The transition from elementary school to the upper grades can lead to ambiguous feelings toward the new, male teachers. This study investigated whether collaborative animal care in biology lessons affects students' feelings of relatedness toward their biology teachers positively during the first year after the school transition. Four hundred…

Started in north-east England in 2015, MammalWeb aims to improve our knowledge of British mammals through the use of motion-sensing camera traps. Fundamental to the project is the involvement of local communities and individuals who act as citizen scientists. They contribute to the collection and analysis of the camera trap photographic data.…

The objective of our program is to foster and facilitate authentic research experiences in middle and high school science courses. We do so by providing students with a complete experience in scientific experimentation and communication. The centerpiece is a set of experiment modules in which students investigate the effects of toxic chemicals on…

As institutions, science and science education alike have rarely included the perspectives and contributions of indigenous peoples pertaining to the natural world. Yet, people worldwide have benefited from the traditional ecological knowledge of indigenous communities. Western science and technology, though broadly worthwhile, have been a source…

"If you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door," Ralph Waldo Emerson is often credited with saying. In today's world, that might more likely be "if you build a better cell phone..." or maybe "a better vehicle..." But as an 8th-grade design project, the author challenges his students to build that better mousetrap. In…

A collaborative effort between a junior high school and a nearby university allowed 40 eighth-grade honors students to engage in a scientific investigation within a university laboratory. These students, with their science teachers and university researchers, gathered data on egg cannibalism in a beach-spawning fish and thereby contributed to an…

This article describes a two-day lesson in which fifth-grade students took on the role of marine biology scientists, using their critical-thinking and problem-solving skills to explore human impact on the blue crab ecosystem. The purpose of "Crabby Interactions" was to help students understand the impact of human activities on the local…

The STEM team at the University of Worcester support STEM activities in schools in Herefordshire and Worcestershire. Part of this help includes suggesting activities for STEM clubs. As the biologist on the team author, Sue Howarth was asked by teachers for ideas to use in biology clubs. This article was prompted by feedback that these ideas might…

This article discusses how real research on Down syndrome, being done in a lab at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI), was incorporated into a laboratory activity for middle school students. The activity asked students to evaluate real evidence from the research laboratory of a GK-12 fellow (a graduate student funded by the…