To promote scientific literacy in school science, students need to learn key concepts in science, along with the nature of scientific knowledge and how it is generated. Ideally, this learning mirrors authentic scientific inquiry through student engagement in three key epistemic practices: flexibility and creativity, knowledge construction, and…

Setting primary science in an everyday context supports learning in a number of ways. Exploring the science associated with everyday people, places and materials helps to access pupils' prior knowledge and experience and thus facilitates a more constructivist and pupil-centred form of pedagogy. This account looks at various examples from the…

The challenges of contemporary society require pupils to make informed decisions and take responsible actions on problems related to science and technology. This work provides guidelines to support teachers in the design of learning scenarios that enable achievement of these goals. Two classroom examples based on contemporary news events explain…

Immersive virtual environments (IVEs) model scientific inquiry practices and can provide rich learning experiences for students. However, the teacher is an essential component of how the students engage with the technology, as they embed the IVE into everyday teaching and learning. Ideally, classroom pedagogies would reflect the scientific…