This article reports the development and application of two instruments for assessing science teachers? pedagogical knowledge in the context of teaching higher?order thinking: a Likert?type research instrument, and an instrument that analyzes classroom observations. The rationale for developing these instruments and their main categories is described. One hundred and fifty Israeli science teachers replied to the Likert?type questionnaire. Results show that biology teachers gained a significantly higher score than either physics or chemistry teachers, that junior high school teachers scored significantly higher than high school teachers, and that a significant negative correlation was found between final scores and teaching experience. Participants in the classroom observation study were 14 teachers who attended a one?year professional development course for teaching higher?order thinking. The instrument was sensitive in detecting progress in teachers? pedagogical knowledge in several categories, such as: Frequency of tasks that required higher?order thinking; The variety of thinking strategies that teachers addressed during their lessons; Engagement of students in metacognitive thinking; and Using the ?language of thinking? in class. The implications of the findings for research and practice are described.

Despite inconclusive evidence regarding the effectiveness of cognitive conflict, educators still consider it a significant instructional strategy. One of the challenges of current research is to study the conditions under which cognitive conflict is effective. This research examines the notion that cognitive conflict may have dissimilar effects for students of different academic levels. The study compares the effectiveness of teaching the control of variables thinking strategy to students of two academic levels (low vs. high) by two different teaching methods [inducing a cognitive conflict (ICC) vs. direct teaching (DT)]. One hundred twenty-one students who learned in a heterogeneous school were divided into four experimental groups in a 2 × 2 design. Results show no main effect of teaching method but do show a significant interaction effect between level of students and teaching method. The findings show that students with high academic achievements benefited from the ICC teaching method while the DT method hindered their progress. In contrast, students with low academic achievements benefited from the DT method while the ICC teaching method hindered their progress. The interaction effect was preserved in a retention test that took place 6 months after instruction. The findings show that previous inconclusive findings regarding the effectiveness of the ICC method can be explained by its contradictory effects on students of different academic levels.

Low participation rates of girls in advanced physics classes are a serious problem in many countries. Assuming that physics teachers can affect girls’ choice to elect advanced physics classes, and that teachers’ behaviors are affected by their knowledge and beliefs, the goal of this study was to investigate physics’ teachers’ knowledge and beliefs regarding girls’ low participation rates in physics. Interviews were conducted with 25 physics teacher who taught in 25 different high schools in an urban area in Israel. The findings show that: approximately one-half of the teachers underestimate the severity of the problem; almost two-thirds of the teachers do not see it as a problem that requires any action; and most teachers do not know what can be done to encourage girls to elect physics and to create a more gender inclusive physics learning environment. The implications for physics teacher education are discussed.