JoinAll Resources
Journal Article
Making a Mini-Submarine: An open-ended investigation with positively buoyant results
A minature submarine is a fascinating toy that sinks and rises in a container of water. They make excellent teaching tools for illustrating the concept of density and buoyancy. In this article, students are challenged to produce minature submarines t...
Journal Article
Students are enthusiastic with the multi-resource learning environment in which multiple resources, such as the Internet, science posters, magazines, books, CD-ROMs, and inquiry labs are used in the learning process. They can engage in their own lear...
Journal Article
Hands-On Science, 680 Hands at a Time
This article explains how students can do hands-on science in a large lecture theater with seats bolted to the floor. It specifically describes the logistics of doing a collapsing can activity in such a large class to demonstrate the birth of a black...
Journal Article
Idea Bank: Tips and techniques for creative teaching
The Idea Bank provides tips and techniques for creative teaching, in about 1,000 words. In this month’s Idea Bank the focus is on density slicing—an important analytical tool that allows students to do project work in a highly quantitative manner...
Journal Article
Teaching Teachers: Standardizing the Language of Inquiry
Using the precise language of science can help teachers develop students' science-process skills. Inquiry goes far beyond simply asking questions. Inquiry combines the use of science processes with knowledge of science content....
Journal Article
In the Footsteps of Archimedes: Archimedes' fabled experiment leads to discoveries about density
In this article, an activity is created where students find the mass of a sample of copper with the stipulation that they can use anything in the lab other than a balance. Students are given paper cups of copper shot and each has a different mass. Wo...
eBook
Charging Ahead: An Introduction to Electromagnetism (e-Book)
Charging Ahead: An Introduction to Electromagnetism is a set of hands-on activities designed to help teachers introduce middle and high school students to electromagnetism, one of the most fascinating and life changing phenomenon humankind has witnes...
eBook
Community Connections For Science Education: History and Theory You Can Use, Volume II (e-Book)
Community Connections For Science Education: History and Theory You Can Use, Volume II takes a look at various informal science education (ISE) settings—some found in most communities, some unique to one location. An informal science experience has...
Journal Article
Idea Bank: Tips and techniques for creative teaching
The Idea Bank provides tips and techniques for creative teaching, in about 1,000 words. In this month’s Idea Bank, learn about open-ended inquiry and the encouragement to shift science away from the traditional "cookbook" type lab to more inquiry-b...
Journal Article
You Can Always Tell a Dancer by Her Feet
This discrepant event and the activities that follow examine pressure from a scientific perspective, while applying math to deepen students’ understanding of the concept. Although this unit was developed for use with preservice teachers, you also u...
Journal Article
Visualizing Science Using the Roundhouse Diagram
At the middle school level, science instruction becomes complicated by difficult vocabulary and complex, often abstract, notions (Jones and McEwin, 1983). To learn science, students must understand key concepts through reasoning, searching out relate...
Journal Article
Boiling Ice: A physics demonstration illustrating the kinetic molecular theory of matter
Physics is a good course to teach to young students because inquiry-based activities can be integrated into lectures to reinforce concepts and ideas. This article features a favorite activity that keeps student interest high—where ice is made by bo...
Journal Article
It happens every summer in Scott County, Virginia. Kids take time off from their summer vacation to return to the science classroom. They return to build bridges, make polymers, fill prescriptions, and work side by side with practicing chemists, engi...
Journal Article
Commentary: Enriching the Curriculum
An opinion piece about teachers covering the basic science curriculum, and doing this while meeting the needs and interests of an increasingly diverse student population....
Journal Article
Optic Inquiry: Students investigate a simple anomaly to learn basic science skills
Using an inquiry approach in the classroom is an effective teaching method. In this article, the inquiry-based lesson called "Magic in a Tube," helps students formulate questions, practice science skills, incorporate writing in science work, develop ...
Journal Article
Scope on the Skies: Ancient Skies
Writing this month’s column is quite literally a once in a millennium opportunity. As the New Year, century, and millennium get underway, many of us are wondering what lies ahead. But before we take look at the evening skies of our future, the auth...
Journal Article
Planimal House: An inquiry-oriented project in which biology students study live organisms
Planimal House is a six-week-long inquiry oriented project that enables biology students to learn the secrets of nature by doing in-depth research on living creatures. It brings biology and the nature of inquiry alive!...
Journal Article
Drawing on Student Understanding: Using illustrations to invoke deeper thinking about animals.
Students spent a significant amount of time learning about insects, using art and drawing as tools to deepen their understanding. Using artistic expression enhances students' abilities to communicate science explanations, to engage in science as a me...
Journal Article
Editor's Roundtable: Start the new year right
Science Scope’s editor shares thoughts regarding the current issue....
Journal Article
This mobile science outreach project began as an extension of Citylab—a biotechnology learning laboratory for Boston middle and high school students and teachers at Boston University School of Medicine. Quality science education is the mission of t...
Journal Article
How do you light a fire under a class of 36 thirteen and fourteen-year olds and convince them that they want to learn about physics, chemistry, and math so badly that they are willing to give up recess and lunch to learn more? For the author’s stud...
Book Chapter
Standards have become a part of the educational landscape. In this chapter, we survey the origins of national standards; reflect on their power, in particular those in science education; and examine the role professional development must play if stan...
Book Chapter
The Role of the Science Leader in Implementing Standards-Based Science Programs
Although most of the literature of reform and systemic change focuses on policy, programs, and practices that the leaders should be responsible for producing, this chapter will emphasize what is known about how leaders bring about these improvements ...
Book Chapter
Celebrating Cultural Diversity: Science Learning for All—An Introduction
What is a “multicultural” classroom? Classrooms, even if they are filled with non-majority students, are not necessarily multicultural. There are three elements necessary for a truly multicultural science-learning environment: First, the sense th...
Book Chapter
What Should Students Learn About the Nature of Science and How Should We Teach It?
The purpose of this article is to: 1) explicate the central pattern of scientific reasoning, 2) show that the pattern has been applied by scientists to help answer a wide range of scientific questions, and 3) argue that sequencing instruction that ...
Book Chapter
Two natural forces are continuously at work on the landscape—the forces of destruction and the forces of construction. In locations of destruction, the material that is lost through natural events must go somewhere else, and landforms are construct...
Book Chapter
This section introduces students to the animals that depend on soil. In addition to studying the animals students can see, introduce them to Earth's vast invisible life—the billions of microscopic organisms, such as bacteria, protozoa, fungi, and a...
Book Chapter
Soil erosion can be caused by water or wind. Although undetectable at first, the natural process of erosion from water and wind can lead to significant soil losses from agricultural and urbanizing land. In this section, students simulate rain and win...
Book Chapter
Soil is the solid material on Earth’s surface that results from the interaction of weather and biological activities with the underlying geologic formation. Soil is produced from broken down rocks, organic matter (decayed animal and plant life), wa...
Book Chapter
Because you are reading this book, we are going to make the bold assumption that you’re interested in creating, improving, or solidifying a formal-informal partnership in science education. In this chapter, you will discover the opportunities that ...
Book Chapter
The Standards vision guides the discussion in this chapter on science teaching standards for the postsecondary level. The discussion centers on the importance of goal setting, designing experiences to meet students’ needs, assessment, and collegial...
Book Chapter
One of the reasons for studying toxicology at the high school level is its relevance to everyday life. On a daily basis we are confronted with news reports about toxic chemicals in our food, water, and environment. How do we decide which of these are...