Uses a cross section to enhance three-dimensional knowledge of the anatomy of a canine head. Involves (n=124) veterinary students dissecting the head and experimental groups also identifying structures on a cross section of the head. Reports a positive impact of this experience on participant students. (Contains 52 references.) (Author/YDS)

Examines the outcomes of a unit that integrates explicit teaching of general reasoning patterns into the teaching of a specific science content. Focuses on the teaching of argumentation skills in the context of dilemmas in human genetics. (Contains 50 references.) (Author/YDS)

Uses the Teacher Communication Behavior Questionnaire (TCBQ) which can be used to assess students' and teachers' perceptions of science teachers' interpersonal communication behaviors in their classroom learning environments. (Contains 58 references.) (Author/YDS)

Reports on a three-year ethnographic study with an experienced elementary science teacher and describes the role of positive and negative emotions in constructing science pedagogy, curriculum planning, and relationships with children and colleagues. (Contains 70 references.) (Author/YDS)

Describes the commitments and research that went into the design of a 9-week high school course in evolutionary biology designed to bring students to an understanding of the practice of evolutionary biology by engaging them in developing, elaborating, and using one of the discipline's most important explanatory models. (Contains 39 references.)…

Examines the knowledge, intentions, and instructional practices of two beginning secondary science teachers as they learned the subject matter of the nature of science (NOS) and attempted to teach NOS during their student teaching experience and their first year of full-time teaching. Suggests that the relationship between NOS and science subject…

Investigates the responses of a sample of preservice biology teachers enrolled in a teaching methods course to a casual question about why water rose in a jar inverted over a burning candle placed in a pan of water by formulating and testing six hypotheses. (Contains 43 references.) (Author/YDS)

Presents a model of collective teaching and learning as a way to build deep learning of science concepts while learning about alternative ways to teach the same subject matter. Articulates coteaching/cogenerative dialoguing in terms of activity theory and the associated first-person research methodology that has been developed as a method for…

Proposes a multilevel-multifaceted approach to evaluating the impact of education reform on student achievement that would be sensitive to context and small treatment effects. Uses a different assessment based on students' proximity to the enacted curriculum. Indicates that close assessment were more sensitive to the changes in students' pre- to…

Examines students' intuitive physics ability and characteristics associated with physics competence in two studies; study one focuses on students' performance on a physics quiz and the second study focuses on exploring the personality and academic variables and also examines student's awareness of their own physics ability. (Contains 45…

Explores the performance of n=142 high schools students at the 1996 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science test who are enrolled in a project based science (PBS) program as compared to a national sample of students. Recommends using inquiry-based approach such as PBS to implement reform in schools. (Contains 32 references.)…

Examines structural characteristics of university engineering students' conceptions of energy elicited through paragraph writing and their relations with categories of their conceptions specific to energy in solution processes identified through interviews. Reports that structures of students' conceptions are characterized primarily by…

Describes the development and application of a two-tier multiple choice diagnostic instrument to assess high school students' understanding of inorganic chemistry qualitative analysis. Shows that the Grade 10 students had difficulty understanding the reactions involved in the identification of cations and anions, for example, double decomposition…

Uses narrative methodology in a qualitative study to understand what becoming a scientist or engineer entails for women stereotyped as model minorities. Narratives revealed that Confucian cultural scripts shaped gender expectations even in families several generations in America. (Author/MM)

Describes four causal models of the longitudinal relationships between attitudes and achievement as proposed in the literature. Examines the causal relationships over time between attitudes toward science and science achievement for White rural seventh- and eighth-grade students, and finds that a cross-effects model was the best fitting model form…