Thinking about where to next for science is really important. Do
we continue with just a pile of one-offs that turn up on the day or the week?
Do we have a two year plan with all the context strands neatly put in as well
as topic ideas? How do we cover all topics anyway? And my new big question: why
do seniors never do butterflies? Why is it only the juniors?
These are only my ideas and there are plenty of far smarter
people who have thought far deeper! Another good place to go is the NZCER
resource: http://www.nzcer.org.nz/nzcerpress/constructing-your-primary-schools-science-curriculum.
It really is a great place to begin thinking about these questions.
So for me, the first question is what do you want
to have in your local science curriculum? What do the local community and whānau
want? Mind you, are your whānau aware of how we teach science these days? It’s important
that everyone is reading from the same page! What is in your local community
that can be taken advantage of? The blue ducks on the river that DoC monitors
might be something the school wants to get involved in, for example.
Once we have some ideas, we can start thinking about how
we’re going to teach science. Do we want to have a couple of context strands a
year? Do we want to have a four year plan in place? Although I’ve heard there
are actually other curriculum areas (!), you may want to have some sort of
science every term, particularly of that suits the school –teachers,
environment, resources, etc. I know we always talk about the Nature of Science
and the science capabilities and I am always keen that those are the first stop
when planning a unit, we still need to have some contexts so that we can develop
the capabilities in the students. Some schools go for a plan where Year One has
two context strands, perhaps Living World and Material World whilst Year Two
will have Planet Earth and Beyond and Physical World. I’ve seen some examples
that go deeper with suggestion so that classes may look at plant life one time,
and animals the next… I do sometimes wonder if we try and go too deep in our
units –a six week unit on shadows or chemical reactions might be a bit
much. I also try to remember that the science essence statement on p. 17 of the
NZC talks about students exploring so how can I make sure that’s
happening all the time? Particularly for the juniors, lots of ‘experiences’ and
perhaps two to three lesson units might be enough –and this might work for the
seniors too if they haven’t had a lot of science. I also like the idea of
asking the children what they are interested in. Have a big brainstorm and then
after school see how they all link up –do they fit into particular context
strands? Is there a natural flow with some ideas? Some ideas may not be
possible as a science unit and may be better as a literacy unit with a
flavouring of science on the top –and that’s an important point: don’t forget
that we have numeracy and literacy blocks to teach science too… Measuring, statistics,
reading, writing, oral language and
visual language can all happen through science.
For me (and do remember this is out of my brain so feel free to
disagree!), I do like the idea of children coming across ideas that they have
encountered before. I’m thinking about, for example baking soda and vinegar at
Year 3 level and then playing with this again in Year 7 as well as jotting down
ideas that you see as children are talking, reading, writing. I was doing a
sugar cube experiment in a class and noticed all the children were thinking
that the sugar cubes were melting… I didn’t correct them but thought instead
that here’s an opportunity to take a few
lessons around melting and dissolving to enable children to develop their own
understanding rather than me saying “It’s actually dissolving” even though the children
can clearly see that the sugar cube is melting! Stuff might come up from news
items too –the Rena sinking in Tauranga would have been a good chance to
investigate about oil, it’s properties and perhaps even what it does to
animals. Could children have had a try to make something that could scoop up
oil (and now we’ve got a technology cross over!). Having a science table is
also a good way of hearing what children are talking about –I’d have one up at
least for the terms we are doing science if not all year, as long as it gets
refreshed… Could it have a bit of a context focus? For example, this month we
are going to look at geology on the science table so bring along some rocks!
One school that I worked with last year had a great plan where
they covered two context strands a term with a deliberate focus around the
science capabilities as well as one week a term where teachers planned some
capability activities with a focus each term on a different capability. I like
this idea too as it gives us space to have a play in science without worrying
about ticking all the boxes!
Sooooo wrapping up a long post, once a curriculum is in place,
it’s time to think about the actual units…
Six weeks on a topic eg Floating and
Sinking, Forces, Friction, Solar System or perhaps six weeks on a strand where
teachers may do a lot of smaller units on that context eg Physical World is the
theme and we look at forces, light, sound and magnets. Either way, what NoS or
capability will you be developing? Might even be a couple as all will probably
be happening in each unit. I might decide that I’m developing the Gather and
Interpret Data capability with a Living World context of plants. So I’m
gathering evidence of how the children notice and infer although we will be
making explanations and critiquing too…
I've developed a little word document with these ideas in too...
