Abstract
The purpose of this chapter is to explore scientific practices and discuss their implications for science teaching and learning. In the past few decades, there has been increasing interest in the notion of science-as-practice. Curriculum reform documents such as the Next Generation Science Standards in the USA are increasingly advocating the teaching and learning of scientific practices. What are scientific practices? Why is a characterization of scientific practices important for science education? What heuristics can be developed to facilitate the teaching and learning of scientific practices in science lessons? These questions will guide the discussions in this chapter. The chapter focuses on three examples of scientific practices that are also prevalent in international science curricula: classification, observation, and experimentation. The discussion gives rise to a heuristic that captures the relationships among the cognitive-epistemic-discursive practices of science. Implications of this heuristic to science education policy and instruction are explored.
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Notes
- 1.
We distinguish between modeling as a scientific practice and models as form of scientific knowledge. Models as a form of scientific knowledge will be discussed in more detail in Chap. 6.
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Erduran, S., Dagher, Z.R. (2014). Scientific Practices. In: Reconceptualizing the Nature of Science for Science Education. Contemporary Trends and Issues in Science Education, vol 43. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9057-4_4
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