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Journal Article

Editor’s Roundtable: Science, the ultimate math word problem

Science is a proving ground for skills learned in math classes, and for most students, it is often the first place where they have had to repeatedly use math to answer questions and solve problems. A lack of math skills can have a negative impact on ...

Journal Article

Making and Measuring a Model of a Salt Marsh

Students are often confused by the difference between the terms accuracy and precision. In the following activities, students explore the definitions of accuracy and precision while learning about salt march ecology and the methods used by scientists...

Journal Article

Tried and True: The blue bottle demonstration

The abilities to propose experiments, make observations, and use data to justify conclusions are critical to the scientific process (NRC 1996; NRC 2000). The Blue Bottle Demonstration provides an excellent platform for introducing these skills. The d...

Journal Article

Science Sampler: Sinking and floating—Bringing math to the surface

The concept of density underlies the explanation for a variety of natural phenomena such as weather patterns and plate tectonics. However, we often find that although students can identify the formula d = m/v, they are not able to apply it to other c...

Journal Article

Reflections on Czech Science Teaching

International comparisons help us explore the assumptions made about U.S. schools, students, and pedagogy. That is why the author decided to spend five months in the Czech Republic teaching science education courses at Palacky and Ostrava Universitie...

Journal Article

Draw-a-Scientist/Mystery Box Redux

The sequence of activities presented here—Draw-a-Scientist and the Mystery Box Redux—were designed to help students better understand the nature of science (NOS) and engage them in the process of scientific inquiry. As a result, students begin to...

Journal Article

Teaching Science to Students from Rural Mexico

George Roberts has been teaching ninth-grade Earth science in Gardston, Iowa, for 10 years. This year, as chair of the Gardston High School’s science department, he agreed to have all the English Language Learner (ELL) students assigned to his clas...

Journal Article

Editor’s Note: The Voices of Science

Developing literacy skills in science develops students’ voices. These voices give us representation, a role in decisions, a way to express ourselves, and a chance to participate. A voice is a profound gift that requires knowledge and responsibilit...

Journal Article

Engaging General Biology Students With Learning Contracts

Students in a general biology class used a learning contract where they selected chapter-relevant activities they could complete through several formats: oral, written, or artistic. The majority of students felt they learned a lot with this method, t...

Journal Article

Research and Teaching: Location, Location, Location—Does Seat Location Affect Performance in Large Classes?

This study found no evidence that seat location affects student achievement even in very large classes where students sitting in the back are a considerable distance from the instructor. Rather, the differences in performance observed were consistent...

Journal Article

Point of View: In Defense of the Lecture

Science education research has produced empirical data supporting good teaching techniques. An awareness of this body of knowledge can be helpful in deciding what to do with your 50 minutes to increase the effectiveness of your lecture. Some simple b...

Journal Article

Science Sampler: My glass of water has “circulating streams” in it!

The use of science stations in the classroom is a good way to integrate investigative skills and the teaching of science content. The author uses two different types of science stations within the 5E learning cycle (Bybee et al., 1989) to teach the t...

Journal Article

Developing an Interdisciplinary Curriculum Framework for Aquatic-Ecosystem Modeling

This paper presents results from a July 2005 workshop and course aimed at developing an interdisciplinary course on modeling aquatic ecosystems that will provide the next generation of practitioners with critical skills for which formal training is p...

Journal Article

Using Japanese Lesson Design to ANTicipate an Invasion on Maui

Native ant species do not exist on the island of Maui, the second largest of the Hawaiian Islands. However, one ant, the little fire ant (LFA or Wasmannia auropunctata) has recently appeared in the region, being discovered on the Big Island of Hawaii...

Journal Article

Commentary: Looking Back—A Nation at Risk and National Standards

Looking back, we were a nation at risk in the early 1980s, and, looking around, we still are. As the pace of global change and technological innovation increase, preparing our students for their adult lives is like hitting a moving target. We are not...

Journal Article

Invite an Alien to Astronomy Night

Dozens of inflatable aliens recently “descended” upon the authors’ middle school to kick-off their first school-wide Astronomy night. With an estimated attendance of over 500, their eighth-grade students hosted over a dozen activity-rich sessio...

Journal Article

Teaching the Nature of Science Through the Concept of Living

By virtue of its connection with scientific literacy, the nature of science has been considered essential subject matter for the science curriculum. With this in mind, seventh-grade students were introduced to three aspects of the nature of science: ...

Journal Article

Solve Medical Mysteries

Wondering how to make the study of the immune system and infectious agents more relevant to your students’ lives? The online adventure series, Medical Mysteries, can provide the context and motivation. The series combines the drama of television’...

Journal Article

The Prepared Practitioner: Constructivism and Conceptual Change, Part II

As complex and theoretical as constructivist principles sounds, classroom application often boils down to two precepts. First, learning is an active process—it does not happen passively. Learners need to mentally process new ideas to assimilate or...

Journal Article

The Early Years: Science Tickets

Teachers can spark interest in a science topic by using “science tickets”—special objects offered to children as a way to transition to the science room or into a small group to do a science activity. Objects ranging from ordinary (shells, leav...

Journal Article

Choice, Control, And Change: Using Scientific Evidence to Promote Healthful Food and Activity Choices

Childhood obesity and its long-term health implications should be of major concern to science educators. In an effort to support teachers and youth about this growing problem, a five-unit, 19-lesson module entitled Choice, Control, and Change (C3) wa...

Journal Article

Science Teaching and International Assessments

This article is an introduction to the international assessments Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and a review of results from 2003. International comparisons,...

Journal Article

Career of the Month: An Interview with Green Product Chemist Andy Chen

Green chemistry is the design of chemical products and processes that reduce, recycle, or eliminate the use of generation of hazardous substances. The fundamental idea of green chemistry is that the designer of a chemical is responsible for consider...

Journal Article

Perspectives: Reading and Science

To become good readers, students need experience in reading for information. Science class is an ideal place for students to develop motivation and strategies for informational reading. Yet with the promotion of hands-on science, many teachers get th...

Journal Article

Scope on Safety: Sun Safety

So, what does “sun safety” have to do with middle school science teachers, especially during the winter months? With the movement toward hands-on science and environmentally oriented curricula, more students and teachers in science classes are do...

Journal Article

A Cultural Classroom Library

Native American and other cultural stories provide students with a broader perspective on the world. In addition, cultural stories connect science content and knowledge about the world to cultural interpretations and people’s life ways. By implemen...

Journal Article

Science Prop Boxes

A prop box is a teacher-created resource full of age-appropriate and meaningful activities focused on a central theme. Prop boxes work much like learning centers in an elementary classroom with the important addition of providing opportunities for so...

Journal Article

Safe Science: Circuit Safety

The study of electricity in general science or physics is fascinating for students. Unfortunately, a number of electrical dangers exist in the laboratory that are applicable to all types of science including biology, chemistry, physics, and Earth sci...

Journal Article

Inquiring Into The Digestive System

Teaching science by means of inquiry-based projects has the potential to transform the science lab into a place of debate and discovery, but teachers run the risk of either leaving students to work too independently or forcing them to be too dependen...

Journal Article

Inquiry by Design Briefs

Design briefs are plausible situations in which students are asked to solve problems given limited materials, a specific time frame, and a number of rules and limitations. It is the author’s contention that the design brief, an established format i...

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Science Shorts: Taking a Look at the Moon

The communication skills of reading and writing go hand in hand with science as natural partners for fostering students’ understandings of the world. The similarities that exist between reading and writing strategies and science-process skills add ...

Journal Article

Ask the Experts—November 2007

In this month’s column, the experts address the following questions: If you are in a car traveling at the speed of light, what would you observe if you turned on the headlights? and Given that absolute zero is the lower limit to temperature, a theo...

Journal Article

Favorite Demonstration: Demonstrating Inquiry-Based Teaching Competencies in the Life Sciences—Part 2

This set of botany demonstrations is a continuation of the inquiry-based lecture activities that provide realistic connections to the history and nature of science and employ technology in data collection (see the September/October issue of JCST fo...

Journal Article

Society for College Science Teachers: Revisiting the Cone of Learning—Is it a Reliable Way to Link Instruction Method with Knowledge Recall?

In his article, Dale had constructed a tiered triangle to rank students’ ability to recall information that had been taught six weeks earlier (Dale 1969). Dale had found that only 5% of the knowledge gained through lecture was remembered by student...