Innovative Methods of Teaching Science and Engineering in Secondary Schools

This article describes the design of an interactive learning environment to increase student achievement in secondary schools by addressing students’ preconceptions, and promoting purposeful social collaboration, distributed cognition, and contextual learning. The paper presents the framework that guided our design efforts to immerse all students in a progression of guided-inquiry hands-on activities. Students find compelling reasons to learn by responding to authentic sciencebased challenges, both in simulations and hands-on activities, based on specific instructional objectives derived from the national science and technology standards.

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