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Students need to learn how to engage in several scientific practices in order to be considered proficient in science. Many of these practices are needed to evaluate scientific claims made in the popular media. Yet, there are few instruments available that science educators can use to assess whether students can apply what they know about scientific practices in order to critique scientific media reports. In response to the need for valid, reliable, and informative assessments of knowledge of scientific practices that are not embedded in complex scientific content, an instrument was developed and validated over two iterations. This assessment satisfied construct, content, face, concurrent, and discriminant validity checks for different undergraduate student populations, and the item analysis demonstrated that each item was informative for this subset of the general population. This instrument will allow instructors to compare student performance across space and time, promoting and supporting research on the teaching and learning of scientific practices., The scientific issues currently facing society, such as deciding whether to spray for mosquitoes to reduce the risk of West Nile virus or weighing the negative side effects of a [...]

Argumentation in the science classroom can serve a variety of purposes and helps science teachers achieve multiple learning goals for their students (Duschl, Schweingruber, and Shouse 2007). Through the process [...]

A Framework for K-12 Science Education (NRC 2012) and subsequent Next Generation Science Standards (Achieve Inc. 2013) will substantially influence the teaching and learning of science in the United States. [...]

'My brain hurts!' said Elton after being asked by a peer student to explain what evidence supported his claim that the Earth is warming. Another student jumped in to defend [...]

This article describes a new instructional model called Argument-Driven Inquiry (ADI). This model is designed to promote student engagement in processes of investigation design and scientific argumentation. In this study, the ADI instructional model is compared with a more traditional approach to instruction across 16 laboratory sections of introductory college chemistry. Data was collected pre- and postintervention to address students ' conceptual understanding of chemistry, ability to use evidence and reasoning to support a conclusion, and attitude toward chemistry. Results indicated significant differences between instructional approaches on measures of students' abilities to use evidence and reasoning while no significant differences in conceptual understanding were observed. Students in the ADI sections, particularly females, had a significantly more positive attitude toward chemistry, according to postcourse measures. Implications for the use of the ADI instructional model are discussed., A number of innovative instructional methods have been developed over the last decade in order to promote and support inquiry-based learning in laboratory courses at the undergraduate level. These methods [...]

The National Science Education Standards state that inquiry should be viewed as a process of both 'explanation and argument' and 'exploration and experiment' and suggest that students need more opportunities [...]

In America's Lab Report: Investigations in High School Science (2005), the National Research Council (NRC) makes several suggestions for how laboratory activities can be changed to improve students' skills and [...]

A major goal of the science curriculum is for students to develop an understanding of the scientific view of the world and to be able to use scientific reasoning when [...]