Viewpoint

Physical Science in Primary Schools

When most current teachers -- primary, secondary and tertiary -- were themselves in primary school, science in the classroom was isolated on the nature study table. Nature Study, renamed and redefined as The Living World, still has an important place in the curriculum, but to it have been added in equal importance, The Material World, The Physical World, Planet Earth and Beyond, and the global instruction to explore the nature of science and its relationship to technology.

The whole is organised into a system of levels -- Levels One to Four being what we know as New Entrants to Form Two, and Five to Eight spanning the high school years from Forms Three to Seven. Central to the idea of levels is the explicit realisation that most of those children who will join the ranks of the scientific community in later life, work at levels which are beyond expectations based on date of birth.

The rules have been changed. The New Zealand Science Curriculum (1993) represents a major change in official doctrine. The challenge is now to provide resources and in-service training for primary teachers to implement the proposals which have suddenly become official policy.

A careful reading of the curriculum will show that the Material World deals with physical properties up to and including Level Four. The concepts of ionic solutions and chemical equations largely remain in the secondary school. Planet Earth and Beyond deals with earth science (geology) and some descriptive astronomy. The new areas of interest have a great deal to do with what used to be called physics.

In a climate where more hands-on real science is being called for, there are very good reasons for the changed emphasis. Exploring the nature of science at a young age requires simple examples with few variables which have clear outcomes. Traditional Nature Study cannot easily be taken far enough.

What, for example, is the function of water in the germination of seeds? Wetting them with baby oil will not work -- but why? Germinating seeds and caring for plants are valuable activities for many reasons. Teachers will continue to have children sprout seeds, hunt insects, keep frogs and maintain nature tables, but to meet the requirements of the new curriculum they must now add a range of carefully selected enquiries drawn from other areas of science.

For example: what factors influence the speed of a person on a slide? Would eating more help, or is it better to wear silk pants?

These are simple questions which can be explored with models and then answered unequivocally by going to a playground and doing the real thing. In pursuing these questions, children learn about themselves, about measurement, about accepting instrument readings above their subjective experience, about controlling variables and about the use of models in relation to the real world.

There will always be those who insist that they will be pulled down faster on the slide if they nurse their cousin -- when they have just shown with the models that the mass makes no difference.

Publishers have been quick to repackage existing books with new brightly coloured covers and new labels for hard-pressed primary teachers faced with the task of simultaneously implementing new curricula in every subject. Much of this material is imported and much of it is useful, but there are reservations. There is still a lightly concealed emphasis on fact rather than process, and the traditional errors and half-truths of elementary science are being repeated. It would help if members of the academic community followed the late Richard Feynman's lead by reading what is available for primary teachers and contributing ideas of their own.

Periods of rapid change in education are rare events separated by long periods of stability. The present upheavals have created a climate in which teachers are looking for new ideas and outside assistance. The unprecedented opportunity to contribute to the nurture of our next generation of scientists should not be missed.

Ian Jacobs is a textbook writer and independent science education consultant based in Russell.