An experiential science program, such as a summer course at a field station, requires unique assessment tools. Traditional assessment via a pencil-and-paper exam cannot capture the essential skills and concepts learned at a summer field station. Therefore, the authors developed a pre- and postcourse image-based analysis to evaluate student…

The authors investigated whether a series of mini prewriting assignments linked to a formal paper describing an original research project would improve preservice elementary teachers' writing abilities in a science context. They compared 38 final reports from students who completed the prewriting assignments with 38 reports randomly selected from…

This case study stresses the need to broadly consider an entire system, including all of the energy inputs and outputs involved, to determine the real efficiency of that system. It also asks its student audience to consider the role that scientific input plays in policy decision-making processes. It emphasizes that, despite the importance of this…

The 5E model of inquiry-based learning was incorporated into a sophomore-level microbiology laboratory to increase student understanding of serial dilutions, a concept that is often difficult for most students to comprehend. Quantitative and qualitative assessments were conducted during the semester to determine the value of this approach for…

Teaching through inquiry doesn't come automatically--professors have to think of instruction in a different way. Instead of describing information that students should know, they must challenge students to think at a higher, critical-thinking level than they are accustomed to. After all, the most important aspect of a professors' job or "business"…

Science 101 was designed by a multidisciplinary, multi-institutional team, with leadership from the Departments of Biology and Teacher Education, and participation by faculty in the Departments of Chemistry, Physics, and Mathematics, the College of Engineering, and master teachers from school districts in the state of Illinois. Their goal was to…

To address the confusion resulting from difficulties with proportional reasoning among preservice physical science students, a cube-assembly activity was used to bring a sense of concreteness to abstract ideas. The activity took students from the concrete step of assembling cubes of various sizes and directly measuring their properties to slightly…

This paper presents an assessment of a biology education seminar for science graduate students. It describes how this seminar emphasized pedagogy "and" reflective assignments to help students identify and explore novel instructional strategies, discover who they are as teachers, focus on student learning, and acknowledge the challenges of…

This study is an analysis of the effectiveness of a faculty-designed laboratory experience about a difficult topic, cellular respiration. The activity involves a hands-on model of the cellular-respiration process, making use of wooden ball-and-stick chemistry models and small toy trucks on a table top model of the mitochondrion. Students…

This public-hearing case study is centered upon the recent decision by President George W. Bush to set NASA's primary goal as a return to the Moon, followed by a mission to Mars. The members on the expert panel are fictitious and the transcript contrived; however, the views expressed in the case study correspond to actual views held by leading…

Discrepancies abound in use of the word "inquiry." In this paper, the authors propose a quantitative rubric designed to characterize the level of inquiry in laboratory activities and laboratory curricula. They do not wish to answer the question, "What is inquiry?" but rather, provide a tool for identifying its varying degrees of student…

This quasi-experimental pilot study of nonscience majors taking a physical science course at a university in South Texas was conducted on Hispanic undergraduate students, and is theory based--an application of attribution theory. That the treatment group outperformed the comparison group provides evidence of the positive effect of having students…

The authors teach upper-level science courses in cell biology, genetics, and biochemistry at a public, four-year "community university" that serves a demographically diverse population of traditional and nontraditional students. In this article, they describe some of the issues they have found to be particularly significant at their "community…

In this project, introductory college physics students (noneducation majors) were asked to teach simple machines to a class of second graders. This nontraditional activity proved to be a successful way to encourage college students to think critically about physics and how it applied to their everyday lives. The noneducation majors benefited by…

Students' learning about the nature of science (NOS) consists of two related aspects that include their understandings of and ability to apply science processes, and their beliefs about NOS. To help students develop such understandings, the New Society activity gets them talking to each other about science, using the language of science such as…