This book provides an international perspective of current work aimed at both clarifying the theoretical foundations for the use of multimodal representations as a part of effective science education pedagogy and the pragmatic application of research findings to actual classroom settings. Intended for a wide ranging audience from science education faculty members and researchers to classroom teachers, school administrators, and curriculum developers, the studies reported in this book can inform best practices in K - 12 classrooms of all science disciplines and provide models of how to improve science literacy for all students. Specific descriptions of classroom activities aimed at helping infuses the use of multimodal representations in classrooms are combined with discussion of the impact on student learning. Overarching findings from a synthesis of the various studies are presented to help assert appropriate pedagogical and instructional implications as well as to suggest further avenues of research.

In a changing world that demands new skills, a vital concern of public education is the gap in academic performance between low- and high-achieving students. There is no excuse for the achievement gaps that persist among poor and minority students in schools today. All students can succeed at high levels, regardless of race, ethnicity and economic background. Several countries have successfully confronted inequities in achievement, demonstrating that any school can close achievement gaps regardless of the community they serve, and that all students can achieve at high levels when they are provided with the right opportunities. This book is about understanding what factors selected countries have applied to promote progress and what factors contribute to progress in the closing of achievement gaps. It is about creating opportunities for all students.
"Closing the Achievement Gap from an International Perspective: Transforming STEM for Effective Education" is written in response to rising concern for the improvement of quality education - especially in mathematics and science - provided to all students. The contributors take a systematic view of the subject, beginning with a cross-national analysis of teacher qualifications and the achievement gap that spans 50 countries. The content of the book is organized in sections describing education around the globe: North and South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia. Individual chapters offer close-up analysis of efforts to close achievement gaps in the U.S. and Canada, Mexico, England, Turkey, China, South Africa and Australia among many others.The contributors provide information on the achievement gap in mathematics and science, review current research, and present strategies for fostering improvement and raising performance with a focus on school-related variables that adversely affect educational outcomes among poor and minority students. The authors of the various chapters looked at how students' data correlated with classroom practices, teacher instruction and academic programming, as part of their efforts to measure student growth. Qualitative and quantitative data are provided to provide evidence not only of the problem, but also for the solution. The book concludes with a chapter on promoting equality and equity to shrink the achievement gap worldwide."

American science education is in trouble. As the United States continues to lag behind other nations in science achievement, the question is asked: how can we better get our students excited and inspired by science? This is the science teacher's duty. The irony of the education profession is that some of the most important aspects of it are the hardest to measure and replicate. The things that matter most can be the hardest to quantify. Some teachers can know the different learning styles, intelligences, and brain preferences of their students. They can know best practices of how to deliver instruction. They can do all these things and more, but still not convey imagination and passion for science to their students. But some science teachers do inspire. These special teachers seem to possess something the others don't, but what is it? Exceptional science teachers make us feel better about ourselves through their teaching of science, and bring us to a higher quality of life as a result, while some science teachers can be the leading researchers in their fields, yet leave us flat. What is the recipe for this unique, special teacher? And why is it so hard to explain and describe? The objective of this book is to uncover these aspects of teaching that are so hard to measure and quantify. This is achieved through interviewing people who are either current or retired teachers, or who were positively affected by a teacher, and also through case studies of exceptional teachers in order to quantify and explain the exact traits and personality quirks of these exceptional people. The contribution to the field of education this book hopes to achieve is the examination of the question; why do some teachers have that "X" factor, what, exactly is it, and how can we all have it?

The purpose of the edited volume is to provide an international lens to examine evidence-based investigations in Ethno-STEM research: Ethno-science, Ethno-technology, Ethno-engineering, and Ethno-mathematics. These themes grew out of multi-national, multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary efforts to preserve as well as epitomize the role that Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) play in cognitive development and its vital contributions to successful and meaningful learning in conventional and non-conventional contexts. Principled by the Embodied, Situated, and Distributed Cognition (ESDC), this innovative book will provide evidence supporting the embeddedness of a thinking-in-acting model as a fundamental framework that explains and supports students' acquisition of scientific knowledge. So often 'western' science curricula are experienced as irrelevant, since it does not take cognizance of the daily experiences and world in which the learner finds himself. This book takes a socio-cultural look at IKS and applies research in neuroscience to make a case its incorporation in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) classroom. We use the Embodied Situated Distributed Cognition (ESDC) Model as conceptual framework in this book. Although the value of IKS is often acknowledged in curriculum policy documents, teachers are most often not trained in incorporating IK in the classroom. Teachers' lack of the necessary pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in effectively incorporating IK in their classrooms is a tremendous problem internationally. Another problem is that IK is often perceived as "pseudo-science", and scholars advocating for the incorporation of IK in the school curriculum often do not contextualize their arguments within a convincing theoretical and conceptual framework.

Rough and soft. Hot and cold. Wet and dry. How do you tell the difference? This book introduces students to the concept of opposites. With images that are easy to identify and clear, simple sentence structures, this science reader simplifies scientific concepts for young students as they improve their reading skills. A fun and easy science experiment and Your Turn! activity provide more in-depth opportunities for additional learning. Nonfiction text features include a glossary and an index. Engage students in learning with this dynamic text!

Science Bug International is an exciting and comprehensive science programme that has been designed to make sure your children never stop asking questions about their world! The Topic Book includes fun and engaging practical activities as well as opportunities for consolidation and reflection making it perfect for use inside and outside the classroom. With full and comprehensive coverage of the skills and knowledge required for curriculum attainment, Science Bug International will help you to nurture and inspire your young scientist.

Apply high-quality project-based learning strategies to create lessons and units that help students solve a variety of urgent environmental problems. Environmental science (ES) education is essential to providing students with opportunities for hands-on investigations to find solutions to complex environmental problems. But the recent COVID-19 crisis has dramatically curtailed student access to ES-focused experiences, particularly affecting students of color and those from low-income communities. At the same time, changes in pollution and air quality levels, as well as a resurgence of wildlife, have created new avenues for students to connect with the revitalized world through technology and social-emotional learning (SEL) strategies. Project-based learning (PBL), with its emphasis on inquiry and authentic challenges, can be an effective approach to teaching ES. Those new to PBL may not feel they have adequate training. Likewise, teachers who haven't taught ES may question how to incorporate it into their curriculum. This book addresses both situations, providing practical guidance for teachers, along with examples of technology-rich, learner-centered student projects covering a range of timely and cross-curricular topics such as endangered animal populations, maintenance of oceans, rebounding of bee populations and urban air quality. This book: Helps teachers design learning experiences that model authentic problems and processes practiced by scientists and engineers, to prepare students for future careers in science. Provides strategies to develop students' SEL skills and instill in them a renewed empathy for the environment as they get a glimpse of what a better, cleaner and more sustainable world can look like. Introduces facilitation techniques that redefine the teacher's traditional role as one that supports increased student agency, the development of critical thinking skills and an expanded awareness of their place in the global community. Includes a chapter that focuses on applying the principles and strategies shared in the book in an online learning environment. Addresses Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) topics in environmental science and is aligned to the ISTE Standards for Educators. PBL is one of the best ways for students to explore complex processes and concepts, and this book will help teachers leverage this approach to empower students to take action toward a better future and world.

Science Bug International is an exciting and comprehensive science programme that has been designed to make sure your children never stop asking questions about their world! The Topic Book includes fun and engaging practical activities as well as opportunities for consolidation and reflection making it perfect for use inside and outside the classroom. With full and comprehensive coverage of the skills and knowledge required for curriculum attainment, Science Bug International will help you to nurture and inspire your young scientist.

This brilliantly bonkers book takes a sideways look at all that is wild, wonderful and downright weird about science, including sections on animals, plants and the human body. Find out what made the loudest sound ever heard, why spiders do cartwheels and what happens inside your ...

Making big science topics just the right size for little readers as we explore the human body. Did you know that your body is two-thirds water? Or that it takes two days for food to go right through your body? The human body is pretty amazing, and we'd like to tell you why... So sit back, and let expert scientist and CBeebies writer Emily Dodd tell you all about the human body. With bite-sized text, facts to make you say 'WOW', and easy-to-understand explanations, big science topics are now just the right size for readers 4 years plus. Brilliantly illustrated by Chorkung, this is the perfect little book for readers who are just discovering all the AMAZING STUFF in the world around them.

This volume investigates a number of issues needed to develop a modular, effective, versatile, cost effective, pedagogically-embedded, user-friendly, and sustainable online laboratory system that can deliver its true potential in the national and global arenas. This allows individual researchers to develop their own modular systems with a level of creativity and innovation while at the same time ensuring continuing growth by separating the responsibility for creating online laboratories from the responsibility for overseeing the students who use them. The volume first introduces the reader to several system architectures that have proven successful in many online laboratory settings. The following chapters then describe real-life experiences in the area of online laboratories from both technological and educational points of view. The volume further collects experiences and evidence on the effective use of online labs in the context of a diversity of pedagogical issues. It also illustrates successful online laboratories to highlight best practices as case studies and describes the technological design strategies, implementation details, and classroom activities as well as learning from these developments. Finally the volume describes the creation and deployment of commercial products, tools and services for online laboratory development. It also provides an idea about the developments that are on the horizon to support this area.

These giant books of projects and experiments take a hands-on approach to science concepts. Hundreds of simple and easy experiments explore various scientific principles behind natural phenomena like friction, centrifugal force, and the underlying laws of physics that help make machines work. These fun yet practical experiments make it easy for anyone to become a rocket scientist What makes a wind-up toy move? Why do you oil your bicycle chain but not your brake pads? This book helps kids master the laws of force and motion through simple experiments they can conduct using common household items. Each experiment includes step-by-step, illustrated instructions as well as background information, studies, and results that help kids develop a deeper understanding of the concept.

Learner-centered teaching is a pedagogical approach that emphasizes the roles of students as participants in and drivers of their own learning. Learner-centered teaching activities go beyond traditional lecturing by helping students construct their own understanding of information, develop skills via hands-on engagement, and encourage personal reflection through metacognitive tasks. In addition, learner-centered classroom approaches may challenge students' preconceived notions and expand their thinking by confronting them with thought-provoking statements, tasks or scenarios that cause them to pay closer attention and cognitively "see" a topic from new perspectives. Many types of pedagogy fall under the umbrella of learner-centered teaching including laboratory work, group discussions, service and project-based learning, and student-led research, among others. Unfortunately, it is often not possible to use some of these valuable methods in all course situations given constraints of money, space, instructor expertise, class-meeting and instructor preparation time, and the availability of prepared lesson plans and material. Thus, a major challenge for many instructors is how to integrate learner-centered activities widely into their courses. The broad goal of this volume is to help advance environmental education practices that help increase students' environmental literacy. Having a diverse collection of learner-centered teaching activities is especially useful for helping students develop their environmental literacy because such approaches can help them connect more personally with the material thus increasing the chances for altering the affective and behavioral dimensions of their environmental literacy. This volume differentiates itself from others by providing a unique and diverse collection of classroom activities that can help students develop their knowledge, skills and personal views about many contemporary environmental and sustainability issues.

Part of the "Accelerate" series, "Exploration of Mars" describes the types of space mission that would be required to bring life to Mars. It looks at different space probes and vehicles using illustrations with extended captions and labels. How and why would Mars need to be altered in order for human life to be sustainable on the planet? There is a discussion about what living things need to survive. The book offers a split page presentation which creates some interesting changes of scene. For example, readers can see how the inside of a habitation module corresponds to its interior.

This book consolidates contemporary thinking and research efforts in teaching and learning about the nature of science in science education. The term 'Nature of Science' (NoS) has appeared in the science education literature for many decades. While there is still a controversy among science educators about what constitutes NoS, educators are unanimous in acknowledging the importance of this topic as well as the need to make it explicit in teaching science. The general consensus is that the nature of science is an intricate and multifaceted theme that requires continued scholarship. Recent analysis of research trends in science education indicates that investigation of the nature of science continues to be one of the most prevalent topics in academic publications.

"Advances in Nature of Science Research" explores teaching and assessing the nature of science as a means of addressing and solving problems in conceptual change, developing positive attitudes toward science, promoting thinking habits, advancing inquiry skills and preparing citizens literate in science and technology.The book brings together prominent scholars in the field to share their cutting-edge knowledge about the place of the nature of science in science teaching and learning contexts. The chapters explore theoretical frameworks, new directions and changing practices from intervention studies, discourse analyses, classroom-based investigations, anthropological observations, and design-based research. "