Applies to:

Subject:

Science

Overview

What exactly is science, what does it aspire to do, and why should we, the people, care? It seems like a simple question, but it’s an infinitely complex one. We, in our previous issue, had talked about what science is in the light of its very nature and the processes it entails. We had also taken you through a journey on how to teach Nature of Science to students and its importance in education in general and the teaching of science in particular. Isaac Asimov views concur, “Science does not purvey absolute truth; science is a mechanism. It’s a way of trying to improve your knowledge of nature; it’s a system for testing your thoughts against the universe and seeing whether they match.” Carl Sagan echoes the same sentiment when he remarks, “Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge.”

So how to get children interested in science? We have already covered the last issue of our ‘Story of the month’ section on teaching Nature of Science to students as young as kindergarteners. In this issue we take this idea further and will talk about teaching Nature of Science to students of grades 3 to 5.

So what are the abilities of students of grade 3rd, 4th, and 5th and how will this impact a teacher’s teaching of Nature of Science to these students? What will be the implications, of understanding these abilities, for a teacher in designing her instructional strategies? What will the students achieve by learning about the nature and process of science?

Answers to all these questions above and instructional strategies for teaching Nature of Science to grade 3 to 5 students is discussed in detail here.