actions are a result of decision-making processes wherein teachers judge how they can teach effectively. The early years of teaching profession is important in shaping new teachers' practices in accordance with their beliefs. This study identifies how the beliefs and classroom practices of a new science teacher change within the first three years of working. This study's participant was a new high-school science teacher in Midwestern United States. Changes were investigated by employing qualitative research methods. Data for this longitudinal case study were gathered from interviews, questionnaires, and classroom observations for three years. The findings show that teachers cannot practice their reformist beliefs without experiencing real class environments.

Given the importance of cultivating scientific literate societies, the integration of scientific inquiry into school curriculum is key to contemporary science education. It is apparent that textbooks have been an accessible source of science information for teachers and students since the growth of public K-12 schooling worldwide. Textbooks are crucial for understanding the basis of science curriculum, since many science teachers design their courses according to textbook content. This study aimed to determine whether the activities (both experiments and student activities) in Turkish biology textbooks reflect contemporary inquiry-based approaches. To this end, the sample of the study was composed of four biology textbooks approved by the Turkish Ministry of National Education (MoNE) for grades 9-12. Analysis of these textbooks was conducted using the Inquiry-Based Tasks Analysis Inventory (ITAI). The overall findings indicate that activities in textbooks were mostly compatible with the established curriculum, but they were insufficiently designed to prepare students to do inquiry or to understand what scientific inquiry is. Results demonstrated that these textbooks' most considered ITAI dimension was "Construction of Understandings about Scientific Concepts," while the least frequently explored dimension was "Understandings about Scientific Inquiry." Additionally, in the "Expected skills" dimension, "observing" and "inferring" were the most frequently used skills.

Science/Technology/Society (STS) as a reform effort has been active in Iowa for three decades. A program called Iowa Chautauqua has evolved over the four decades to promote K-12 STS teaching in Iowa's 300 school districts. This is a study of how teachers have become Teacher Leaders of the reforms and lead other teachers who enroll as new teachers and schools each New Year. All were involved with Action Research projects each year while also assisting graduate student teams who serve as research associates. In this study, students were asked to identify specific teacher actions that were designed to make student learning more successful. The study examines general student views of teacher actions as well as specific examples of how students interact with the teacher and how the teachers encourage greater student/student involvement. The results show success with STS and how it defines science and affective actions of teachers in classrooms. Student views of Teacher Leaders, new Chautauqua teachers, and Control Teachers with no STS or Chautauqua experiences provide ways of recognizing successes of current reform efforts.

The purpose of this study is to profile future science teachers' understandings of current environmental issues in the context of an education reform in Turkey. Knowledge base and understandings of elementary and secondary prospective science teachers about biodiversity, carbon cycle, global warming and ozone layer depletion were targeted in the study. Questionnaire surveys developed for this purpose were adapted and used in this investigation. The questionnaires were administered to 360 participants in six universities. Analysis involved frequencies, percentages and comparing means for students majoring in elementary and secondary science teaching. Analysis of variance for differences among majors and responses to different issues are also included. Findings are compared and contrasted with the previous research in other countries. The study has implications for the prospective preparation of teachers and the future of environmental literacy movement in Turkey. (Contains 6 tables.)