Best Practices for Teaching Science
Methods for Teachers
"Science for All Americans: A Project 2061 Report on Literacy Goals in Science, Mathematics, and Technology"
The importance lies in "calling for students to experience science as an intriguing, exciting, active search for meaning and understanding of their world..." (1989). Teaching science no longer relies on memorization, lecture or cold, hard facts. Teaching science is now an experiment in itself - a challenge to give students the ability to think and investigate on their own to seek out their own answers.
Four Strands of Scientific Proficiency
First
Knowing, using and interpreting scientific explanations of the natural world.
Second
Generating and evaluating scientific evidence and explanations.
Third
Understanding the nature and development of scientific knowledge.
Teaching Science with Best Practices
- Students are innately curious about the natural world - build on that!
- Immerse students in doing science, not just learning topics.
- Use the Four Strands of Scientific Proficiency to guide teaching
- Integrate engineering with science
- Create a pyramid of scientific knowledge - build on what the students already know while teaching them to reorganize and understand conceptual change.
- Learn as individuals and as a collaborative group.
- Encourage self-direction in their learning!
- Assess what they have learned and how they have learned it.
"When you exude a passion for knowing why and invite students to share the power and beauty of scientific understanding, you can nourish the wonder already present in their minds."
(Zemelman, Daniels and Hyde, 2012)