The purpose of this study is to investigate whether university students in pre-service teacher programs of elementary schools have difficulty dealing with animals existing nearby. In this study, 23 female university students were asked to evaluate their beliefs and attitudes toward 17 types of animals easily found in backyards, including insects. The result suggested that the female students’ (1) sympathy towards insects, (2) hate against insects, and (3) ability to touch insects were improved after they experienced collection and observation of insects in the session.

In the high school curriculum today the concept of“The central dogma” is not included in“Biology”. Only students who take the applied biology class have an opportunity to learn the concept in “BiologyⅡ”, where an E. coli cell-based recombinant system has been used for a student experiment. In the new curriculum coming in 2012, it is scheduled to be taught the central dogma at first or second grade in the first chapter of “Basic Biology”. In view of the importance in modern biology, it has been desired to have a new educational material which hits the spots in both features, effectiveness and easy-handling. Here we introduced that an in vitro simple gene expression kit is useful for visualization of transcription and translation processes in a test tube. Transcription was carried out using a phage RNA polymerase, and production of the mRNA was directly monitored using an RNA staining dye. Green fluorescent protein (GFP) was translated in the wheat germ cell- free protein synthesis system, and the product was detected directly by its fluorescence. Having established the kit, we have tested its value in the present “BiologyⅡ” classes, and could in fact confirm its usefulness. Since wheat seeds are foodstuff, the kit is free of bio-hazard and ethical issues. We expect that the kit will provide effective methods also in the new curriculum.

The main purposes of this study are 1) to examine whether preservice elementary and lower-secondary school teachers have familiarity with using photographs and pictures of 25 biological implements using their photographs and pictures in elementary and lower- secondary school science textbooks, and 2) to investigate whether they know the names of the implements shown in the textbooks. The main findings of this study were as follows ; 1) less than 70% of the teachers had seen four out of 25 kinds of the implements ; 2) less than 70% of the teachers had used seven out of 25 kinds of the implements ; and 3) none of the teachers correctly wrote the names of the all kinds of implements. The authors suggested some teaching strategies to improve the problems mentioned above.

In this study, clay teaching materials were developed for a High School Biology I class to illustrate the early development process and Vogtian fate-map of an amphibian embryo. In addition, a 50-minute lesson was conducted in which all students used clay to gain a deeper understanding of the three-dimensional structure and cross-section of an embryo. Lessons on the early development process and Vogtian fate-map of an amphibian embryo often end with only a surface understanding. This study revealed that by thinking and creating by students through the use of clay, they gained a deeper understanding of the positions, shapes, relationships between parts, and names in the early development process and fate-map.