Chemistry

In this Perspective, I consider how our field can take principled actions to align our ways of designing and refining courses with our oft-stated goal for chemistry learning to be useful in daily life. To do so, I make three interrelated arguments. First, I argue achieving this goal will require a particular focus on epistemologies: “[people’s] systems of beliefs [tacit or explicit] about (1) the nature of knowledge and (2) the processes of knowing” [ Educ. Psychol. 2011, 46 (3), 141].

This study examines an expansive shift in the priorities of professional learning within a collective of high school science teachers, scientists, community organizers, youth, and educational researchers who were working together on classroom science projects grounded in community concerns of environmental racism. Through a participatory design-based approach, we challenge the assumed relationship between educational research and priorities for teacher professional learning.

This paper argues for addressing histories of scientific institutions and their entanglements with Euro-American imperialism, racial capitalism, and environmental injustice in secondary science education. Our argument is grounded in the history of a multinational chemical corporation that operates a chemical plant in a neighborhood where one author lives and the other teaches. This plant has sponsored the school’s athletic department and is also the greatest source of industrial pollution in the neighborhood.

These high-quality, NGSS-aligned science lesson plans are built on phenomena meaningful to rural students. They include plans for middle school science, as well as high school biology, Earth science, chemistry, and physics.

This collection offers K-12 curricula, activity guides, and other resources to support hands-on, inquiry-based investigations of the ecosystems and organisms around us. Themes include: Hudson River ecology, urban ecosystems, schoolyard ecology, biodiversity, water and watersheds, and data exploration and nature of science. Additional resources are available for home and distance learning.