Sexual health is a controversial science topic that has received little attention in the field of science education, despite its direct relevance to students' lives and communities. Moreover, research from other fields indicates that a great deal remains to be learned about how to make school learning about sexual health influence the real-life…

Researchers and practitioners alike express concerns about the conceptual difficulties associated with the concepts of momentum and kinetic energy currently taught in school physics. This article presents an in-depth analysis of the treatment given to them in 44 published textbooks written for UK secondary school certificate courses. This is set…

This study employed hierarchical linear models (HLM) to investigate Peer-Led Guided Inquiry (PLGI), a teaching practice combining cooperative learning and inquiry and tailored for a large class. Ultimately, the study provided an example of the effective introduction of a reform pedagogical approach in a large class setting. In the narrative, the…

The central purposes of this study were to review the development and evolution of the Scientific Attitude Inventory (SAI) and then reevaluate the psychometric properties of the revised form of the SAI, the Scientific Attitude Inventory II (SAI-II). The SAI-II was administered to a convenience sample of 543 middle and high school students from…

This study explored teacher perspectives on the use of socioscientific issues (SSI) and on dealing with ethics in the context of science instruction. Twenty-two middle and high school science teachers from three US states participated in semi-structured interviews, and researchers employed inductive analyses to explore emergent patterns relative…

This study explores general-chemistry instructors' awareness of and ability to identify and address common student learning obstacles in chemical equilibrium. Reported instructor strategies directed at remediating student alternate conceptions were investigated and compared with successful, literature-based conceptual change methods. Fifty-two…

This study explored the understandings of data and measurement that school students draw upon, and the ways that they reason from data, when carrying out a practical science inquiry task. The two practical tasks used in the study each involved investigations of the relationships between two independent variables (IVs) and a dependent variable…

As part of a larger project aimed at promoting science and literacy for culturally and linguistically diverse elementary students, this study has two objectives: (a) to describe teachers' initial beliefs and practices about inquiry-based science and (b) to examine the impact of the professional development intervention (primarily through…

Science education standards established by American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the National Research Council (NRC) urge less emphasis on memorizing scientific facts and more emphasis on students investigating the everyday world and developing deep understanding from their inquiries. These approaches to instruction…

Investigated effects of teacher-induced imagery generation on rule recall and transfer using boys in ninth-grade physical science classes assigned to imagery encouragement or discouragement treatment groups. Results indicate that imagery utilization significantly facilitates rule recall and that imagery encouragement during instruction leads to…

Investigated effects of teaching an explicit approach to problem solving on the mathematical chemistry achievement of preparatory college students (with a control group being taught dimensional analysis as its problem-solving strategy). No difference in cumulative achievement between the groups was found. Interpretations of the results obtained…

Presents data on student attitudes (N=380) toward chemistry using the Student Opinion Survey in Chemistry (SOSC) and compares these data with those reported in H. Heikkinen's 1973 doctoral dissertation. The potential usefulness of using the SOSC in cross-national studies is also discussed. (Author/JN)

This study used a microcomputer program which diagnosed and remediated an alternative conception of velocity. Results show computer simulations are credible representations of reality and that the remedial part of the program produces significant conceptual changes in students holding the alternative conception. (Author/JN)

Determined if providing feedback to students had any impact on the correlation between performance in physics and a test of simple, mechanistic mathematics skills. Also determined if students who drop out of the physics course demonstrated any identifiable difference in performance on tests involving a variety of reasoning and problem-solving…

Investigated relationships among attitudes toward science, interest in science, science curiosity, and self-concept of science ability. Data, obtained from 228 sixth-grade students, show that attitudes toward science, interest in science, and science curiosity are highly related. Implications of these findings for science instruction are…