Taking a Scientific Approach to Science

During the past few decades, major advances in the fıelds of cognitive psychology, brain research, and discipline-based education research in college science classrooms are providing guiding principles for how to achieve learning of complex knowledge and skills such as science. In part I, we describe the nature of expertise and how it is learned, primarily based on the fındings of cognitive psychology.We also give examples of studies in undergraduate science classrooms and the resulting student outcomes compared with those from traditional lecture instruction. In the second feature of this two-part series, we will discuss the challenges and opportunities for making these teaching methods standard practice in undergraduate science classrooms and the results of a large-scale successful experiment in doing so.