Describes an evaluation of a program on science and mathematics for perspective elementary teachers. Among the conclusions are that students in the program (n=65 in 1988 and n=61 in 1989) had significantly more positive scores on teaching science and mathematics than a control group of students. (PR)

This paper examines the use of students' lived experiences in an urban elementary science classroom. Students bring different funds of knowledge that are accumulated through their lived experiences into the classroom, and I examine what those funds of knowledge mean to an elementary science teacher working in an urban school. I describe how a…

Describes an educational TV series, broadcast in Pennsylvania, called Science for the Seventies (SFTS), which presents science lessons for the elementary level. Each lesson consists of objectives, background information, an equipment list, and four or five related science activities. (MLH)

The treatment group of first-graders received audio-tutorial instruction in the particulate nature of matter; the control group received audio-tutorial instruction in a nonscience subject. The treatment group used a particulate model to explain the nature of smells much more effectively than the control group. (MLH)

Reported is a study to verify the pattern of bias associated with the Model Identification Test and to determine its source. This instrument is a limited verbal science test designed to determine the knowledge possessed by elementary school children of selected concepts related to "the particle nature of matter." (PEB)

Reports the results of a study of the relationship between cognitive style and achievement in a modern elementary science program. (JR)

Describes the development of an attitude instrument and its administration with 29 elementary teachers who were members of an elementary school science institute. Each teacher's classroom performance was also judged via videotape. (Author/EB)

Describes the specialized techniques required for teaching science to deaf students. Emphasis is placed on the use of the program, Me Now, developed by the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study Group as a science course for use with young deaf children or verbally less able children. (EB)

Studied the effect of classroom verbal interactions between teachers and students on the development of skills important in process-oriented elementary science curricula. Both suburban and inner-city sixth-grade students increased their ability to infer when they were exposed to a probing, rather than a nonprobing, discussion strategy. (MLH)

Presents the transformation in the models of science teaching from 1945 to the present; compares current science education in Japan with that in the United States. (Author/GA)

Reports a study describing children's learning about controlling variables in an environment where student autonomy is maximized and teacher controlled instruction is minimized. (SL)

A factorial design which intersected process skill instruction with field experience was utilized. Significantly higher physics achievement scores and process skill competency were observed for the field-experience, process-supplemented physics course. (CP)

Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programs is summarized and discussed for Piagetian schools and alternative conceptions movement. Commonalities/differences between these two rival programs are presented along with fundamental assumptions, auxiliary hypotheses, and research policy. Suggests that research findings should not be merely…

Investigated whether instructing children in the component skills underlying Piagetian transitivity tasks would increase their performance on both transitivity-related tasks and on reasoning tasks not directly related to transitivity. Results indicate that incorporating the quantification of certain abstract symbols, training can influence…

Investigated the role of "a priori" ideas in planning experiments and data processing leading to inferences. Thirty-one students (ages 11-13) observed a "combustion/candle in a closed container" experiment and were asked to interpret sets of measurements. Findings, among others, show that children preferentially experiment on…