Designing hands-on, inquiry-based activities incorporating contemporary science

The Advancing Science and Engineering through Laboratory Learning (ASELL) for Schools program has been instrumental in getting schools across Australia to reconsider the effectiveness of the laboratory learning activity (LLA) in science education. In Victoria, the ASELL for Schools project has collaborated with another nationally funded program, the Reconceptualising Maths and Science Pre-service Teacher Education Program (ReMSTEP), to integrate contemporary science and industry links into the redesign of LLAs. In this paper, we present some of the ideas that are used to re-craft an LLA, along with four case studies. [Author abstract]