Big Ideas in Science Education Quiz

Working with Big Ideas of Science Education

• A group of experts in science education identified key ideas that students should encounter in their science education to enable them to understand, enjoy and marvel at the natural world.

• The goals of science education should be a progression towards understanding key ideas – ‘big ideas’ – of relevance to students’ lives during and beyond school, instead of just a body of facts and theories.

• Principles and Big Ideas of Science Education, resulting from an international seminar of expert scientist and science educators in 2009, identified some guiding principles, ten big ideas of science and four ideas about science and its applications.

• Working with Big Ideas of Science Education – resulting from a further seminar and work by the same group – adds to the earlier work in setting out in greater detail the rationale for working towards big ideas and the implications of this for curriculum content, pedagogy, student assessment and teacher education.

• The focus remains on conceptual understanding with the development of scientific capabilities and attitudes embedded in appropriate pedagogy rather than as separate lists of goals.

• The big ideas of science and about science are expressed in the form of narrative descriptions of a progression that builds up understanding of key ideas across the years from the start of primary to the end of secondary school.

• The implication of putting into practice principles and big ideas are considered in relation to the selection of content, pedagogy, student assessment and teacher education.

• Inquiry-based pedagogy is being embraced in principle across the globe, supported by an increasing body of research on its effectiveness.

• Situations where science is used in daily life, and which are likely to capture the interest of many students, often involve combining science with other subjects, particularly engineering, technology and mathematics.

• Education that helps students to connect ideas across and within subject domains encourages creativity and innovation.

• Advances in research into the activity of the brain are rapidly identifying factors that facilitate effective learning.

• In many countries there has been a constant increase in testing and the use of test results to set targets for teachers and schools, which all too often encourage teaching of disconnected pieces of knowledge.Principles and Benefits of Science Education

• The current approach to teaching science can hinder students' development of key abilities and understanding.

• Teachers should have a wider picture of powerful ideas in mind when planning lessons.

• Teacher education should provide teachers with experience in scientific activity and developing big ideas.

• Understanding big ideas in science has benefits for students and society, including making informed choices about health and the environment.

• Science education can contribute to building confidence and respect for oneself and others.

• The goals of science education include developing understanding of big ideas in science, scientific capabilities, and attitudes.

• Science education should enhance learners' curiosity and questioning.

• Learning activities should be based on students' experiences and interests, and should enable them to engage with real objects and problems.

• Assessment should be used to improve learning, and a range of methods should be used to gather evidence.

• Teacher education should include experience in scientific activity and discourse, and teachers should have opportunities to improve their own understanding in science.

• The choice of big ideas to be included in science education involves decisions about range and size.

• Science education should also aim to develop understanding of the nature of science and the capacity to engage in scientific inquiry.Working with Big Ideas of Science Education: Range, Size and Identification

• Scientific inquiry involves the use of evidence to test ideas and the understanding that results will depend on the evidence collected and how it is interpreted.

• The development of big ideas in science education must promote the development of competence and confidence in inquiry.

• Combining science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) in educational programs can better match teaching and learning to practices in the workplace and research settings, but it should be done through curriculum planning that coordinates related themes and topics.

• Big ideas of science are ideas that can be used to explain and make predictions about a range of related phenomena in the natural world, and they can come in different sizes, from small ideas to larger and more comprehensive ones.

• Big ideas at an interdisciplinary level, below the level of overarching transdisciplinary concepts, are most useful for learners at school, as they have more obvious links to their experiences.

• The ten ideas of science and four ideas about science identified in Principles and Big Ideas of Science Education continue to apply as big ideas that all students should have the opportunity to learn by the end of compulsory education.

• The selection criteria for big ideas include explanatory power, providing a basis for understanding issues, leading to enjoyment and satisfaction, and having cultural significance.

• Feedback on the selection of big ideas has not pointed to a need for major changes, but more attention needs to be given to how to work with big ideas in practice and the implications for curriculum content, pedagogy, and student assessment.

• The development of understanding of big ideas in science is a gradual and progressive process continuing throughout formal education and beyond, starting from small, local, and context-specific ideas and leading to more powerful ideas that explain a wider range of related phenomena.

• There is a huge amount of research into students’ own ideas which shows that many of their initial ideas are unlikely to be in line with scientific understanding, and the path to more scientific ideas depends on their experiences and on how they are helped to make sense of them.

• Describing the progression of ideas from those that students form from their earliest years to the grasp of big ideas is important to inform curriculum development and the use of assessment.

• Teachers need to see the connection between learning experiences at various points in schooling and the overall aim of understanding big ideas.Models of Progression in Science Education

• There are three models of progression in science education: ladder, jigsaw, and spiral.

• The ladder model sees progression as a linear development with separate stages and fixed learning targets, which may not convey the big ideas to students.

• The jigsaw model only describes the overall endpoint, but it provides too little guidance to teachers and curriculum developers.

• The spiral model gradually develops ideas over time through a spiral curriculum, but there is a risk of losing sight of connections between ideas in different strands.

• A combination of these models is needed to develop different big ideas.

• The narrative approach provides a description of how ideas change from small contextualized ideas to big abstract ideas that enable understanding of the natural world.

• The ideas are divided into two categories: ideas about the natural world and ideas about science.

• The range of ideas appropriate for different stages of schooling is indicated in a sidebar.

• The aim is to move a little further towards a big idea at each stage, not to try to forge a link between every activity and the most sophisticated form of the idea.

• The pedagogy experienced by students is a contextual variable that affects how far they can move in this direction at any time.

• The first big idea is that all matter in the universe is made of very small particles.

• The big ideas are developed gradually over time, from primary school to later secondary education.