Conceptual development

Conceptual development takes place throughout our lives. We devote most of this review to discussing what is known about how children develop their kn owledge and understanding of biological concepts. This area remains surpris ingly under-researched, and there is a need for comparable longitudinal stu dies to be carried out on different populations throughout the world, using carefully designed and rigorously tested methodologies. Nevertheless, enou gh is known about how children learn biological concepts to suggest that sc hool biology teaching would be more effective if (a) pupils had more contro l over their learning and (b) more learning took place in groups.