Science undergraduates' timely degree completion (TDC) has become increasingly important for students themselves, universities, and society, due to issues such as cost, efficiency, and productivity, respectively. This study investigated the potential effect of several variables on TDC of Bachelor of Science (BSc) students at an Australian…

The goal of this study was to examine the way preservice science teachers depict and develop their understanding of nature of science (NOS), from the perspective of the family resemblance approach (FRA). FRA defines NOS as a Cognitive-Epistemic and Social-Institutional system. Appling the dual-analytic approach via reflective drawing analysis, we…

Emerging evidence attests to the need to intervene in young students' science motivation and achievement before their science motivation starts to dwindle. Heeding this call, we implemented a science utility value intervention for fifth and sixth graders in 23 classrooms (N = 550). Through five intervention sessions that consisted of diverse…

With the transition to distance-learning at the beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak, several countries required parents and their children to remain at home, under lockdown. Many parents found themselves taking on additional responsibilities regarding their children's education. However, children do not always interpret their parents' intentions as…

This work analyzes whether there is a cognitive bias between the ideal perception of the skills and the real performance in an introductory physics class, and additionally, whether predictions of students' performance are related to various motivational variables. We examined through a validated survey and network analysis the relationship between…

In an increasingly complex media environment, science educators must help prepare students to make decisions on science-related issues that are in the best interest of themselves and their communities. Researchers have suggested the use of socioscientific issues (SSI) to teach students how to think scientifically and to make good decisions…

The importance of science beliefs such as self-efficacy, interest, identity, sense of belonging, perceived recognition and effectiveness of peer interaction in science education has been increasingly recognized in recent years. Self-efficacy, interest, and identity can be considered students' internal beliefs, and sense of belonging, perceived…

This qualitative study aimed to explore what are pre-service elementary teachers' (N = 325) conceptualizations of scientific practices prior to their entry into the science teaching methods course through their drawn images and narratives of the scientists (male and female) and teacher as scientists. Data (drawings, narratives, and responses to…

Previous studies noted the scantiness of diagnostic instruments for the assessment of students' understanding of fundamental biochemistry concepts. Consequently, within this study, a four-tier test for the examination of secondary school students' conceptual understanding of amino acids, proteins, and enzymes has been developed. Items in the test…

The use of texts is an indispensable resource for students' learning, especially in science domains. While developing understanding of a specific topic usually is the main goal of reading expository texts, an important consideration is how to best measure whether this understanding has been reached. In this study, we aimed to analyze gains in…

This study investigated how an intervention consisting of a series of physical science lessons embedded within the elementary science methods course impacted elementary preservice teachers' (N = 473) science content knowledge as evidenced in their scaled scores for the science content component of a standardized subject certification examinations…

While technology advancement and scientific innovation have created new topics and fields of inquiry in STEM education, external content experts such as university scientists/researchers have been increasingly involved to enhance K-12 teachers' disciplinary understandings and professional development (PD). However, few studies have scrutinized…

This study aimed to examine whether withholding answers coupled with physical manipulation of material strengthened by the self-explanation effect (SEE) contribute to the development of a deeper conceptual understanding and retention of learning about motion content in a hands-on (HO) learning environment. The correlation between students'…

There is currently a lack of systematic study examining the integration of verbal-visual elements in science textbooks. In particular, few research has investigated how different types of visual representations (e.g. photograph, diagram, table) vary across the major written genres of science (e.g. information report, explanation). Based on the…

This study analyzes the potential of group-based negotiation processes based on changes in reasoning and argument weighting for a socioscientific issue (SSI) in biology classes. In the corresponding pre- and post-study, students were encouraged to reason and weight arguments about the conservation of local biodiversity before and after a…