ABSTRACT School curricula should give prominence to content that is relevant to both societies and individuals. For this reason, global challenges are increasingly being highlighted in discussions. However, global challenges and how people need to deal with them can only be understood if they are the focus of teaching for an appropriate amount of time. We, therefore, need a new subject that draws on many disciplines but is based on educational theory. The present article presents a perspective on natural science teaching, predicated on the assumption that Central European Theory or Concept of Bildung engenders favourable conditions for the advancement of our societies, and indeed, for the establishment of conditions conducive to both socially adequate and fulfilling individual development. This article argues that it is imperative to prioritise the needs of both society and the individual within an educational framework by examining the most significant constraints on current natural science teaching and learning, such as time on task, socio-metacognition (mainly introspection and evaluation of collective information), in combination with sense making.

ABSTRACT Chemists encounter complex phenomena on different levels of granularity, from interacting molecules to their role in society, presenting a challenge for educators. Systems thinking can help clarify this complexity. This study investigates how chemists, chemistry teachers, and teacher educators reason about complex chemical phenomena in terms of eight system characteristics (components, interactions, hierarchy, dynamics, input-output, feedback, boundary, and emergence), and how these characteristics might be applied for teaching systems thinking in chemistry education. Data were collected through thirty semi-structured interviews. Findings show that the system characteristics are suitable for reasoning about complex phenomena across different levels of granularity and for capturing aspects of chemical reasoning (e.g. structure and properties). However, interpretations of these characteristics vary due to overlaps, informal meanings, omissions, and the type of phenomenon and level of granularity considered. Teachers and teacher educators find the characteristics useful for supporting students’ thinking and enhancing context-based education. Challenges facing include difficulties in interpretation, expressed feelings of incompetence, and uncertainty about their added value. Additionally, usage appeared to vary by question and subject, without consensus. Based on these insights, we propose directions for professional development to enhance the use of system characteristics in chemistry education.

ABSTRACT This study aims to investigate upper secondary school students’ engagement in computer-supported collaborative learning while interacting with a digital interactive visualisation of the carbon cycle. Task-based interviews were conducted with student pairs who used the visualisation to complete a carbon cycle activity, focusing on the transformation and movement of carbon compounds between carbon reservoirs. Drawing on an activity theory framework, the analysis identified contradictions and alignments among elements of the learning activity system. Findings indicate that students’ ability to construct system-based explanations was enhanced by access to key scientific concepts, effective interaction with the visualisation, and guided instructional support. Students’ development of explanations was sometimes obstructed when they engaged task-irrelevant concepts, lacked access to concepts or made unhelpful interpretations of the visualised information. Furthermore, a collaborative and socially supportive learning environment played a critical role in fostering collective sense-making and active engagement with the complexities of Earth system processes.

ABSTRACT The significance of the Nature of Science (NOS) in cultivating scientific literacy is well-recognised in science education research. Integrating NOS elements comprehensively and balancedly into science curriculum standards is crucial for effective NOS education. This investigation employed the Family Resemblance Approach (FRA) analytical framework to conduct a systematic content analysis of China's national curriculum standards for four STEM disciplines: Biology, Chemistry, Geography and Physics. Our analysis revealed three primary findings: (1) The representation of NOS is heavily skewed towards the cognitive-epistemic system (e.g. aims, practices, methods, knowledge), while elements of the social-institutional system (e.g. professional activities, ethos, societal interactions, financial systems) are critically underrepresented across all subjects; (2) Distinct patterns of NOS emphasis exist between disciplines. Physics highlights the systematic integration of methodological foundations supporting knowledge; chemistry presents an iterative knowledge-practice cycle; biology emphasises the primacy of social value orientation; while geography mediates knowledge and societal dimensions through cognitive aims; (3) The compartmentalised, discipline-specific structure of the curriculum creates epistemic silos, hindering the development of a holistic and integrated understanding of NOS as both a knowledge-building and socially embedded enterprise. This study provides critical evidence for optimising science curriculum design and instructional practices during China's educational reforms.

ABSTRACT As artificial intelligence (AI), and particularly Generative AI (GenAI), is increasingly being integrated into education, preparing teachers for the AI era is essential. This study presents the design, implementation, and evaluation of a graduate-level course for in-service STEM teachers; it was designed according to six established principles of effective teacher professional development (PD) and structured around the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s AI competency framework for teachers (AI-CFT). The course lasted 14 weeks and covered all AI-CFT aspects: human-centered mindset, ethics of AI, AI foundations, AI pedagogy, and AI for PD. A mixed-methods study was used to examine the reflection of AI-CFT aspects in teachers’ learning, and their trust and self-efficacy regarding AI use. The findings from two consecutive course offerings (N = 25 and N = 19) revealed significant gains in teachers’ self-efficacy and their understanding of the key AI-CFT aspects. Notably, teachers’ trust in AI-based educational technology did not increase, while their growing attention to the ethical challenges and limitations of GenAI was in line with the course’s emphasis on critical engagement and pedagogical alignment. The research contributes to the emerging area of AI competence development by providing a PD framework that is based on UNESCO’s AI-CFT.

ABSTRACT Our world faces complex, intertwined, and transdisciplinary challenges – such as sea level rise and loss of biodiversity, and schools have been the designated place where young generations should acquire specific competences to face them. In this paper, I frame these issues as Wicked Problems (WPs) and offer an empirical exploration of how middle-schoolers (11–13 years) encounter them. During three workshops in two Swedish middle schools, pupils encountered environmental WPs via process drama, and to navigate these activities, they enacted competences which have been long advocated for. These were made visible by students’ performance as they revealed and used their knowledge and their ability to problematise and empathise. These instances were then acknowledged by peers and teachers, and these moments of recognition impacted how students utilised said competence and performance. Process drama thus opens spaces where students can practice encountering environmental WPs, as well as make use of and acknowledge their competence and performance; these three dimensions are thus in a relation of mutual affect when in a situated educational setting.

ABSTRACT In recent years, the educational impact of generative AI (GAI) has attracted growing attention, with student dependency emerging as a key concern. Given that GAI primarily relies on text-based interaction, this study designed an integrated visual scaffolding approach combining the Toulmin Argument Pattern (TAP) and the fishbone diagram to support students’ scientific argumentation learning. A quasi-experimental study involving 211 students compared three experimental conditions and one control group, manipulating two factors: (1) visual scaffolding (integrated vs. minimal) and (2) GAI support (present vs. removed after Topic 3). Students participated in find-the-difference argumentation tasks, constructing claims, warrants, rebuttals, and qualifiers based on images of natural phenomena. Results suggest that integrated visual scaffolding may complement text-based GAI support by sustaining learning motivation, facilitating knowledge application, and promoting diverse argument construction. After GAI withdrawal, students who continued to use visual scaffolding demonstrated more stable performance through peer interaction, particularly in constructing evidence-based warrants and rebuttals. These findings highlight the complementary role of visual scaffolds in GAI-supported learning and offer implications for learner-centred instructional design.

ABSTRACT This research explores the types of teachers’ knowledge and their preparation for self-regulated learning and teaching (SRL&T), focusing on pedagogical-content-knowledge (PCK), technological-pedagogical-knowledge (TPK), and assessment knowledge (AK). It examines how pre- and in-service chemistry teachers develop SRL&T, a new knowledge type essential for promoting students’ self-regulation. The study involved analysing the SRL-oriented digital assignments of 34 teachers to assess their knowledge levels at various stages of their careers. Pre-service teachers developed assignments primarily in pairs, while in-service teachers worked individually. Two key questions guided the investigation: (1) How do pre- and in-service teachers demonstrate PCK, TPK, AK, and SRL&T knowledge? (2) What differences, if any, exist between pre- and in-service teachers in these knowledge types? The analysis of the teachers’ assignments, using a rubric to assess PCK, TPK, AK, and SRL&T, revealed high levels of PCK across both groups, with significant differences in AK based on teaching experience. The study offers theoretical insights into teachers’ professional development by examining their knowledge acquisition. Additionally, it introduces the SRL&T component to the teachers’ knowledge type rubric, providing a methodological contribution with broad applications in educational contexts.

ABSTRACT This study examined changes in senior high school students’ chemistry performance over a semester and how these changes varied based on their academic resilience in chemistry. Participants were 684 first-year senior high school students from 14 schools. Latent profile analysis revealed three distinct profiles: low (19.152%), moderate (64.766%), and high (16.082%) levels of academic resilience in chemistry. Subsequently, a two-way repeated measures analysis of variance was conducted to compare changes in chemistry achievement across the three profiles over the transition period. Results indicated that students in the low-resilience profile showed a declining trend in chemistry achievement, those in the high-resilience profile demonstrated improvement, and those in the moderate-resilience profile exhibited relatively stable achievement. These findings highlight resilience as a universal asset in chemistry learning, extending its relevance beyond at-risk groups. By identifying student profiles and their associated achievement trajectories during the transition period within China’s highly selective educational system, this study provides a person-centred framework that can inform differentiated early support in cognitively demanding science subjects and offers a valuable reference point for other selection-oriented systems internationally.