In our first year science and sustainability education subject, how to best support pre-service teachers to meet the conceptual demands of understanding important socio-ecological challenges such as climate change is a key focus of our teaching practice. In this multi-method case study, we explore how a flipped classroom supported students' engagement and learning by way of an end-of-semester student survey, and a narrative account of our experiences, as educators, enacting the active learning strategies in class. Analysis of survey data showed that while students reported a high level of engagement with the videos and believed that they supported their learning, opinions were divided as to whether a flipped classroom was preferred over traditional lectures. Additionally, our reflections on how students engaged with the active learning strategies revealed that significant time was required at the start of class to review key concepts, as students appeared reluctant to engage independently with the planned activities-particularly those that involved more challenging science concepts. Informed by these findings, we propose a flipped learning continuum that fosters different levels of student-centred learning and autonomy, depending on students' learning needs and their readiness for a flipped learning approach. In the context of the first year experience, specifically, some teacher-led instruction may be appropriate in a flipped classroom to support students' transition to learning in higher education.

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Research aimed at understanding the role of the affective domain in student learning in classrooms has undergone a recent resurgence due to the need to understand students' affective response to science instruction. In a case study of a year 8 science class in North Queensland, students worked in small groups to write, film, edit, and produce short videos about the socio-scientific issue of coal seam gas mining as part of a unit on energy. Student emotions over the course of the unit of work were recorded using emotion diaries (a self-report measure), video recordings of lessons, and end-of-project interviews. We identify trends in student emotions and analyze their relation to classroom activities using two constructs for interpreting the affective dimension of student learning: emotional energy and emotion regulation. By analyzing a salient classroom event, we report students' regulation of negative emotions like frustration and anger as they worked together to complete the video project successfully. Furthermore, we propose that emotions, particularly positive emotions, elicited by the video task and not the socio-scientific issue dominated students' experiences and perceptions of the unit. This raises questions about how students' positive emotions might be regulated effectively so that they remain focused on the intended learning. # 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 53: 2016

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In response to international concerns about scientific literacy and students' waning interest in school science, this study investigated the effects of a science-writing project about the socioscientific issue of biosecurity on the development of students' scientific literacy. Students generated two BioStories each that merged scientific information with the narrative storylines in the project. The study was conducted in two phases. In the exploratory phase, a qualitative case study of a 6 th grade class involving classroom observations and interviews informed the design of the second, confirmatory phase of the study, which was conducted at a different school. This phase involved a mixed methods approach featuring a quasi-experimental design with two classes of Australian middle school students (i.e., 6 th grade, 11 years of age, n=55). The results support the argument that writing the sequence of stories helped the students become more familiar with biosecurity issues, develop a deeper understanding of related biological concepts, and improve their interest in science. On the basis of these findings, teachers should be encouraged to engage their students in the practice of writing about socioscientific issues (SSI) in a way that integrates scientific information into narrative storylines. Extending the practice to older students, and exploring additional issues related to writing about SSI are recommended for further research.