Many studies have investigated the classification of living things. Our study deals with a different problem: the attribution of life to one component of a living organism, specifically the bones. The task involves not only specifying what we mean by "alive", but also requires "informed thinking" leading to an understanding of…

A single heartbeat is a complicated process. In Dutch upper secondary biology textbooks this process is illustrated by the classical Wiggers diagram, which usually shows different heart-related quantities, like voltage (ECG), blood pressure, and the heart sounds. It may help students to understand the nature of the Wiggers diagram if they perform…

While learning and teaching difficulties in genetics have been abundantly explored and described, there has been less focus on the development and field-testing of strategies to address them. To inform the design of such a strategy a review study, focus group interviews with teachers, a case study of a traditional series of genetics lessons,…

The method for extracting and separating hydrophobic photosynthetic pigments proposed by Katayama "et al." ("Japanese Journal of Phycology," 42, 71-77, 1994) has been improved to introduce it to student laboratories at the senior high school level. Silica gel powder was used for removing water from fresh materials prior to…

The study explored how Grade 10 science students learned from scientific graphs. This paper explores (a) students' abilities to interpret graphical information; (b) students' abilities to represent information graphically; (c) factors that could impede the process of interpretation and construction of graphs among secondary school science…

In recent years, the science teaching community and curriculum developers have emphasised the importance of teaching inquiry and teaching science as inquiry. One way of developing learners' skills for planning and carrying out scientific research is by allowing them to perform independent research, guided by a teacher. It was recently discovered…

This study employed problem-based learning (PBL) for project work in a Year 9 biology class. The purpose of the study was to investigate (a) how self-generated problems and questions directed students in their learning, (b) how students reacted to this instructional approach, and (c) the problems that they encountered. Students formulated problems…

This study examines the difficulties biology teachers face when teaching cell division in the secondary schools of the central part of the Erzurum province in Turkey. During this research, a questionnaire was distributed to a total of 36 secondary school biology teachers. Findings of the study indicate biology teachers perceive cell division as…