The Science Curriculum: Between Ideals And Outcomes

My earliest memory of science in elementary school was in first grade. I remember walking into the classroom early in the morning and seeing plant pots lined up in the back of the room. Of course one of us asked, Mrs. Denny, what are those for? She answered like any experienced teacher “We will get to those after lunch. Thank you for noticing though.” As a young student, I was more interested about taking the plant home to my mom and showing her what I did. After lunch, we went on a walk to the atrium in the center of the school. Mrs. Denny pointed out the different kinds of plants that were in the atrium like flowers, and other small plants. We walked back to our classroom and talked about what a plant needs to grow and finally got to make a plant ourselves. We each had a cup of water, a cup of soil, a pot, and a plant. I also remember in third grade learning about the weather by creating a big picture of the water cycle with the clouds and why there is lightening and thunder. After we made the picture, we each got to write down a question about weather and Mrs. Heffernan went over each one. I loved science when I was little because I was able to explore and try new things. I struggled in math and reading because they were very black and white but science allowed creativity. I enjoyed science in elementary school because it was very hands on so I didn’t have to sit in my seat. I would define science has a content area that allows the individual to research and develop

My placement, at Alexander Goode Elementary School, is in Kindergarten and does not have a Science curriculum. While talking to my cooperating teacher, Ms. Gifford, she informed me they are so focused on getting behavior under control in the beginning of the year. Also, students enter the classroom with little phonemic awareness and prior knowledge to literacy concepts.

As a future elementary teacher with an endorsement in science it is important to understand the six NSTA Preservice Science Standards to accurately teach the sciences to P-12 students. Within this paper, the each six NSTA Preservice Science Standards will be examined and described in order to gain a better understanding of teaching the sciences.

This framework builds on previous high quality works in science education: Science for All Americans (1989), Benchmarks for Science Literacy (1993), and NSES (1996). Unlike these previous standards, the importance of having the scientific and educational research communities was taken into the process for developing the framework. Thus, the most current research on science and science learning was grounded when identifying the science that all K-12 students should know, which increased its scientific validity and accuracy. The second step was facilitated by Achieve, Inc. with the recognition of the importance of state and educator leadership in the development of the actual standards. Thus, state policy leaders, higher education, K–12 teachers, and the science and business community were involved when developing Next Generation of Science Standards

19th. That is where America ranks in number of Bachelors degrees given in STEM as a percent of population (Curbeam 3). But this wasn’t always the case. America was one of the strongest nations in science and technology in mid 20th century during WWII and the Cold War. With the US harnessing the power of the atom and landing men on the moon, getting people excited about math and science wasn’t necessary because they already were. Another addition to this success was the clearly historic non-partisan support of NASA and other governmentally supported STEM programs. This support has faded over time. Because of this partisanship, support for NASA and STEM has dwindled from congressional gridlock. Many

As Whitehead says, “If a science forgets its heroes, it is lost.” Learning about nature of science and its social and cultural aspects will enhance of our understanding that science is a human endeavor. Science is a way of explaining natural phenomena by using interpretations and interferences with experimental data and observations. However, including history of science in our teachings, as well as a laboratory part, is a great way to illuminate students about the evolution of science and how scientists can take risks and sometimes fail while seeking information. Whether they study science fields or not, this history will encourage students to make and learn from mistakes while engaged in scientific practices that will expand their

Based on the NSTA Position statement, the curriculum of science from kindergarten through 12 grades has kept changing during the century of rapid development of science. Those changes increase the complexity of teaching and learning science. Teachers are required to design the science class that provides sufficient and effective activities of science to students. In addition, students are expected to complete the task by following the instruction and to adopt the factual knowledge replacing the superficial information or isolated facts. The importance of science programs is to assist students to adapt the community of the well-developed science, and develop student’s self-assessment skills.

Science is the process of observing, thinking, and reflecting on actions and events, for young children science involves constructing the relationship within which the factual information can be organized into meaningful concepts ( Brewer, J.A,2007)Therefore, engaged in the science and discovery centre children will firstly, gain the knowledge the basic science concepts and show the familiarity with the terminology. Secondly, children would adopt the scientific skills for observing, communicating, comparing, classifying, organizing , measuring and experimenting. Thirdly, being involved in the science and discovery centre children will develop dispositions, and show interest to investigate unusual objects and events. Likewise, children will

In addition to research based programs that integrate science and literacy learning into one combined lesson there are other strategies that teachers can use to integrate these two subjects. The 5-E’s model for lesson planning is an effective way to structure science lessons to incorporate literacy learning. The 5-E’s include engaging the student in the learning, exploring the content topic, further learning is done through explaining the topic, students are then required to elaborate on the topic, and then asked to evaluate their learning. In the article “Content Area Literacy: Individualizing Student Instruction in Second Grade Science” (Connor et al., 2010), researchers created the ISI-Science curriculum and implemented

The general definition of science is the systematic study of the physical and natural world through observation and experiments. On the contrary, it is much more than that. Much like art, it holds a sense of subjectivity. It is an abstract paradigm that requires the input of one’s personal beliefs and values to help it progress. It is much more than just facts and theories of how the world works, but also a prime representation of the ethics and beliefs of the scientists that help mold it today. Science is a database for factual knowledge on the natural world, furthermore, it also incorporates the environment it has created. The environment consists of the particular people, behaviors, and struggles of the scientific community. Even though science incorporates many thoughts and ideas, it does not contain other ideas. Science does not hold a moral category. It does not define what is considered right and what is considered wrong. It merely provides information on certain ideas for further understanding. Any theories and applications of it can lead to other subjects. This idea also applies to what the acquired scientific knowledge is used for. Even though the ideas of complexity and subjectivity are present in both science and art, the concept of aesthetic should only be important for art. Despite requiring organization and general cleanliness, science does not need to pass the eye test. Science should be represented through proper data and its analysis and the non factual features need to have a rational reasoning. To judge or base an idea on its appeal does not equal to

The purpose of this article is to inspect the possible link between teachers’ visions of the growth of scientific knowledge and the methods they use to help students construct a knowledge of science. Teachers’ views about science influenced not only lessons about the nature of science but also shaped an implicit curriculum concerning the nature of scientific knowledge. The study used sampling to find seven teachers. During the interview, the teachers were questioned about their syntactical knowledge. Syntactical knowledge refers to by Brickhouse as the methods used in a discipline to construct knowledge (e. g. , how experimentation and evidence influence the generation of scientific theories, how theories are used in generating new knowledge,

The TOPS curriculum and enrichment in science and math has deeply motivated me towards this program. By entering the TOPS program I will be surrounded by students that also share my love for math and science. In the TOPS program, students are exposed to an enriched curriculum and an increased workload, this will help me prepare and become well adjusted for high school. The TOPS program is truly a terrific learning opportunity, it’s enriched curriculum, profound teachers and awesome students are definitely something I want to be a part of. Thank you for considering me.

Accordingly to Bell’s article for levels of inquiry, “The National Science Education Stamdards characterize inquiry instruction as involving students in a form of active learning that emphasizes questioning, data analysis, and critical thinking.” The level of inquiry that was planned in this 5E lesson is a guided inquiry. In this lesson plan, the students are investigating teacher-presented questions using student designed and selected procedures. As we may know, the less information that is given to a learner, the higher the level of inquiry will be.

Scientific-based instruction is something that teachers use all the time in their classroom. Teachers are consistently assessing and evaluating students’ performance, creating and amending individual education plans, lesson plans, and reflecting on their practices. As teachers, we should be doing rigorous research and building hypothesis to base further teaching practices on.

Science is, by its nature, inquiry based and science knowledge is built through processes in which discoveries of the natural world are made (Abruscato, 2000). It utilizes discovery and scientific thinking process to explore and learn knowledge and skills. Learning by doing is the new efficient method in teaching science. For kindergarten, this method leads to better understanding of science concepts and builds skills that children will use in future life .What a child can do with assistance now, they can later do on their own (Vygotsky, 1978). John Dewey (1916) stated that children must be engaged in an active quest for learning and new ideas. Inquiry is important in educating kindergarteners because it not only keeps them interested in lessons but also helps them retain more information when performing exploration and investigation. Children are naturally motivated to learn and actively seek out information to help their understanding (Piaget, 1950).The success of students who participate in hands- on inquiry activities suggests that if students have first hands experience with science, concepts are easier to understand and apply and students are generally more favorable to science and have better understanding of the nature of science .Within a conceptual framework, inquiry learning and active learner involvement can lead to important outcomes in the classroom. In kindergarten, students who are actively making observations, collecting results and drawing