Many papers have emphasized the need for and importance of particular examples and the underlying rationale for introducing a historical dimension in mathematics education. This article presents the development and implementation of a project, based on original sources, in a situation where the existing curriculum does not include history. The…

Edgar Allan Poe's standing as a literary figure, who drew on (and sometimes dabbled in) the scientific debates of his time, makes him an intriguing character for any exploration of the historical interrelationship between science, literature and philosophy. His sprawling "prose-poem" "Eureka" (1848), in particular, has…

This study examined pre-service mathematics teachers' knowledge of history of mathematics and their attitudes and beliefs towards using history of mathematics in mathematics education based on year level in teacher education program and gender. The sample included 1,593 freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior pre-service middle school (grades…

In this paper we present the main lines of a course on the history of mathematics for prospective secondary school (students' age range 14-19) mathematics teachers, enrolled on a 2-year postgraduate teacher preparation program. In order to integrate the historical objectives with the educational objectives of the program we adopted the…

The purpose of this study is to identify the epistemological features and model qualities depending on model evaluation levels and to explore the reasoning process behind high-level evaluation through small group interaction about blood circulation. Nine groups of three to four students in the eighth grade participated in the modeling practice.…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship of students' understanding of science knowledge, attitude and decision making on socio-scientific issues (SSI), especially on the issues of nuclear energy in Korea. SSI-focused instructions were developed to encourage students to understand and reflect on knowledge, attitude and…

There is no consensus on the genuine meaning of wave-particle duality and the interpretation of quantum theory. How can we teach duality and quantum theory despite this lack of consensus? This study attempts to answer this question. This research argues that reality issues are at the core of both the endless debates concerning the interpretation…

The purposes of this study were, based on John Dewey's ideas on experience, to examine how primary students used their own everyday experience and were affected by own and others' experience in science discourse, and to illuminate the implications of experience in science education. To do these, science discourses by a group of six…

Usually, in physics textbooks, the physical magnitude "work" is introduced as the product of a force multiplied by its displacement, in relation to the transfer of energy. In other words, "work" is presented as an internal affair of physics theory, while its relation to the world of experience, that is its empirical meaning, is…

A historical case study concerning the serious doubts that arose in early 1930s about the validity of the law of energy conservation in nuclear disintegrations, and the hypothesis of neutrino, will be closely analyzed with the goal of promoting understanding of the nature of science. This work is based upon primary archival and printed sources,…

Energy is a central topic in physics and a key concept for understanding the physical, biological and technological worlds. It is a complex topic with multiple connections with different areas of science and with social, environmental and philosophical issues. In this paper we discuss some aspects of the teaching and learning of the energy…

Energy is one of the most important unifying themes in science. Yet the way energy is conceptualized varies depending on context. In this paper, the discourse used to explain the role of energy in systems from biology, chemistry, and physics is examined from the perspective of metaphor theory. Six substance metaphors for energy are identified in…

This paper discusses Ernst Mach's interpretation of the principle of energy conservation (EC) in the context of the development of energy concepts and ideas about causality in nineteenth-century physics and theory of science. In doing this, it focuses on the close relationship between causality, energy conservation and space in Mach's…

In his influential 1960 paper "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences", Eugene P. Wigner raises the question of why something that was developed without concern for empirical facts--mathematics--should turn out to be so powerful in explaining facts about the natural world. Recent philosophy of science has…

The paper deals with physics teaching/learning in high school. An investigation in three upper secondary school classes in Italy explored the reactions of students to a structuring lecture on optics within the discipline-culture (DC) framework that organises physics knowledge around four interrelated fundamental theories of light. The lecture…