JoinAll Resources
Journal Article
Scope on the Skies: Moon phases
When teaching Moon phases, the focus seems to be on the sequence of Moon phases and, in some grade levels, how Moon phases occur. Either focus can sometimes be a challenge, especially without the use of models and observations of the Moon. In this mo...
Journal Article
The setting: the science classroom. The characters: you and your students. The scene: Your students acting out scientific discoveries, modeling a frog’s life cycle, mimicking the transition from liquid to solid. This is dramatic science, a teaching...
Journal Article
Scope on Safety: Glue guns—Aiming for safety
While glue guns are very useful, there are safety issues. Regardless of the temperature setting, glue guns can burn skin. The teacher should demonstrate and supervise the use of glue guns and have a plan should a student get burned. There should be a...
Journal Article
The New Teacher’s Toolbox: Teaching in the Digital Age
New technologies are engaging today’s students the way PowerPoint did a decade ago. The pressure to go digital can seem especially overwhelming to new teachers, but fear not! Teaching in the digital age is easier than you think. This month’s colu...
Journal Article
Technology can be a powerful tool to increase motivation, engagement, and achievement (Park, Khan, and Petrina 2009). In this article, the authors describe their collaborative approach to integrating technology with a lab on bacterial transformation....
Journal Article
Last year, the author of this month’s Idea Bank had his 11th-grade physics students in Shanghai, China work with students from Chicago, Illinois. Both sets of students were given a list of questions and problems and asked to work together via Skype...
Journal Article
GENIQUEST is a cyberlearning computer program that allows students to investigate biological data using a research-based instructional model. In this article, the authors make the case for using cyberlearning to teach students about the rapidly growi...
Journal Article
Safer Science: “Chemicals of Interest” and More
In the science classroom, developing security involves more than just looking up chemicals. Securing high school science laboratories, preparation rooms, and storerooms is an integral part of protecting schools and the general public from terrorist-t...
Journal Article
Flower petals, acorn hats, exoskeletons of beetles, and lichens are just a few of the objects students may find in a surprising array of vivid colors. These tiny examples from nature’s palette can be discovered in a school yard, a park, or even alo...
Journal Article
NSTA initiated the student chapter program in 2001 to help preservice science teachers at universities and colleges gain access to professional development opportunities and provide support as they enter the profession. Here the authors share example...
NSTA Press Book
Exemplary Science for Resolving Societal Challenges
Amid a flurry of national standards and high-stakes assessments, it’s easy to overlook the curiosity and invention that is inherent to science and that should be central to any science lesson plan. Similarly, the connections between what students l...
eBook
Exemplary Science for Resolving Societal Challenges (e-book)
Amid a flurry of national standards and high-stakes assessments, it’s easy to overlook the curiosity and invention that is inherent to science and that should be central to any science lesson plan. Similarly, the connections between what students l...
Book Chapter
A Perspective on the Reform of Science Teaching
This chapter presents a perspective on reform. It begins with a brief review of the instructional core, then turns to a larger view of reform, one that includes broader questions of goals and progresses to the most fundamental area—classroom practi...
Journal Article
Scope on Safety: Negligence—Some things you can’t afford to ignore
Governmental immunity statutes may not shield science teachers from lawsuits if the teachers fail to take appropriate safety measures in the face of known hazards or dangers in the laboratory. The lesson then seems simple: Understand your “duty of ...
Journal Article
Message from the NSTA President: Imagine and Invent—Create a Great Future
The time is right for an emphasis on imagination and innovativeness in science education, both in students and in teachers. Change now dominates our economy and culture, and can only be realized through imagination and creativeness. Therefore, our ne...
Journal Article
Case Study: Using Photographs as Case Studies to Promote Active Learning in Biology
If a picture is worth a thousand words, think about how long it takes your students to read a thousand words. Case studies are effective and stimulating ways to teach a variety of subjects, including the biological sciences. In learning the details o...
Journal Article
Making the Case for Action Research
As any contemporary teacher knows, credit and credibility are showered on those who engage in research-based practices. And not just any research. It must be tied to a study with a large enough number of participants; a clear intervention; control an...
Journal Article
Supporting Right-Brained Thinking
In his book, A Whole New Mind, Daniel Pink champions the benefits of right-brained thinking: creativity, flexibility, empathy, and meaning. He stresses the need to not only be logical, but also aware of emotion; to not only be sequential, but also co...
Journal Article
Science 101: What and how do insects see?
Insect vision is both simple and complex. It’s simple in that insects can’t focus and generally see a blur. It’s complex in that insects are very good at detecting motion, they can see in almost any direction, they can use polarized ultraviolet...
Journal Article
In times of economic downturn, college enrollments often increase. Entering students may come from diverse educational backgrounds and bring variable skill sets. In this article, the authors describe a skills-focused course developed to ensure that t...
Journal Article
Career of the Month: An Interview With Audiologist Brian Fligor
Hearing is an important sense that many of us take for granted. Unless we are affected by hearing loss, we often do not think twice about listening to our favorite tunes or a neighbor’s conversation. Many things—from a viral infection to turning ...
Journal Article
Electrospinning has been used to create nanofibers for filtration devices, tissue engineering, and protective clothing. Although electrospinning is now widely studied, because of the expensive equipment required and the advanced nature of this topic,...
Journal Article
Despite years of formal education, approximately one-third of all undergraduate students still cannot explain the causes of the seasons. Student manipulation of a handheld model is one approach to teaching this concept; however, the large number of s...
Journal Article
Insect vision is an area of active research that allows fruitful exploration into the nature of the scientific endeavor because of the bias our own vision brings. As scientists, we use our senses to make observations, but we can’t assume that what ...
Journal Article
Imagine entering a new classroom and finding your lab materials in complete disarray. Broken bits of metal and shards of glass mirrors are interspersed among live, unlabeled radioactive sources. Splintered metersticks and oily beakers lie amidst bead...
Journal Article
Science 2.0: GeoEverything—The Magic Carpet
Global Positioning System receivers (GPSr) are an indispensible classroom bridge between maps and the physical world as students go back and forth between projections and Earth. When using a GPSr, the spatial-relations skills students employ can help...
Journal Article
Message from the NSTA President: Imagine and Invent—Create a Great Future
The time is right for an emphasis on imagination and innovativeness in science education, both in students and in teachers. Change now dominates our economy and culture, and can only be realized through imagination and creativeness. Therefore, our ne...
Journal Article
Everyday Engineering: An absorbing look at terry-cloth towels
This article describes a lesson where students explore the absorbency of several towels with different weaves and weights. The lesson follows the 5E learning-cycle model and incorporates engineering in the sense of product testing with a focus on the...
Journal Article
The Early Years: Inquiry at Play
Play and science inquiry are essential parts of early childhood programs. Imaginative play, unscripted yet guided by children’s own rules, allows students to use their imagination and develop self-regulation, symbolic thinking, memory, language, an...
Journal Article
Thinking Like a Ssssscientist!
A fear of snakes developed into an opportunity to teach students about the process of science: formulating questions, collecting and analyzing data, and communicating findings to the public. By using snakes to help students “think like a scientist,...
Journal Article
In this article, a science teacher from the Midwest reflects on her summer vacation to the Gulf of Mexico. She felt that this vacation would help improve her teaching about the environmental problems in the gulf and elsewhere. After all, anyone can s...
Journal Article
The Monroe 2-Orleans BOCES is an organization that serves nine school districts west of Rochester, New York. One of the many programs provided by Monroe 2-Orleans BOCES is a regional summer school program that allows students to recover credit during...
Journal Article
Formative Assessment Probes: “Doing” Science
The “Doing Science” probe from Uncovering Student Ideas in Science: Another 25 Formative Assessment Probes (Keeley, Eberle, and Dorsey 2008) can reveal some surprising ideas your students have about how scientists do their work. In order to build...
Journal Article
NSTA is breaking new ground with this month’s issue of Science Scope. For the first time, an NSTA journal is focused on action research and the role teachers play as classroom researchers. This issue chronicles the challenges and journeys teachers ...