What is science for a child? How do children learn about science and how to do science? Drawing on a vast array of work from neuroscience to classroom observation, Taking Science to School provides a comprehensive picture of what we know about teaching and learning science from kindergarten through eighth grade. By looking at a broad range of questions, this book provides a basic foundation for guiding science teaching and supporting students in their learning. Taking Science to School answers such questions as: When do children begin to learn about science? Are there critical stages in a child's development of such scientific concepts as mass or animate objects? What role does nonschool learning play in children's knowledge of science? How can science education capitalize on children's natural curiosity? What are the best tasks for books, lectures, and hands-on learning? How can teachers be taught to teach science? The book also provides a detailed examination of how we know what we know about children's learning of science--about the role of research and evidence. This book will be an essential resource for everyone involved in K-8 science education--teachers, principals, boards of education, teacher education providers and accreditors, education researchers, federal education agencies, and state and federal policy makers. It will also be a useful guide for parents and others interested in how children learn.

What is science for a child? How do children learn about science and how to do science? Drawing on a vast array of work from neuroscience to classroom observation, Taking Science to School provides a comprehensive picture of what we know about teaching and learning science from kindergarten through eighth grade. By looking at a broad range of questions, this book provides a basic foundation for guiding science teaching and supporting students in their learning. Taking Science to School answers such questions as: When do children begin to learn about science? Are there critical stages in a child's development of such scientific concepts as mass or animate objects? What role does nonschool learning play in children's knowledge of science? How can science education capitalize on children's natural curiosity? What are the best tasks for books, lectures, and hands-on learning? How can teachers be taught to teach science? The book also provides a detailed examination of how we know what we know about children's learning of scienceâ€"about the role of research and evidence. This book will be an essential resource for everyone involved in K-8 science educationâ€"teachers, principals, boards of education, teacher education providers and accreditors, education researchers, federal education agencies, and state and federal policy makers. It will also be a useful guide for parents and others interested in how children learn.

What is science for a child? This work provides a picture of what we know about teaching and learning science from kindergarten through eighth grade. It answers questions such as: When do children begin to learn about science? What role does nonschool learning play in children's knowledge of science? It is suitable for K-8 science teachers.

This book narrates two teachers’ experiences creating and leading an elementary after-school science program at a public housing authority. The narrative employs a reflexive ethnographic approach to examine the reflections of each teacher during one academic year. The book explores the teachers’ understandings of socially just teaching, their pedagogical transformations, and a vision of how science as a discipline was important in terms of enacting a culturally sustaining pedagogy. The reflexive ethnographic perspective enables consideration of the implications of teachers’ positionality in teaching science to marginalized and/or underrepresented students in informal learning contexts.

What types of instructional experiences help K-8 students learn science with understanding? What do science educators, teachers, teacher leaders, science specialists, professional development staff, curriculum designers, and school administrators need to know to create and support such experiences? Ready, Set, Science! guides the way with an account of the groundbreaking and comprehensive synthesis of research into teaching and learning science in kindergarten through eighth grade. Based on the recently released National Research Council report Taking Science to School: Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K-8, this book summarizes a rich body of findings from the learning sciences and builds detailed cases of science educators at work to make the implications of research clear, accessible, and stimulating for a broad range of science educators. Ready, Set, Science! is filled with classroom case studies that bring to life the research findings and help readers to replicate success. Most of these stories are based on real classroom experiences that illustrate the complexities that teachers grapple with every day. They show how teachers work to select and design rigorous and engaging instructional tasks, manage classrooms, orchestrate productive discussions with culturally and linguistically diverse groups of students, and help students make their thinking visible using a variety of representational tools. This book will be an essential resource for science education practitioners and contains information that will be extremely useful to everyone �including parents �directly or indirectly involved in the teaching of science.

When implemented effectively, technology has great potential to positively connect with learning, assessment, and motivation in the context of K–12 science education and inquiry. Written by leading experts on technology-enhanced science learning and educational research, this book situates the topic within the broader context of educational psychology research and theory and brings it to a wider audience. With chapters on the fundamentals of science learning and assessment, integration of technology into classrooms, and examples of specific technologies, this concise volume is designed for any course on science learning that includes technology use in the curriculum. It will be indispensable for student researchers and both pre- and in-service teachers alike.

Teaching Science in Elementary and Middle School integrates principles of learning and motivation with practical teaching ideas for implementing them. Paralleling what scientists do, project-based learning (PBL) represents the essence of inquiry and the nature of science, and engages children and teachers in investigating meaningful, real-world questions about the world around them. This text provides concrete strategies on teaching using a project-based approach and on meeting the principles in A Framework for K–12 Science Education and the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). Features include strategies for planning long-term, interdisciplinary, student-centered units; scenarios to help readers situate new experiences; and a wealth of supplementary material on the Companion Website. Features in the Fifth Edition: Integrates research-based findings from the National Research Council’s Taking Science to School, A Framework for K–12 Science Education, and NGSS to engage learners and help them make sense of phenomena in using disciplinary core ideas, science and engineering practices, and crosscutting concepts Gives attention to cultural diversity throughout the chapters, with an added focus on working with English Language Learners Describes how to develop and use assessments that require students to make use of their knowledge to solve problems or explain phenomena Illustrates how to use PBL to make connections to Common Core Standards for Mathematics and English Language Arts Provides examples of project-based lessons and projects to illustrate how teachers can support children in engaging in scientific and engineering practices, such as asking questions, designing investigations, constructing models and developing evidence-based explanation

Consistent with international trends, there is an active pursuit of more engaging science education in the Asia-Pacific region. The aim of this book is to bring together some examples of research being undertaken at a range of levels, from studies of curriculum and assessment tools, to classroom case studies, and investigations into models of teacher professional learning and development. While neither a comprehensive nor definitive representation of the work that is being carried out in the region, the contributions—from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Singapore, Australia, and New Zealand—give a taste of some of the issues being explored, and the hopes that researchers have of positively influencing the types of science education experienced by school students. The purpose of this book is therefore to share contextual information related to science education in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as offering insights for conducting studies in this region and outlining possible questions for further investigation. In addition, we anticipate that the specific resources and strategies introduced in this book will provide a useful reference for curriculum developers and science educators when they design school science curricula and science both pre-service and in-service teacher education programmes. The first section of the book examines features of science learners and learning, and includes studies investigating the processes associated with science conceptual learning, scientific inquiry, model construction, and students’ attitudes towards science. The second section focuses on teachers and teaching. It discusses some more innovative teaching approaches adopted in the region, including the use of group work, inquiry-based instruction, developing scientific literacy, and the use of questions and analogies. The third section reports on initiatives related to assessments and curriculum reform, including initiatives associated with school-based assessment, formative assessment strategies, and teacher support accompanying curriculum reform. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781315717678, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license.