You don't get your book into its sixth edition unless you are doing something right, and Teaching Secondary School Science does a lot right. It is a good, general-purpose textbook for secondary science "methods of teaching" courses. In its 25 chapters and appendix, the reader finds discussed almost every topic of concern to a beginning teacherfrom developing a personal philosophy of teaching, to national standards for science education, curriculum development in middle and secondary schools, methods and strategies of teaching, handling controversy in the classroom, and assessing student performance. It is a generic textbook, which can be utilized for courses preparing students to teach in any of the secondary science disciplines. I have used it in our "methods" course, and it also been used in the past by our biology department.

When I use this book for chemistry (and physics) students, I supplement it with a great deal of material that is specific to the disciplines and is not adequately addressed by Trowbridge and Bybee. This includes resources from ChemSource and its associated videotapes (SourceView), much more about safety and waste disposal, and specific information about chemical topics from my own experience and from a room full of printed and video resources. This year, I will be directing my physics students to the new book Teaching Introductory Physics, by Arnold B. Arons. We also spend more time on the use of computers and networks. Trowbridge and Bybee provide one brief chapter on this, but the subject requires a great deal more. It may well be impossible to adequately discuss this topic in a general textbook.