Context-based education helps students see and appreciate more clearly links
between the science they studied and their everyday lives (e.g., Hofstein et al. 2000 ) .
The Industrial Chemistry project in Israel, focused on how learning industrial chemistry
case studies affected students’ perceptions of their classroom learning environment.
Three groups of Grade 12 high school students majoring in chemistry were
selected for the study. Two of the groups (Groups 1 and 2) were exposed to an industrial
chemistry case study whereas the third group of students, a control group, were
not. The analysis revealed that Group 1 students outperformed the other two groups
of students regarding their perceptions of the relevance of their chemistry studies. In
addition, they achieved higher awareness of the social implications of their chemistry
studies, for example, they found that their chemistry studies better prepared
them to become future citizens and informed them about occupational possibilities
(Hofstein et al. 2000 ) .