2. Queensland Curriculum F-10
‘Essential Learnings’
National Curriculum (ACARA) –
which we will focus on almost
exclusively
Relevant Science
Syllabuses – Queensland
3. You need to really know your way
around the syllabuses for the grades
you intend to teach
(There would also be considerable value
for you in having a sense of the
syllabuses in the other grades)
This course
4. The document included on the
course web site is a very restricted
subset of the overall National
Curriculum, Science, losing a lot of
the ‘preamble’ with more
explanatory material
I urge you to spend time on the full
ACARA site for the current version
of the Australian Curriculum
5. Science Understanding (SU)
Scientific Inquiry Skills (SIS)
Science as a Human Endeavour (SHE)
Strands in the National
Curriculum, Science
6. The Science Inquiry Skills and Science as a Human
Endeavour strands are described across a twoyear
band. In their planning, schools and teachers refer to
the expectations outlined in the Achievement
Standard and also to the content of the Science
Understanding strand for the relevant year level to
ensure that these two strands are addressed over the
twoyear period.
The three strands of the curriculum are interrelated
and their content is taught in an integrated way.
The order and detail in which the content
descriptions are organised into teaching/learning
programs are decisions to be made by the teacher.
- Australian Curriculum, Science
7. This strand is the ‘science content
knowledge’ or ‘conceptual
understanding’ strand
It is divided into biological,
chemical, physical and earth and
space sciences
Science Understanding
8. This is the ‘nature of science’ and ‘social
contexts of science’ strand of the syllabus
It is divided into ‘Nature and
development of science’ and ‘Use and
influence of science’
Links to the STSE approach,
socioscientific issues and the ‘curricular
emphases’ model
Science as a Human
Endeavor
9. This is the ‘process skills’ strand of
the syllabus
It is divided into ‘Questioning and
predicting’, ‘Planning and
conducting’, ‘Processing and
analysing data and information’,
‘Evaluating’ and ‘Communicating’
The links to Bloom’s Taxonomy are
clear
Science Inquiry Skills
10. One possible approach to
integrating socioscientific issues
(SSIs – the new language) or
Science, Technology and Society
(STS – the old language) or
Science, Technology, Society and
Environment (STSE – the middle
language) issues in science
classrooms without taking much
more time
Curricular emphases
11. Developed by Doug Roberts and
refined by Frank Jenkins
Involves planning teaching units
with a particular ‘curricular
emphasis’ chosen (to match the
content) from among:
Nature of Science
Technology
Science and Society
12. Units with a ‘nature of science’ emphasis include the
history and philosophy of science and some of the
epistemological ‘rules of the game’ as a way of
complementing and contextualising the scientific
content
Units with a ‘technology’ emphasis explore the
complex and dynamic relationships between science
and technology
Units with a ‘science and society’ emphasis look at
the social impacts, benefits and consequences of the
associated science, and also address the
‘environment’ element
13. Serves the purpose of allowing teachers to honour
the goals and aspirations of the students they teach
and of the students’ parents.
Any approach to teaching science for all that fails to
also deliver high quality science education for future
scientists and excellent outcomes on high stakes tests
is doomed
Curricular emphases offer teachers a way to achieve
‘both-and’ outcomes, rather than to be placed on the
horns of an ‘either-or’ dilemma
14. Using a variety of different
curricular emphases across the year
leads to balance in all the goals of
science education
Curricular emphases for
planning
