It can be a struggle for early childhood teachers to create hands-on, engaging lessons about animals. This is especially true of units that require exposure to a wide range of animals from a variety of habitats. The authors' describe how they shook up their traditional animal unit by creating a Kindergarten zoo! Herein they summarize their…

Teaching scientific writing in biology classes is challenging for both teachers and students. This article offers and reviews several useful 'toolkit' items that instructors of science writing can use to improve college student success. The tools in this kit are both conceptual and practical, and include: (1) Understanding the role of student…

Undergraduate life science majors are reputed to have negative emotions toward mathematics, yet little empirical evidence supports this. We sought to compare emotions of majors in the life sciences versus other natural sciences and math. We adapted the Attitudes toward the Subject of Chemistry Inventory to create an Attitudes toward the Subject of…

This study assesses the environmental proficiency of Texas life science educators certified from 2003 to 2011 by analyzing their TExES 138 8-12 exam results in domains V and VI. The sample consisted of all the individuals that took and passed the TExES 138 life science 8-12 exam. During this period, approximately 41% of the individuals who took…

This study investigates teacher content knowledge of candidates enrolled in an online graduate teacher certification programme. Descriptive data and linear regression were used to draw conclusions about the content area knowledge of individuals in the sample and the significance of the predictors examined. Descriptive data show 1/3 of the 8-12…

A number of factors affect successful implementation of an integrated science curriculum, including various outputs and inputs related to teacher quality such as professional development experiences, adequate planning periods, and adequate content preparation of teachers with regard to content knowledge associated with the curriculum taught. This…

This study sought to determine which journals are read by Texas life science teachers and the relationship between reading practices and sex, teaching certification, professional degree attainment, and teaching experience. (MNS)

The guide is arranged in vertical columns relating curriculum concepts in earth science to curriculum performance objectives, career concepts and career performance objectives, suggested teaching methods, and resource materials. The course for eighth graders attempts to place the curriculum concepts in order of increasing difficulty. Occupational…