In this paper, I discussed different types of models in science education and applications of them in learning and teaching science in particular physics. Based on the literature, I categorized models as conceptual and mental models according to their characteristics. In addition to these models, there is another model called “physics model” by the physics-education community. And then, I discussed applications of these models for learning and teaching science particularly physics along with examples that can guide teachers and students in their science courses.
 

This study is based on the principle that the mathematical anxiety in preservice kindergarten teachers-tobe should be removed and they should be encouraged towards mathematics. It is expected from teachers-to-be who are able to construct this confidence to prepare exercises improving mathematical ideas for their students. This study was carried out with second year students of Preservice Teaching Section, Primary School Teaching Department, Faculty of Education, Uludağ University who taking pre-school mathematics. The study continued for 14 weeks (1 semester). The researcher of this study gave the course. The training was realised as 1 hour of basic mathematics and 2 hours of pre-school mathematics teaching within one week. An attitude test was applied to the pre-service teachers-to-be both the beginning and at the end of training. In addition, several personal questions related with the course were asked to these pre-service-teachers-to be. In this study, it is concluded that pre-service-teachers-to-be have developed positive attitudes and are encouraged towards mathematics and their success to prepare exercises on mathematical subjects, such as classification, ordering, comparison, pairing, numbers, geometric shapes, calculation, measures, space perception, problem-solving and developing creativity, for pre-school kindergarten students has improved.

This study investigated the effect of computer attitude, ownership and use on the computer literacy of science teachers in Nigeria.  One hundred and twenty (120) science teachers drawn from the four political divisions of Ogun State, Nigeria were used for the study.  Two valid and reliable instruments namely Computer Attitude, Ownership and Use Scale (CAOUS) and Computer Literacy Self Assessment Scale (CLSAS) were used to collect the needed data.  Percentages, standard deviation and multiple regression statistics were employed for data analyses.  The findings revealed that the science teachers have positive attitude towards computer.  Also, a little above half of the science teachers had personal computers and not all the teachers used computers frequently.  Finally, computer attitude, ownership and frequency of use jointly predicted the science teachers’ computer literacy with the influence of computer ownership being the highest when considered individually. Suggestions based on these outcomes were presented in this paper.
 

Environmental education is considered an appropriate intervention for creating awareness of, and an understanding of the challenges of environmental degradation. The introduction of EE into the Nigerian school curricular creates a challenge of how to teach it. A majority of the teachers still employ the old, traditional “chalk and talk” method. This study experimented with two modes of participatory strategies, the full and quasi participatory modes in teaching secondary school students in Nigeria some EE concepts. Three hundred and sixty students were randomly selected and assigned to the three treatment groups. Five hypotheses were tested at P<.05 and data was collected using a test instrument measuring students’ understanding of the EE concepts taught. Findings from the study indicate that generally students taught using the participatory modes performed better than their counterparts in the conventional lecture group. However, between the two participatory modes examined, it was noted that students in the quasi participatory mode performed better than their colleagues in the full participatory group. An explanation of this could be that the quasi mode offers the learners a unique opportunity to work together in a more flexible way, to read, accept and internalize the basic environmental concepts. The implications of the findings for classroom practice were discussed in the paper.
 

In this study, the contradiction between the cooperative learning which has an important place in science education and relative evaluation system has been tried to be defined. The fixation of the situation which was done with the data obtained from literature also has been supported with a semi-structured interview study made with eighteen science lecturers from Kazim Karabekir Educational Faculty. The qualitative analysis of the obtained data brought out into light that relative evaluation system has negative effects on the interaction among students. Such negativities have a quality that can be an obstacle to the cooperative learning which has an important place in science education. For this reason, it is considered that such a study will be beneficial to researchers who work on science education and education policies and to science teachers.

According to the 2006 data of Turkish National Police (TNP), throughout Turkey, 1742 cases comprised of organized crime, collective or individual smuggling, nuclear stuff smuggling were recorded. Between 2000 and 2006, 11600 organized crimes had been recorded. It is known that the high number of crime is closely related to the geo-strategic and geo-political position of Turkey. Turkey functions as a bridge between Asia and Europe, the West and East blocks, European and Middle East countries, and Muslim and Christian cultures in many aspects. Moreover, it has borders with eight countries in Asia and Europe (Georgia, Armenia, Nakhichevan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Greece and Bulgaria). With such a position, Turkey is involved in all the routes of human trafficking. In this study, the reasons for Turkey to be a bridge in this intercontinental crime trafficking were defined with respect to its geostrategic and geo-political position. The study is comprised of three sections first of which presents the crime routes related to the geo-strategic and geo-political position of Turkey. In the second part, the spatial distribution and gates of the crimes committed over Turkey were specified and the motives behind these crimes were analysed. In the conclusion part, suggestions were put forward for the existing problems and their solutions

 Teaching is a profession that needs specialist knowledge and skill. Because of this, education of teachers is crucial process. In Turkey, new strategies to educate teachers put on the educational practice. Educating the teacher candidates is beginning from the secondary schools in new system.  The aim of this study was to determine the motivational levels and motivational supplies for candidate teachers in the secondary teacher training schools.  The population of the study was selected from five secondary teacher training schools in five cities. Totally 509 students as a sampling group was selected with randomly. Data were collected by the ―Motivation Scale‖ and analyzed by using ANOVA and t-test. The results of the study indicated that, secondary teacher training schools students had been most affected from the self-confidence and future anxiety sources. Finally suggestions were included for motivating to teaching in secondary teacher training schools.

A questionnaire was used to explore the prevalence of ideas about global warming in Year 10 (age 15-16 years) school students in Turkey.  The frequencies of individual scientific ideas and misconceptions about the causes, consequences and ‘cures’ of global warming were identified.  In addition, several general findings emerged from this study.  Firstly, many students believed that radioactivity is causally linked to global warming; they believed that radioactive leakage from nuclear power stations exacerbates global warming, and that reducing the global nuclear arsenal could reduce it.  Secondly, students appeared to confuse the causes and consequences of global warming with those of ozone layer depletion.  For example, global warming was associated by many students with skin cancer, in reality a consequence of ozone layer damage.  Furthermore, there seemed to be a general conflation of ideas whereby many pro-environmental actions that are not, in reality, connected with global warming were seen by students as helping to reduce it.  More generically, many students accepted the scientific mechanism of global warming while simultaneously believing erroneous explanations.  Thus, acceptance of scientific ideas does not lead automatically to elimination of misconceptions about the same issue.  On a more practical level, relatively few students realised that saving electricity would contribute to a reduction in global warming.  Encouraging students to use electricity economically would be a way of educating them about the importance of pro-environmental actions by individuals and empowering them to undertake some such actions.

Infinity has contradictions arising from its nature. Since mind is actually adapted to finite realities attained by behaviors in space and time, when one starts to deal with real infinity, contradictions will arise. In particular, Cantorian Set Theory for it involves the notion of “equivalence of a set to one of its proper subsets,” causes perceptual issues. Prospective mathematics teachers usually learn this concept via traditional lecture methods and experience possible problems later. Since Cantorian Set Theory is used in courses like Topology, Algebra, etc. and prospective teachers will teach it to students using appropriate methods, it is important that they comprehend it well. The purpose of this study is to assess the effects of teaching Cantorian Set Theory via an Active Learning Based Course on prospective students’ achievement. The results indicate that prospective teachers who were in experimental group (taught by active learning based methods) were more successful than those who studied the traditional lecture method and the difference between the groups was significant (p = 0.02).