The need for renewable and non-fossil fuels is now recognised by nations throughout the world.Consequently, an understanding of alternative energy is needed both in schools and in everyday life-long learning situations. This study developed a two-tier instrument to diagnose students' understanding and alternative conceptions about alternative energy in terms of: sources of alternative energy, greenhouse gas emission, as well as advantages, and disadvantages. Results obtained with Year 10 and 11 students (n = 491) using the 12-item two-tier instrument (α = 0.61) showed that students' understanding of alternative energy was low (M = 7.03; SD = 3.90). The 23 alternative conceptions about alternative energy sources that could be identified from the instrument are reported. The implications for teaching and learning about alternative energy and suggestions for further development and improvement of the instrument are presented.Keywords: Alternative energy; Environmental education; Alternative conceptions; Two-tier test items; Diagnostic assessment IntroductionThe world's population is rapidly increasing causing a rise in the demand for energy use.Conventionally, the sources of energy used worldwide are coal, oil, and other fossil fuels such as natural gas. However, concerns about the depletion of these fossil fuels, particularly of oil, and their impact on the environment and sustainability is so huge that groups of countries have developed environmental protection policies, such as the Kyoto Protocol, to curb the contribution to global warming through Clean Development Mechanisms (CDM), carbon emission trading, and joint implementation (UNFCCC, 2011a). Consequently, many developed countries have pledged to reduce carbon emissions with the Kyoto Protocol as their guide. In addition, the Conference of the Parties (COP) was established in 2012 to put into effect a binding global climate treaty. Subsequently, this date was extended to 2020, to enable countries to make their commitment to reducing carbon emission more concrete. Strategies for targets to be met by 2050 for a sustainable future include cutting carbon emissions, reaching cap and trade agreements, and going carbon-neutral (UNFCCC, 2011b). A large part of these strategies to meet these targets are to utilise alternative energy sources.The sources of energy that are alternative to fossil fuels, focused upon in this study, are renewable energy such as solar, hydropower, geothermal, wind, ocean energy and biomass energy. The non-renewable nuclear energy source and hydrogen fuel cells were also included in this study due to frequent references to these sources. The provision of electric power, transportation, and heating/cooling needs of the world had been suggested to be feasible from a combination of sources mainly from the wind, water, and the sun (WWS) with the other alternative energy sources -geothermal, hydropower, and ocean energy -filling in the gaps (Delucci & Jacobson, 2010). However, a full conversion to WWS power worldwide is not recognised n...

Comic books can be and are produced mainly for science communication. Comics are more favorable to be read by the students as comics engaged students in reading compared to thick science textbooks. This study explored the role of comics as an aid in teaching elementary school science on the topic of ‘Plant Systems’ using an action research approach. A total of 18 Grade 5 students from one of the elementary schools in Brunei Darussalam participated in the study. A 15-page fully colored comic featuring a leaf fairy character called ‘Nym’ was utilized to teach the students alongside various activities about plants during the intervention lessons. A pre-test was administered prior to the lesson to establish their existing knowledge of the topic, and then a post-test administered after all the intervention lessons were completed.<strong> </strong>The results from the achievement scores analyzed between the pre- and post-tests indicated that the students’ knowledge on ‘Plant Systems’ improved significantly.<strong> </strong>The students were found to be interested, engaged and enthusiastic in the use of comics as revealed from the thematic analysis of the interviews. There are also vast potentials for comics to be used regularly to support learning in science-related classrooms.

This study investigated the use of storytelling in teaching elementary science on the topic of ‘Sense Organs’ at the Grade 1 level. A total of 21 students from one of the elementary schools in Brunei Darussalam participated in the study. The qualitative analyses of the observations and video recordings resulted in the classifications of the challenges faced when storytelling was used in the lessons. The four identified categories were the language aspect, development aspect, external challenges and existing knowledge. These categories were then used to investigate further any aspect that would develop the challenges into the teaching and learning of science using storytelling. Despite identifying the challenges in using storytelling in teaching science, storytelling may enhance the students’ understanding of science concepts.

This experimental case-study examined the performance of convenient sampling of fourty-five Year 9 students in solving word problems involving percentage from two classes in one government secondary school in Brunei Darussalam, using Bar Model as a solving strategy. Data was gathered quantitatively through written tests in the form of six word problem items as pre-test and post-test. The mean score of the pre-test was 0.93 indicating that the performance of the participating Year 9 students in solving word problems involving percentage was low prior to intervention. Intervention lessons produced a gain in the post-test mean to 2.87. Although the mean of post-test marks is still lower than the passing mark of the test, paired-sample t-test provided evidence of significance, thus proving that Bar Model Method had positive effect to the performance of word problem involving percentage. Evidence also indicated an increase in the students' overall marks from pre-test to post-test, with almost all except two students failed the pre-test to twenty-six students achieving marks above passing mark of 3 in post-test. Item-by-item analysis showed increase in correct responses in every item in post-test, even those with no attempts in pretest. These provided further evidence that there is overall improvement in students' performance in word problems related to percentage after the use of Bar Model as intervention.

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