The scientific competencies advocated by the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) focus on the abilities needed in students' adult lives. This study investigated how such scientific competencies could be improved by using online argumentation. One hundred and thirty-eight 8th grade high school students took part in the study,…

Science education in China is Subject Matter Knowledge (SMK) oriented in that SMK understanding is the major benchmark to assess students' achievement in science learning. Such an orientation causes students to overemphasize the memorization of SMK and neglect other indispensable components of science, such as scientific attitudes and…

To date, there has only been little conceptual change research regarding conceptions about glaciers. This study used the theoretical background of embodied cognition to reconstruct different metaphorical concepts with respect to the structure of a glacier. Applying the Model of Educational Reconstruction, the conceptions of students and scientists…

This study is part of a first study of collaborative socio-environmental projects that engage Jewish and Arab students in Israel in learning about their local environment and about each other through outdoor learning and environmental action. We used ideas of social learning and environmental citizenship to frame our research. We investigated…

This study used a Chinese-language version of the Index of Science Reading Awareness to explore the science reading metacognition and comprehension of Taiwanese students. Structural equation modelling results confirmed the underlying model comprised three clusters of metacognitive knowledge: beliefs and confidence in science reading, knowledge of…

Research in the field of students' understandings of models and their use in science describes different frameworks concerning these understandings. Currently, there is no conjoint framework that combines these structures and so far, no investigation has focused on whether it reflects students' understandings sufficiently (empirical…

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between student self-concept and achievement in science in Taiwan based on the big-fish-little-pond effect (BFLPE) model using the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2003 and 2007 databases. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to examine the effects of the…

This research examines how science teaching orientations and beliefs about technology-enhanced tools change over time in professional development (PD). The primary data sources for this study came from learning journals of 8 eighth grade science teachers at the beginning and conclusion of a year of PD. Based on the analysis completed, Information…

The concept of energy is one key component of science education curricula worldwide. While it is still being taught in many science classrooms from a mainly conceptual knowledge perspective, the need to frame the concept of energy as a socioscientific issue and implement it in the context of citizenship education and education for sustainable…

Dynamic visualizations can make unseen phenomena such as chemical reactions visible but students need guidance to benefit from them. This study explores the value of generating drawings versus selecting among alternatives to guide students to learn chemical reactions from a dynamic visualization of hydrogen combustion as part of an online inquiry…

School-based curriculum innovations, including those in science education, are usually not adequately evaluated, if at all. Furthermore, current procedures and instruments for programme evaluations are often unable to support evidence-based decision-making. We suggest that adopting fidelity of implementation (FOI) criteria from healthcare research…

An understanding of the scientific enterprise is useful because citizens need to make systematic, rational decisions about projects involving scientific endeavors and technology, and a clearer understanding of scientific epistemology is beneficial because it could encourage more public engagement with science. The purpose of this study was to…

This qualitative, multi-case study explored the use of science-content music for teaching and learning in six middle school science classrooms. The researcher sought to understand how teachers made use of content-rich songs for teaching science, how they impacted student engagement and learning, and what the experiences of these teachers and…

Due to the scarcity of cross-cultural comparative studies in exploring students' self-efficacy in science learning, this study attempted to develop a multi-dimensional science learning self-efficacy (SLSE) instrument to measure 316 Singaporean and 303 Taiwanese eighth graders' SLSE and further to examine the differences between the two…

Following a sociocultural perspective, this study investigates how students who have grown up using the SI (Systeme International d'Unites) (metric) or US customary (USC) systems of units for everyday use differ in their knowledge of scale and measurement. Student groups were similar in terms of socioeconomic status, curriculum, native…