Presents tips and suggestions for parents that can make a family nature walk more rewarding and help parents encourage their children to look closer at the natural world. (JRH)

Presents suggestions to help students learn about the concept of flight. Ideas include making a classroom timeline of flight, creating balloon rockets to demonstrate the concept of thrust, making tissue paper parachutes and observing the effect of drag, designing a space mission patch, and having a model paper airplane competition. (SM)

Each new baby is scrutinised and their facial features and other characteristics catalogued against known family members. This is essentially a social process: the new family member is recognised and accepted into the tribe. However, people's genetic inheritance--the information in their DNA--is also a serious matter with the potential to…

Two or three years ago, there was an exchange of several articles in "Primary Science Review" about the question: "What is the best way of naming the forces acting on a descending parachute?" (Harrison, 2001; Harlen, 2002; Sell, 2002). Stuart Harrison reported that, according to the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA), a third of…

When children first hear the term "sound wave" perhaps they might associate it with the way a hand waves or perhaps the squiggly line image on a television monitor when sound recordings are being made. Research suggests that children tend to think sound somehow travels as a discrete package, a fast-moving invisible thing, and not something that…

Science is a story, a narrative, and scientists are storytellers. Teaching is quite possibly the ultimate in storytelling so if one is teaching science he/she is already storytelling. Using a story to set up a science topic is effective. One can engage the brains of the audience, paint the scene, let them realise why the idea or work is important…

As a result of listening to and acting upon the ideas and suggestions of the children in the authors' reception class, a simple science activity grew into a multi-curricula "team-building" project. It wasn't until staff were assembling all the information to make a big book to enable the children to look back on their work, that the…

The perception of the role of science subject leader (SSL) and the reality may not be identical but the aims are very similar. However, perceptions of how these aims might be achieved vary greatly. The "scene setting" aspects, so essential to success, are not always seen as being important by those coming into the role. This was echoed in the…

Since science in primary schools is very safe, the coordinator's role in respect of health and safety can be a relatively modest one and integrated with other parts of the job. In this article, the author outlines the role of the science coordinator and sources of advice.

Here we describe a method for teaching the NOS called "Science as Storytelling," which was designed to directly confront narve realist preconceptions about the NOS and replace them with more sophisticated ideas, while retaining a moderate realist perspective. It was also designed to foster a more sophisticated understanding of the…

The purpose of the study was to describe the development and application of an instrument to identify various dimensions of the learning environment, as perceived by elementary and middle school students in Taiwan. The instrument, the New Constructivist Learning Environment Scales, includes four dimensions: attitude concerning instruction,…

This study reports on our steps toward achieving a conceptually coherent and empirically validated learning progression for carbon cycling in socio-ecological systems. It describes an iterative process of designing and analyzing assessment and interview data from students in upper elementary through high school. The product of our development…

Investigations with Wisconsin Fast Plants can make the subject matter come alive...or dead, depending on the experimental treatment. This became apparent when a university-based teacher educator and a fifth-grade teacher collaborated on a professional development experience aimed at increasing understanding of how science inquiry could be used…

Each year, first graders at Kensington Parkwood Elementary School in Kensington, Maryland, look forward to Fabulous Weather Day. Students learn how meteorologists collect data about the weather, how they study wind, temperature, precipitation, basic types/characteristics of clouds, and how they forecast. The project helps the students grow in…

Effective instruction requires continual assessment of student understanding to identify and redirect misconceptions. This is particularly important when dealing with topics that seem straightforward to the teacher but may go beyond the personal experience of many students, such as the life cycle of flowering plants. Life cycles are a core topic…