Reviews research on the relationships between teacher metaphors and the teaching and learning of science. Portrays metaphors as a way in which knowledge about science teaching can be represented and as potential foci for discussions about enacted science curricula and powerful tools for generating new ways of thinking about the teaching and…

Qualitatively examines the development of four community college science professors as science educators while they prepared and taught a summer life science academy for K-12 teachers. Reports that the professors came to see their traditional lecture/lab approach to science education as inadequate with regard to most students. (Author/JRH)

Describes a course teaching planetary science to elementary school students in collaboration with a university. Chronicles how a partnership between an elementary school teacher and a university-based research scientist effectively shaped the teacher's understanding of values and attitudes inherent in science education. Presents a model for…

Explores the differences between the theoretical positions of Vygotsky and Piaget and summarizes recent work that extends and applies a Vygotskian sociocultural perspective to educational issues. Discusses implications of this perspective for research and practice. Contains 52 references. (Author/JRH)

Offers a critique of constructivism in science education that is an attempt to define and identify not only the weaknesses, but also the successes of constructivism. Proposes that an alternative of modest realism offers not only a better representation of the practice of science, but additionally some value in determining issues of pedagogy.…

Describes the history and current status of qualitative research in science education research. Discusses the issue of the quality of research. (JRH)

Describes and discusses an approach to teaching elementary thermodynamics that focuses on promoting and consolidating conceptual change in the classroom toward the accepted scientific view. Reports that this approach enabled a significant proportion of the student group involved to demonstrate understanding of the key ideas as evidenced in…

Examines factors that influence personal science teaching efficacy and science teaching outcome expectancy in elementary teachers. Data collection methods included questionnaires and interviews. Results indicate that preservice and inservice experiences, such as success in high-quality science courses and workshops, access to resources and time,…

Analyzes key concepts of the conceptual change model: intelligibility, plausibility, and fruitfulness, together with conceptions of learning as conceptual change and the nature of conceptual change teaching. Organizes representations of these around a framework developed for representing scientific conceptions in terms of verbal and symbolic…

Explores 11-year-old children's approaches to the concept of volume using 6 tasks that were developed to identify commonalities in children's responses. Results suggest that children hold and use different conceptions, in their effort to explain and compare aspects of volume, which fall in certain categories which were met in almost all the tasks.…

Surveyed a sample of science education journals based on information provided by their editors about standing policy and practice with regard to publications. Focused on the problem of communication within and between the different sectors of the science education community from researchers to teachers. (Author/MKR)

Surveyed secondary biology textbooks to ascertain how the topic of evolution functioned in the overall structure of the subject matter. Results indicated that there has occurred a marked increase in the role played by evolution in the generation of textbooks published during the 1990s. (Author/MKR)

Interviews and surveys using the Science Teaching Efficacy Beliefs Inventory of (n=120) preservice elementary teachers' science teaching self-efficacy before and after planning and teaching a cooperative elementary science lesson at a local public school found evidence that early cooperative field experience had a positive influence on the…

This study portrays Christian elementary preservice teachers' practical arguments based on their religious beliefs in an attempt to develop a relational view of teaching and learning science in a curriculum and instruction course. Concludes that science educators must be sensitive to these beliefs and assist teachers to study the teaching of…

Analyzed operational knowledge of the weight concept of high school students after two educational levels: introductory and advanced physics. Results showed that apparent and true weight concepts are poorly assimilated by most of the advanced placement students. Discusses origins of the shortcomings of the alternative knowledge about weight.…