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Elementary school teacher candidates' (student teachers or STs) views of nature of science are important for an effective science teaching that aims to improve children's scientific literacy. The purpose of this study was to improve STs' views of nature of science through an intensive intervention. The study group consisted of 65 third year STs who were attending a major university in Ankara Turkey during the 2015 - 2016 fall semester. An educational program with a variety of activities that were designed to help improve participants' views of nature of science was applied and the effect of this program was evaluated. The educational program included historical approach activities, generic activities, explicit-reflective approach activities, and media news analysis activities which were applied in three hour periods over the course of nine weeks. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected in this convergent parallel mixed method study. At the beginning of the study, the participating STs had naive views of nature of science and some misconceptions. After the applied educational program, STs' views of nature of science improved and they adopted more contemporary views of science. As a result, a long-term intervention with multiple methods of teaching with different kinds of activities was found to be an effective approach for improving STs' understanding of nature of science.

Many scholars and science curricula from around the world describe socioscientific issues (SSIs) as meaningful contexts for teaching about the nature of science (NOS). These calls are guided by the assumption that science teachers are able to identify relevant aspects of the NOS in a given SSI and to decide how to utilize these for NOS instruction. To this end, this study aimed to assess a group of science teachers' competencies in identifying aspects of the NOS in various educational critical scenarios (ECS) featuring different SSI. 15 science teachers' understandings of the NOS were assessed through interviews and their competence in identifying aspects of the NOS in given ECSs was addressed through an open-ended questionnaire. The results indicated that, although all of the participants had informed views regarding the majority of the aspects of the NOS, the majority of them failed to transfer this knowledge and could not exhibit similar competence in identifying some aspects of NOS in ECSs. This implies that having an informed understanding of the NOS does not guarantee effective translation of this understanding into the classrooms.

Formative assessment or assessment for learning is one of the most emphasized educational innovations around the world. Two of the common strategies that could be used in formative assessment are use of summative tests for formative purposes and comment only marking. We utilized these strategies in the form of formative quizzes in a general chemistry course and measured its effect on students? learning. The results of our weak-experimental design, which was conducted with 124 pre-service elementary school teachers in an undergraduate level general chemistry class, showed that formative assessment alone may not be enough to improve students? learning. The classroom context and background and attitude of students should be taken into account, which are important factors that influence student learning and achievement. In the study, two instruments and semi-structured interviews were used to collect data.

Although understandings of scientific inquiry (as opposed to conducting inquiry) are included in science education reform documents around the world, little is known about what students have learned about inquiry during their elementary school years. This is partially due to the lack of any assessment instrument to measure understandings about scientific inquiry. However, a valid and reliable assessment has recently been developed and published, Views About Scientific Inquiry (VASI; Lederman et al. [2014], Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 51, 65-83). The purpose of this large-scale international project was to collect the first baseline data on what beginning middle school students have learned about scientific inquiry during their elementary school years. Eighteen countries/regions spanning six continents including 2,634 students participated in the study. The participating countries/regions were: Australia, Brazil, Chile, Egypt, England, Finland, France, Germany, Israel, Mainland China, New Zealand, Nigeria, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Turkey, and the United States. In many countries, science is not formally taught until middle school, which is the rationale for choosing seventh grade students for this investigation. This baseline data will simultaneously provide information on what, if anything, students learn about inquiry in elementary school, as well as their beginning knowledge as they enter secondary school. It is important to note that collecting data from all of the approximately 200 countries globally was not humanly possible, and it was also not possible to collect data from every region of each country. The results overwhelmingly show that students around the world at the beginning of grade seven have very little understandings about scientific inquiry. Some countries do show reasonable understandings in certain aspects but the overall picture of understandings of scientific inquiry is not what is hoped for after completing 6 years of elementary education in any country.

The aim of this study is to evaluate a continuing professional development (CPD) program designed to improve teachers' professional competences about the nature of science (NOS) by using a new evaluation perspective. The researchers followed a year long CPD about NOS with the voluntary attendance of 18 middle school science teachers and their students. In a collaborative and reflective environment, teachers were introduced to various NOS aspects and ways to use explicit instruction and formative assessment in their NOS teaching. In addition, teachers received teaching activities and materials to be implemented in their classrooms for one year. The data were collected and evaluated based on the "five level (learning, beliefs, transfer, results, and reaction) evaluation model". The findings demonstrate that the CPD program about NOS effectively improved teachers' views about NOS, beliefs about teaching and learning the NOS, classroom practices about NOS and also their students' views about NOS. This study is the first to use formative assessment and discourse analysis in a professional development program for in-service teacher education, and also first to evaluate teachers' views, beliefs, practices and their students' views about NOS all together. The findings are thought to motivate researchers to consider multiple level evaluations of future professional development programs.

Background: This study describes how teachers' nature of science (NOS) views changed throughout an innovative Continuing Professional Development (CPD) program that provided sustained support throughout the process in a collaborative and reflective environment and activities that are consistent with the current curriculum and NOS tenets integrated within. Eighteen in-service science teachers enrolled in a yearlong nature of science, Continuing Professional Development (NOS-CPD) program. Data were collected by pre/post-interviews using the Views of Nature of Science-Form C (VNOS-C) questionnaire, and a post-interview using an open-ended questionnaire developed by researchers to uncover teacher reactions to the NOS-CPD program. Results: The results indicated that the NOS-CPD program improved the teachers' NOS views more effectively than previously reported short-term teacher development programs, and thus, the findings should be useful for future studies in support of the professional development of teachers. Conclusions: The article concludes with practical advice for implementing NOS-focused, in-service teacher development programs.

Since science teachers are an important factor in implementing educational reforms in science education, there are many studies in the literature about their beliefs and practices. Most of these studies investigate science teachers' certain beliefs about science and education in isolation. This study suggests that it is more useful to investigate science teachers' beliefs and practices from a perspective of "values" and "value systems." An interpretive-qualitative study that investigated four science teachers' values in relation to their beliefs and teaching practices is reported here. In the discussion, it is suggested that determining science teacher's value priorities provide a better understanding of their beliefs and practices which may offer more informed ways of working with teachers to enhance their development. (Contains 2 tables.)