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This article describes an effort to explore and enhance argumentation skills of Taiwanese grade 6 students through instruction in socioscientific issues. An experienced elementary school teacher was given 8 months of personalized instruction on argumentation skills and socioscientific issues, then subsequently implemented a 17-h classroom unit on the establishment of Ma-Guo National Park. His students learned to establish claims and warrants, construct counterarguments, offer supportive arguments, and provide evidence for each one. Data consisted of student responses to questionnaires and individual follow-up interviews. A multiple regression analysis revealed that success in learning argumentation skills was not substantially related to pre-instruction argumentation skills, but significantly related to the student ability levels. High-ability students were significantly better than low-ability students at generating complete arguments. Most students elaborated their arguments, and more highability students offered rebuttals after instruction. However, even these high achievers did not completely understand the meaning of evidence and often misused supplementary warrants as evidence.

The purpose of this investigation was to examine, from a cross-cultural perspective, students' epistemological patterns of reasoning about socioscientific issues (SSI), and to identify potential interactions of cultural and scientific identity. Mediating factors associated with students' argumentation and discourse about SSI, as well as the public's understanding of science, has been identified as an important area of investigation in the field of science education. This mixed-methods design included over 300 students from Jamaica, South Africa, Sweden, Taiwan, and the United States. Students responded to instruments designed to assess their epistemological conceptualizations and justifications related to distributive justice, allocation of scarce medical resources, and epistemological beliefs over five dimensions related to scientific knowledge. Four iterations of a coding scheme produced over 97% inter-rater agreement for four independent coders. Results indicate there is a consistent trend toward epistemological congruity across cultures within inductively derived themes of: (1) Fairness;(2) Pragmatism; (3) Emotive Reasoning; (4) Utility; and (5) Theological Issues. Moreover, there were no discernable differences in terms of how students from these countries presented their beliefs on the sub-categories of each of the five major categories. It appears that students displayed a high degree of congruence with respect to how they frame their reasoning on this SSI as well as their justifications for their epistemological beliefs. There were statistically significant differences regarding the ability to raise scientifically relevant questions among countries. Commonalities as well as distinguishing characteristics in epistemological orientations are compared and contrasted and connections to a model of socioscientific reasoning with implications for research and pedagogy are discussed. ß 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 50: 2013 The purpose of this investigation was to examine, from a cross-cultural perspective, students' epistemological patterns of reasoning about socioscientific issues (SSI), and to identify potential interactions of cultural and scientific identity. We derive our fundamental meaning of epistemological beliefs from the Greek term epistēmē, which expresses how individuals construe and justify meaning from their own personal knowledge and understanding about the world. In this context, epistemological reasoning refers to how individuals frame an issue and Additional Supporting Information may be found in the online version of this article.

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The risk and uncertainty of entrepreneurial activity is high, and failures are common. The existing literature has emphasized that serial entrepreneurs can learn from failures, but studies on how learning affects strategic actions in subsequent entrepreneurship activities are rare. This paper uses the strategic incrementalism perspective to focus on emergent learning and changes in strategy for serial entrepreneurs with failure experience. The empirical results demonstrate that with more intensive emergent learning, serial entrepreneurs make more substantial strategic changes in subsequent entrepreneurship endeavors, and entrepreneurial performance can moderate such relationships.

Resin transfer molding (RTM) has the potential to manufacture high quality, geometrically complex composite parts. Benzoxazine is a new kind of high performance composite matrix. It can be polymerized with a ring-opening reaction without releasing volatiles. In this article, a novel RTM resin made from aromatic diamine, phenol and formaldehyde is reported. The viscosity and curing behavior of the RTM resin as well as the properties of the cured neat resin and fiber reinforced composite were investigated. The resin has a viscosity lower than 0.5 Pa ⅐ s after 4 hr at 100°C, and can be cured at 180°C. The tensile strength, modulus, and elongation of the cast resin are 94 MPa, 4.6 GPa, and 2.2%, respectively. The flexural strength and modulus of the cast resin are 160 MPa and 4.9 GPa. The flexural strength and modulus of its glass fiber laminate are 662 MPa and 30 GPa. It is very easy to control the viscosity and curing rate of the RTM resin through the addition of reactive dilute agents and catalysts according to the requirement of RTM processing. POLYM. COMPOS., 26:563-571, 2005.