Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) provide students with valuable opportunities to engage in research in a classroom setting, expanding access to research opportunities for undergraduates, fostering inclusive research and learning environments, and bridging the gap between the research and education communities. While…

Sustaining a broad diversity of plants is key for a sustainable future. For instance, providing a variety of flowering plants in urban and agricultural landscapes mitigates the current decline of pollinators and biodiversity in general. Therefore, educating about the diversity of flowering plants has high current relevance for biology and…

The objectives of this study were to 1) investigate the efficiency of Application on Nymphaea 'Thai Lotus Species' for creating awareness of Undergraduate Students, 2) compare students' achievements before and after learning through the Application on Nymphaea 'Thai Lotus Species' for Creates Awareness of Undergraduate Students, and 3) examine…

Following the switch to remote online teaching in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the plant taxonomy course at the University of Georgia (UGA) switched to iNaturalist for the specimen collection portion of the course requirements. Building off extant rubrics, the instructors designed project guidelines for a fully online plant collection…

In the course of combining the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with the science education curriculum, the relevance of the micro- and macroalgae in education is based on the biotechnological future-oriented significance and the ever-growing trend toward plant-based nutrition. So, the micro- and macroalgae are finding their way onto the food…

The growing interest in outdoor early childhood education, even in countries with a weak environmental tradition such as Portugal, tends to be associated with a concern over the alienation between urban/Western children and nature. While educational projects in nature criticize this separation, they still maintain a bad culture vs good nature…

Raman scattering spectroscopies are important analytical tools in modern chemistry. Here, we describe the construction of the unamplified Raman scattering analysis (URSA) instrument: an inexpensive, open-table Raman spectrometer that uses a 532 nm diode-pumped laser as a light source. Upon application of this spectrometer to DNA extracted from…

This study analyze data from three national contexts in which teachers worked with the same teaching materials and inquiry classroom activities, investigating teachers' use of strategies to promote interaction and scaffolding when participating in a professional development program. The data material is collected from three case studies from the…

The COVID-19 pandemic presented significant challenges for both students and educators, particularly because of the virtualization of classes and the consequent lack of practical sessions following the closure of laboratories and experimental fields in universities. The absence of interaction among students and practical classes led to a…

The plant kingdom can be learned more successfully if tasks involve direct contact with elements of the plant world and students have the possibility of working cooperatively in small groups within the secondary school classroom. This paper analyses student understanding of the general and floral physiology of angiosperms within a…

This descriptive qualitative case study aims to find out the pre-service science teachers (PST)' confidence about instructional practice in outdoor setting, their knowledge about the plants and it explores the two research questions: To what extent do the preservice science teachers have confidence to teach in the outdoor settings? (1) and What…

The wonderful plants and animals of the Daintree Rainforest in Queensland, Australia, are at risk of extinction. They and the rainforests of the world must be protected by taking action on climate change.

In this paper, we explore the ways that a STEAM-focused summer program for Indigenous youth supported learning in accordance with Indigenous axiologies (what we value esthetically or morally), ontologies (what we believe to be real and how we enact those beliefs), and epistemologies (what we know and how we know it) or AOE. Part of these AOEs…

Previous research indicates that young children, as young as preschoolers, spontaneously draw dihedral and cyclic symmetries in their representations of the natural world. This is an intriguing find because at this age children have barely had their first contact with formal geometry and, therefore, one would not expect to find a use of symmetries…

Explanation of natural phenomena at one level of biological organisation almost always involves causes that are found at other levels. Although scientists thinking across levels find it easy to explain physiological phenomena, students often perceive this as a challenge. We developed a new graphic organiser called Zoom Map, which is a mode for…