Children understand the natural world in ways that make sense to them before they learn any science in school. This column provides ideas and techniques to enhance science teaching. This month's issue helps students connect scientifically correct ideas to what makes sense to them.

Each time students engage in a classroom activity, they make tacit interpretations (about the nature of those activities) that influence how they reason and ultimately what they learn. For example, a student answering a physics question on a worksheet might draw on her everyday thinking to help make sense of the physics, or she might not even…

Studies of learning in school settings indicate that many students frame activities in science classes as the production of answers for the teacher or test, rather than as making new sense of the natural world. A case study of an episode from a class taught by the first author demonstrates what productive and unproductive student framing can look…

The populations of many nations are aging rapidly. This trend is happening against a background of research indicating that ageism is the most commonly experienced form of prejudice. The present research used intergroup contact theory as a framework to explore young people's attitudes and behavioral intentions towards the elderly. Regression…

A cross-sectional study (N = 61) investigated the relationship between young people's previous experiences of intergenerational contact and their willingness to engage in future contact with the elderly. Regression analyses confirmed that frequent positive intergenerational contact predicted more positive outcome expectancies, less intergroup…

When teachers or students assess the quality of ideas in science classes, they do so mostly based on "textbook correctness"; ideas are good to the extent they align with or lead to the content as presented in the textbook or curriculum. Such appeals to authority are at odds with the values and practices within the disciplines of science. There has…

Describes how the concept of similar triangles was taught using an optical method of estimating large distances as a corresponding activity. Includes the derivation of a formula to calculate one source of measurement error and is a nice exercise in the use of the properties of similar triangles. (Author/NB)

Learning mathematics is the central goal of mathematics education, yet it is the least frequently addressed of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics' (NCTM's) Principles and Standards. With an increasing population of English language learners and the inclusion of students with learning disabilities into the regular mathematics…