Journal of College Science Teaching articles from January 2009

Journal of College Science Teaching archives from January 2009

Smooth handoff: alignment of secondary and collegiate learner goals in science.(POINT OF VIEW)(Report)
January 1, 2009... Fumbling the baton Any collegiate instructor who has struggled with and sometimes failed to reach an ill-prepared student of science can empathize with Marion Jones. Heavily favored to win gold in the 4 x 100 women's relay at the 2004...

A simple exercise reveals the way students think about scientific modeling.(Report)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Scientific models are becoming increasingly important in the practice of contemporary science. Models permit scientists to elucidate the behavior of complex systems whose study would otherwise be problematic....

Analysis of students' downloading of online audio lecture recordings in a large biology lecture course.(Report)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Students in large lecture courses have been making audio recordings of lectures for many years. Recently, it has become possible to record lectures digitally and post the resulting files on the web for easy download...

An undergraduate journal club experience: a lesson in critical thinking.(Report)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] In an effort to better prepare our students to read and critically evaluate scientific literature, we introduced a journal club experience into the undergraduate curriculum Undergraduate science research is a...

The role of institutes in interdisciplinary research and education: an example from quantitative biology.(Report)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The book of nature is written in the language of mathematics. --Galileo In 2003, the National Research Council issued the Bio2010 report (2003), an assessment that suggests that the study of biology will...

Enabling a culture of change: a life science faculty learning community promotes scientific teaching.(Report)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Research scientists and educators are supporting the call for teaching reforms in the sciences, and the need for these reforms is gaining acceptance, as evidenced by the increased undergraduate curricular reform...

The learning-focused transformation of biology and physics core courses at the U.S. Air Force Academy.
January 1, 2009... An institution-wide focus on deep learning has resulted in significant changes in the biology and physics core course curricula at the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA). The biology course director has reworked course objectives to...

Biological membranes.(FAVORITE DEMONSTRATION)
January 1, 2009... Biological membranes are complex entities composed of phospholipids, proteins, cholesterols, and carbohydrates. Because these membranes are fundamental to the structure and function of living organisms, it is important that students are able to...

Uretero what? Gynecological health issues, pregnancy, and an infant with a birth defect.(Case study)
January 1, 2009... Part 1: The best-laid plans Yvonne has been a student of science nearly all her life. She values her independence and loves her career in the biopharmaceutical industry. She is extremely focused, as evidenced by her three-, five-, and...

Students' perceptions of their grades throughout an introductory biology course: effect of open-book testing.(RESEARCH and TEACHING)(Report)
January 1, 2009... Students enter introductory biology courses with exceedingly high expectations regarding the grades they will earn and the effort they will put forth during the course. Indeed, on the first day of class, virtually all students believe that they...

Gooey-gosh.(EDITORIAL)(Editorial)
January 1, 2009... When I was a teenager, I hated the family slide show. About once a year, my dad hauled out the cumbersome screen, heavy projector, and boxes of little cardboard squares to show off the family's treasured photographs. My main issue concerned one...

"But, I thought we were colleagues?" Professors evaluating professors.(SCST: SOCIETY for COLLEGE SCIENCE TEACHERS)
January 1, 2009... The Society of College Science Teachers is an affiliate organization of NSTA with a long history of support for the Journal of College Science Teaching. The journal is proud to host the SCST column in which the leadership of SCST can share...

New glimpse into how species diverge.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)
January 1, 2009... Some of the latest research on Darwin's finches of the Galapagos Islands shows an unexpected pattern of natural selection that is allowing researchers "a rare glimpse into what the early stages of speciation might look like," and emphasizing...

Solar power for microscopic machines.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)
January 1, 2009... Some of the tiniest solar cells ever built have been successfully tested as a power source for even tinier microscopic machines. An article in the inaugural issue of the Journal of Renewable and Sustainable Energy (JRSE), published by the...

Elusive antimatter.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)
January 1, 2009... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Scientists are on the hunt for evidence of antimatter left over from the very early Universe. New results using data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Compton Gamma Ray Observatory suggest the search may have...

Nanobamas.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)(Barack Obama)(Brief article)
January 1, 2009... A University of Michigan professor has created 3-D portraits of then-president-elect Barak Obama that are smaller than a grain of salt. He calls them nanobamas. John Hart, an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering, made...

Shaping cells.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)
January 1, 2009... Flip open any biology textbook and you're bound to see a complicated diagram of the inner workings of a cell, with its internal scaffolding, the cytoskeleton, and how it maintains a cell's shape. Yet the fundamental question remains, which came...

Magnetic memory.(HEADLINE SCIENCE)
January 1, 2009... How marine animals find their way back to their birthplace to reproduce after migrating across thousands of miles of open ocean has mystified scientists for more than a century. But marine biologists at the University of North Carolina at...