This paper sets out to identify some key problems, issues and challenges relating to out-of-school experiences of learners in science teaching that emerged during classroom observations in schools in Botswana. Generally, there is evidence suggesting weak incorporation of learners' experiences into teaching. The experiences seemed to have a lower…

This study investigates student conceptualizations of the nature of science (NOS) and how students interpret and evaluate conflicting evidence regarding a socioscientific issue. Eighty-four high school students participated in the study by reading contradictory reports about the status of global warming and responding to questions designed to…

The catalogue of conceptions that students are said to have concerning the different topics of the science curriculum is so great that some authors consider this line of research to be exhausted. However, others insist on the need to re-examine students' conceptions in order to better describe them using new theoretical, contexts and research…

The educational potential of non-linear systems is given surprisingly little attention in science education research--at least in research that links content matter and educational issues. The project on educational reconstruction of non-linear systems at the IPN has investigated the educational significance of threferring phenomena and the…

This contribution presents a tool elaborated from a theoretical framework linking epistemological, learning and didactical hypotheses. This framework lead to design teaching sequences from a socio-constructivist perspective, and is based on the role of models in physics or chemistry, and on the role of students' initial knowledge in learning…

This paper reports upon a study addressing teaching and learning about solubility to Turkish first-year secondary school students (age 14-15). The principal aim of the research was to investigate the impact on students' understanding of solubility, of introducing a simple particle model of matter. A teaching intervention to fit within the existing…

This paper presents a retrospective analysis of two teaching-learning sequences about particle models. We will describe the design process for each sequence and will discuss it with respect to general frameworks such as Ingenierie Didactique and Educational Reconstruction. We will also describe and compare the ways we collected data and…

In the present paper we propose a theoretical framework for an epistemological modelling of teaching-learning (didactical) activities, which draws on recent studies of scientific practice. We present and analyse the framework, which includes three categories: namely, Cosmos-Evidence-Ideas (CEI). We also apply this framework in order to model a…

This paper describes 'didactical structures' as a possible outcome of research on teaching-learning sequences. Starting from an explicit didactical perspective, in this case a so-called problem-posing approach, the research emphasis lies on the didactical quality with which this particular perspective can be put into classroom practice in the…

One notable line of inquiry, aspects of which date back to the early 1980s, involves the design and implementation not of long-term curricula, but of topic-oriented sequences for teaching science. One distinguishing characteristic of a teaching-learning sequence (TLS) is its inclusion in a gradual research-based volutionary process aiming at…

The public controversies associated with biotechnological progress (genetic modification, cloning, and so forth) increasingly impact upon biology teaching in school; teachers find themselves engaged in discussions with pupils on value-laden issues deriving from the social and ethical implications of the 'new science'. The research described in…

The primary purpose was to investigate the efficacy of a full year of single-sex (SS) teaching of science. The secondary aims were to locate any differentiation by set and gender, and to relate these to more proximal variables. Participants were 13 year olds. Higher set girls gave evidence of clear benefits overall, and higher set boys also,…

This paper examines what is important about talk between learners during school science and, having identified this, suggests how we can ensure that what we consider important happens. By looking at the interaction between teachers and learners talking about science, it is possible to indicate ways in which learners can be helped to continue this…

This study explores college students' representations about the nature of theories during their enrollment in a large astronomy course with instruction designed to address a number of nature of science issues. We focus our investigation on how nine students represent their understanding of theory, how they distinguish between scientific theories…

The aim of this study was to detect primary students' conceptions about the origin and conveyance of electric current and about the connection of household electric appliances. In total, 383 students (aged 11-12) from the town of Volos, Greece, participated; 213 of them drawn from experimental classes and 170 from control groups. The results…