This paper aim at investigating what astronomy students and experts discern from the multitude of different disciplinary affordances available in Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) diagrams. HR-diagrams are central to all of astronomy and astrophysics and used extensively in teaching. However, knowledge about what students and experts discern from these disciplinary representations are not well known at present. HR-diagrams include many disciplinary affordances that may be hidden to the novice student, hence we aim at investigating and describing what astronomy students at different university levels (introductory, undergraduate, graduate), and astronomy educators/professors, discern from such representation – referred to as disciplinary discernment (Eriksson, Linder, Airey, & Redfors, 2014). Data from a web based questionnaire were analysed using the Anatomy of Disciplinary Discernment (ADD) framework by Eriksson et al. (2014). Preliminary results show (1) the developmental nature of disciplinary discernment from the HR-diagram by the participants and (2) the large discrepancy between disciplinary discernment by the astronomy educators and their students. We describe and discuss the qualitative nature of these differences and how this can have implications for teaching and learning astronomy.

This paper aim at investigating what astronomy students and experts discern from the multitude of different disciplinary affordances available in Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) diagrams. HR-diagrams are central to all of astronomy and astrophysics and used extensively in teaching. However, knowledge about what students and experts discern from these disciplinary representations are not well known at present. HR-diagrams include many disciplinary affordances that may be hidden to the novice student, hence we aim at investigating and describing what astronomy students at different university levels (introductory, undergraduate, graduate), and astronomy educators/professors, discern from such representation – referred to as disciplinary discernment. Data from a web based questionnaire were analysed using the Anatomy of Disciplinary Discernment (ADD) framework by Eriksson et al.(2014). Preliminary results show (1) the developmental nature of disciplinary discernment from the HR-diagram by the participants and (2) the large discrepancy between disciplinary discernment by the astronomy educators and their students. We describe and discuss the qualitative nature of these differences and implications for teaching and learning astronomy.

Att undervisa i de naturorienterande ämnena (NO) i de tidiga skolåren är ett utmanande, spännande och roligt uppdrag. Dessa ämnen spänner dock över stora innehållsområden och därför kan det vara svårt att få en överblick och välja ett innehåll som är lämpligt för åldersgruppen.

Den här boken hjälper lärare att få grepp om det viktigaste innehållet i de naturvetenskapliga ämnena. Författarna beskriver naturvetenskaperna ur ett helhetsperspektiv och ger en övergripande struktur, som kompletteras med relevanta begrepp. Naturvetenskapens bärande idéer förklaras mer i detalj och utifrån en rad konkreta vardagliga exempel. Innehållet diskuteras i förhållande till Läroplan för grundskolan, förskoleklassen och fritidshemmet (Lgr 11).

Boken kan användas både som kurslitteratur för blivande lärare och som ämnesfördjupning för verksamma lärare.

Ska man vaccinera sig mot influensa, även om det finns risk för biverkningar? Är strålningen från mobiltelefoner farlig eller inte? Och vad stoppar vi i oss? Kan vi lita på att maten vi köper är bra?

Även om de flesta grundskoleelever inte kommer att välja en naturvetenskaplig yrkesbana kommer de att möta den här typen av frågor, som kallas för samhällsfrågor med naturvetenskapligt innehåll (SNI). Denna bok erbjuder både en teoretisk ram och konkreta exempel på hur man kan jobba med SNI i skolan.

Elever tycker ofta att frågorna är intressanta, men de fastnar lätt i att diskutera personliga värderingar och det finns en risk att det naturvetenskapliga innehållet och samhällskontexten går förlorad. Läraren behöver därför stödja eleverna i arbetet med att formulera frågor, arbeta källkritiskt, argumentera, planera undersökningar samt värdera resultat och information. Syftet med arbetsmetoderna är att stärka elevernas möjligheter att använda sig av dessa kunskaper i vardagslivet

Författarna har under tre år bedrivit ett forskningsprojekt om SNI i grundskolan. Erfarenheter och resultat från detta projekt ligger till grund för boken.

According to many documents, there is a strong need to renew science education. One way could be to work with SSI (socio-scientific issues). This paper reports on both students' and teachers' experiences and learning when working with socio-scientific issues in science education in secondary school (aged from 13 to 16). The approach is multidimensional, as factors that influence cognition as well as motivation and the forming of attitudes are complex. Results suggest that SSI work forms are more important than personal factors for explaining outcomes. Relevant issues, autonomy and functioning group work seem to be important aspects of successful SSI work together with structure provided by the teacher, and information that challenges previous knowledge. In general, SSI seems to be most efficient for students, who believe that they learn from presenting and discussing their knowledge, focus on "the large picture", acknowledge own responsibility for learning, find school science personally relevant and are self-efficacious. It seems that the outcomes from SSI work are much in the hands of the teacher. This paper is a short summary of the first year and quantitative part of the project. Further results from the project will later be found in our homepage (http://www.sisc.se).

In a European project—CoReflect—researchersin seven countries are developing, implementing andevaluating teaching sequences using a web-based platform(STOCHASMOS). The interactive web-based inquirymaterials support collaborative and reflective work. Thelearning environments will be iteratively tested and refined,during different phases of the project. All learning environmentsare focusing ‘‘socio-scientific issues’’. In thisarticle we report from the pilot implementation of theSwedish learning environment which has an Astrobiologycontext. The socio-scientific driving questions are ‘‘Shouldwe look for, and try to contact, extraterrestrial life?’’, and‘‘Should we transform Mars into a planet where humanscan live in the future?’’ The students were in their last yearof compulsory school (16 years old), and worked togetherin triads. We report from the groups’ decisions and thesupport used for their claims. On a group level a majorityof the student groups in their final statements expressreluctance towards both the search of extraterrestrial lifeand the terraforming of Mars. The support used by thestudents are reported and discussed. We also look moreclosely into the argumentation of one of the student groups.The results presented in this article, differ from earlierstudies on students’ argumentation and decision making onsocio-scientific issues (Aikenhead in Science education foreveryday life. Evidence-based practice. Teachers CollegePress, New York, (2006) for an overview), in that theysuggest that students do use science related arguments — both from ‘‘core’’ and ‘‘frontier’’ science — in their argumentationand decision making.