Aidan Alvarado’s birthday present when he turns eleven is anything but normal, but for Aidan’s family it is ‘normally abnormal’: the key to his grandfather’s wondrous study and a student membership to the League of Dream Detectives. Aidan doesn’t know what that means, but he’ll soon find out as he tries to solve the mystery of a glowing 1300 year-old Chinese vase with the help of his new friends Denise, her brother Jeremiah, some teenagers with a very cool old car, and the dragon girl Lotu...

What is science? What is the purpose of science education? Should we be training scientists, or looking towards a greater public understanding of science? In this exciting text, some of the key figures in the fields of science and science education address this debate. Their contributions form an original dialogue on science education and the gener

Science education has undergone far-reaching changes in the last fifty years. The articles collected together in this reader examine how we have reached our present consensus and what theories we now use to explain how children learn science. The central sections of the reader examine how all this can be translated into effective and stimulating teaching, how learning can be most accurately and fairly assessed and how the impact of gender, ethnicity and other factors on children's performa...

Eleven-year-old Junior Dream Detective Aidan Alvarado had enough of saving the world; all he wanted to do was play soccer. That wasn’t going to happen! Aidan embarks on his second case as a dream detective when Emperor Wu in ancient China needs his help again.There is a war going on between water spirit dragons. The balance of the universe is upset. The keys to the mystery are a golden feather and a mummy girl's ghost, but nobody knows why.In his quest to save the universe ...

Young people are increasingly being exposed to the huge and complex ethical dilemmas involved in issues such as genetic modification, animal rights and cloning, and they are bringing their views into the classroom. But how can teachers be sure they are sufficiently well-informed to help their pupils make sense of the diverse and emotive arguments surrounding these issues?This book holds the answer. Written by leading ethicists, scientists and technologists, it offers a balanced and...

This book consists of stories of struggles in science education presented by a network of science educators working in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Britain, and the United States. The common goal of these educators is to produce more socially/ecologically just models and practices of science education. The book considers and reworks the key-terms of current social justice: agency, realism, justice, and power. Its first section explores re-inhabiting science in the quest for more just worlds ...

Changing relations between science and democracy – and controversies over issues such as climate change, energy transitions, genetically modified organisms and smart technologies – have led to a rapid rise in new forms of public participation and citizen engagement. While most existing approaches adopt fixed meanings of ‘participation’ and are consumed by questions of method or critiquing the possible limits of democratic engagement, this book offers new insights that rethink public engage...

Written by a leading geographer of climate, this book offers a unique guide to students and general readers alike for making sense of this profound, far-reaching, and contested idea. It presents climate change as an idea with a past, a present, and a future.In ten carefully crafted chapters, Climate Change offers a synoptic and inter-disciplinary understanding of the idea of climate change from its varied historical and cultural origins; to its construction more recently t...

'The following sections are a very good representation of the core developments of complexity thinking in a number of major fields. Our intention is to provide an accessible interdisciplinary introduction to the wonderful intellectual breadth that complexity can offer.' - Jan Bogg and Robert Geyer in the Introduction. Complexity is a new and exciting interdisciplinary approach to science and society that challenges traditional academic divisions, frameworks and paradigms. This book helps t...

In this controversial new book, Daisy Christodoulou offers a thought-provoking critique of educational orthodoxy. Drawing on her recent experience of teaching in challenging schools, she shows through a wide range of examples and case studies just how much classroom practice contradicts basic scientific principles. She examines seven widely-held beliefs which are holding back pupils and teachers:Facts prevent understandingTeacher-led instruction is passive...

What is Urban Theory? How can it be used to understand our urban experiences? Experiences typically defined by enormous inequalities, not just between cities but within cities, in an increasingly interconnected and globalised world. This book explains:Relations between urban theory and modernity in key ideas of the Chicago School, spatial analysis, humanistic urban geography, and ‘radical′ approaches like MarxismCities and...

Who owns your genes? What does climate science imply for policy? Do corporations conduct honest research? Should we teach intelligent design? Humans are creating a new world through science. The kind of world we are creating will not simply be decided by expanding scientific knowledge, but will depend on views about good and bad, right and wrong. These visions, in turn, depend on critical thinking, cogent argument and informed judgement. In this book, Adam Briggle and Carl Mitcham help rea...