Scientific literacy is a central aim of science education. The "Programme for International Student Assessment" (PISA) provides a measure of secondary students' scientific literacy and reported science instruction in 72 countries. Researchers have analyzed PISA data to identify important relationships between science instruction and…

This paper presents a bibliometric analysis of highly cited articles published in the Web of Science category "Education and Educational Research" in the Social Science Citation Index (SSCI). A total of 2091 journal articles published in this category and cited more than 100 times up to the end of the year 2016 were retrieved as highly…

Globalisation and policy transfer in education make it incumbent upon decision makers to prioritise among competing policy options, select policy initiatives that are appropriate for their national contexts, and understand how system-specific factors moderate the relationship between those policies and student outcomes. This study used qualitative…

Teachers are the most important school resource. In every country, teachers' salaries and training represent the greatest share of expenditure on education; and this investment in teachers can have significant returns. Research shows that being taught by the best teachers can make a real difference in the learning and life outcomes of otherwise…

Explanatory typologies have recently experienced a renaissance as a research strategy for constructing and assessing causal explanations. However, both the new methodological works on explanatory typologies and the way such typologies have been used in practice have been affected by two shortcomings. First, no elaborate procedures for assessing…

Although well researched in educational studies, inquiry-based learning, a student-centred way of teaching, is far away from being implemented in day-to-day science and mathematics teaching on a large scale. It is a challenge for teachers to adopt this new way of teaching in an often not supportive school context. Therefore it is important to…

Educators, policymakers, and parents alike are focused on ensuring the academic success of the nation's students. These efforts interact with the expanding use of technology, which affects the lives of students both inside and outside of the classroom. Thus, the role that technology plays in education is an evolving area of research that continues…

The Eurydice network has been collecting data on instruction time for more than two decades. These data have been published in many Eurydice publications, notably all editions of the 'Key data on Education'. Since 2010, annually updated data on instruction time has been available on the Eurydice website. Since 2013, the Eurydice network has been…

Due to the broad acceptance of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and other comparative studies as instruments of policymaking, its accuracy is essential. This article attempts to demonstrate omissions in the conceptualisation, and consequently in calculation and interpretation, of one of the central points of PISA 2006 and…

Twelve articles present excerpts from several national reports of countries participating on the Second International Science Study (SISS) of the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement. The SISS examined science achievement and its correlates in participating countries and studied trends from 1970 through the…

What it means to be a "student" varies within and between countries. Apart from the wide variety of school types and school quality that is experienced by young people, there also is, accompanying increased rates of school participation, a growing population of students who work part-time. The theoretical and actual consequences of…

Presents invited reports that express the personal views of physiologists on the historical influences of physiology education in their countries. Includes reports from Argentina, Australia, Germany, Hungary, India, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the United Arab Emirates. (DDR)

Although the participation rates of females in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (or STEM) education is poor in most Western countries, considerable differences across countries exist as well. This may be due to differences in the so-called gender achievement gaps, that is, delays of one sex with respect to the other. The variation…

The matter presented in this circular relates to the military training of youths of school age, conducted either as a part of the regular school work or by independent agencies. Military instruction, of the exact nature and to the same extent as that given to soldiers, is not found in the schools of any country of Europe except the special…

This study is a comparative analysis that addresses the question: to what extent has the relationship between parental socioeconomic characteristics and educational opportunities changed over time and why? The document suggests six hypotheses regarding change in the effects of social origins on education transitions: (1) modernization hypothesis:…