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Students should be able to identify and measure/calculate length, mass, time, temperature, area, volume, density, speed, acceleration, force, potential difference, current, resistance, electrical power (PW2)

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Identify -  Recognize patterns, facts, or details; provide an answer from a number of possibilities; recognize and state briefly a distinguishing fact or feature.

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Measure/calculate -  Quantify changes in a system by reading a measuring tool.

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Being Numerate
An integral component of being numerate is the ability to identify/see patterns, trends, and relationships. Within this unit, relationships between two variables (heat chapter) and patterns are a prominent feature. Students will learn to pick out these observable relationships and patterns through inquiry based investigation (practical demonstration or thoughtful discussion/hypothesis formation)
This skill (numeracy) is a the foundation upon which many of the scientific concepts are built on.

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Being literate
Within this unit literacy will be addressed with the aim of developing students scientific vocabulary. Hence, furthering their understanding of scientific concepts and developing their ability to engage with scientific discussions around these areas.
The development of a key-word 'word bank' is one aspect of my teaching that aims to incorporate this emphasis on literacy. Students are then able to review the most important terms and add them to their growing list of new words.
A big part of literacy is expressing ideas thoughtfully and clearly. Students will learn in this unit to develop 'mastery' of each concept they encounter. With the emphasis being on true understanding as opposed to a correct answer. Training students 'how to think not what to think' and giving them the tools to accurately describe and express their opinions based on empirical evidence.

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Managing info and thinking
Being reminded of the quote 'curiosity killed the cat' when discussing how we manage investigation and inquiry is a regular occurrence.
Within this unit, through the facilitation of inquiry based learning and investigation, students will learn the value of asking 'why?'
This will be achieved through my lesson plans throughout the unit which all have the aim of facilitating the accumulation of student's prior knowledge and experience.
Developing a scientific 'habit of mind' is a key part of the students development as curiosity driven individuals.

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NOS1 - Students should be able to appreciate how scientists work and how scientific ideas are modified over time.

Scientists work by identifying patterns or details that other untrained people would miss. They work to approach problems from an array of different possibilities without discounting any ideas before investigation.
Measurement (accurate measurement) is an integral component of how science works. Without the ability to take accurate measurements, use the appropriate instruments to identify changes within a system, science would not be possible.

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NOS3 -  Students should be able to design, plan, and conduct investigations; explain how reliability, accuracy, precision, fairness, safety, ethics, and the selection of suitable equipment have been considered.

Selection of suitable equipment to make accurate measurements is an important part of this learning outcome. In order to accurately measure/calculate  these quantities listed above, students must be able to account for accuracy,  precision, equipment selection, safety etc.

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PW1 -  Students should be able to select and use appropriate measuring instruments.

In order to take and read accurate and reliable measurements while conducting investigations, students must be able to pick the appropriate instrument to carry out the task.

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This can be used to unpack the learning outcome mentioned above.

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Experiment class

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Experiment class

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Link to resource (slides on energy with more notes and questions) 

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Link to resource (slides on energy with more notes and questions) 

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https://www.theconicalflask.ie/j-c-science/physics/sources-of-energy

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Link to resource (Slides on energy with more notes and questions) 

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Link to resource (Slides on energy with more notes and questions) 

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https://www.theconicalflask.ie/j-c-science/physics/heat-energy

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Piece on inquiry based learning in science education

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Piece on inquiry based learning in science education

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Aims to bridge the disconnect between the practice of science within the scientific community and the teaching of science in our schools.

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"Inquiry-Based Science Education" published on 01 Jan 2017 by Brill | Sense.

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An aim of my planning documents has been to incorporate a less 'restricted', more free-flowing form of inquiry. This paper speaks about this incorporation of an authentic implementation of an inquiry-based process in the classroom.

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ABSTRACT
Decades of discussion and debate about how science is most effectively taught and learned have resulted in a number of similar but competing inquiry models. These aim to develop students learning of science through approaches which reflect the authenticity of science as practiced by professional scientists while being practical and manageable within the school context. This paper offers a collection of our current reflections and suggestions concerning inquiry and its place in science education. We suggest that many of the current models of inquiry are too limited in their vision concerning themselves, almost exclusively, with producing a scaffold which reduces the complex process of inquiry into an algorithmic approach based around a sequence of relatively simple steps. We argue that this restricts students' experience of authentic inquiry to make classroom management and assessment procedures easier. We then speculate that a more integrated approach is required through an alternative inquiry model that depends on three dimensions (conceptual, procedural and personal) and we propose that it will be more likely to promote effective learning and a willingness to engage in inquiry across all facets of a students' school career and beyond.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank John Leach for his comments and encouragement during early versions of this paper and Murat Gunel for his comments on an early draft. Their contributions are very much appreciated.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Stuart Bevins is a Senior Research Fellow and leads research in the Centre for Science Education, Sheffield Institute of Education. His research interests are social learning theories and the professional development of science teachers.

Gareth Price is a Senior Lecturer in the Centre for Science Education, Sheffield Institute of Education. His research interests centre around creativity, collaborative work,inquiry and the strategies that support students becoming active constructors of their own knowledge.

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Reconceptualising inquiry in science education

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ABSTRACT Decades of discussion and debate about how science is most effectively taught and learned have resulted in a number of similar but competing inquiry models. These aim to develop students learning of science through approaches which reflect the authenticity of science as practiced by professional scientists while being practical and manageable within the school context.

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Great piece on the perils on the standard 'chalk and talk' approach to science education 

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Great piece on the perils on the standard 'chalk and talk' approach to science education 

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Illustration by Vasava

Outbreak alert: six students at the Chicago State Polytechnic University in Illinois have been hospitalized with severe vomiting, diarrhoea and stomach pain, as well as wheezing and difficulty in breathing. Some are in a critical condition. And the university's health centre is fielding dozens of calls from students with similar symptoms.

This was the scenario that 17 third- and fourth-year undergraduates dealt with as part of an innovative virology course led by biologist Tammy Tobin at Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania. The students took on the role of federal public-health officials, and were tasked with identifying the pathogen, tracking how it spreads and figuring out how to contain and treat it - all by the end of the semester.

Although the Chicago school and the cases were fictitious, says Tobin, "we tried to make it as real as possible". If students decided to run a blood test or genetic assay, Tobin would give them results consistent with enterovirus D68, a real respiratory virus. (To keep the students from just getting the answer from the Internet, she portrayed the virus as an emergent strain with previously unreported symptoms.) If they decided to send a team to Chicago, Tobin would make them look at real flight schedules and confirm that there were enough seats.

In the end, the students pinpointed the virus, but they also made mistakes: six people died, for example, in part because the students did not pay enough attention to treatment. However, says Tobin, "that doesn't affect their grade so long as they present what they did, how it worked or didn't work, and how they'd do it differently". What matters is that the students got totally wrapped up in the problem, remembered what they learned and got a handle on a range of disciplines. "We looked at the intersection of politics, sociology, biology, even some economics," she says.

Tobin's approach is just one of a diverse range of methods that have been sweeping through the world's undergraduate science classes. Some are complex, immersive exercises similar to Tobin's. But there are also team-based exercises on smaller problems, as well as simple, carefully tailored questions that students in a crowded lecture hall might respond to through hand-held 'clicker' devices. What the methods share is an outcome confirmed in hundreds of empirical studies: students gain a much deeper understanding of science when they actively grapple with questions than when they passively listen to answers.

"We find up to 20% better grades over usual methods," says Tom Duff, a computer scientist who developed a team-based learning approach at the University of the West of Scotland in Paisley, UK. Other active-learning proponents have found similar gains. Last year, a group led by biologist Scott Freeman at the University of Washington in Seattle published an analysis of 225 studies of active learning in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) and found that active learning cut course failure rates by around one-third.

"At this point it is unethical to teach any other way," declares Clarissa Dirks, a microbiologist at the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, and co-chair of the US National Academies Scientific Teaching Alliance, an initiative to reform undergraduate STEM education.

Active learning is winning support from university administrators, who are facing demands for accountability: students and parents want to know why they should pay soaring tuition rates when so many lectures are now freely available online. It has also earned the attention of foundations, funding agencies and scientific societies, which see it as a way to patch the leaky pipeline for science students. In the United States, which keeps the most detailed statistics on this phenomenon, about 60% of students who enrol in a STEM field switch to a non-STEM field or drop out (see 'A persistence problem'). That figure is roughly 80% for those from minority groups and for women.

Source: Ref. 2

Tough sell

Not everyone embraces the idea. Active learning can be a tough sell to faculty members who thrived on standard lectures during their own student years, and who wonder whether the benefits of active learning - which requires substantially more preparation than do standard lectures - could possibility justify the time that the approach would take away from their research.

Understanding and addressing the resistance has become one of the reformers' prime concerns. Robert Lue, the other co-chair of the teaching alliance and director of the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, says that he is "hell bent on erasing this sense that research is where you apply your intellect, and teaching is a rote skill". Scientists need to approach teaching with the same rigour and appreciation for evidence that they exercise in the laboratory, he says. "It's at the frontier of research. And the more people we get involved, the faster that research will go."

On the surface, active-learning classes can seem to differ little from more conventional approaches. Undergraduate students have always had discussion sessions to ask about the course material, and laboratory classes in which they would carry out experiments. But if you look more closely, says Tobin, these are often just 'cookbook' exercises. The typical approach is 'read that and be prepared to talk about these questions', or 'follow that procedure and you'll get this result'. In an active-learning class such as hers, she says, the students take charge of their own education. "They are framing the questions themselves."

The same is true for active learning in first-year courses, in which the teachers often do supply the questions - but frame them in a way that asks for more than a rote recitation of facts. It is the difference between 'name the sensory nerves of the leg', and what neuroscientist Sarah Leupen asks of her introductory physiology class at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC):
You're innocently walking down the street when aliens zap away the sensory neurons in your legs. What happens?
a) Your walking movements show no significant change.

b) You can no longer walk.

c) You can walk, but the pace changes.

d) You can walk, but clumsily.

"We usually get lots of vigorous debate on this one," says Leupen, who spends most of her class time firing such questions at her students. "It's lovely to experience."

What makes those questions special is that the students cannot answer them simply by reading the course material - although they are expected to have done that before attending class. Instead, they have to apply what they have learned, which they do by clustering around tables in small teams and arguing over the options. That struggle is the real pay-off, says Leupen, who eventually explains the right answer (in this case, d). And if a team gets it wrong, she says, "that's usually a good thing - because then they really remember it".

Evidence has been accumulating for decades that students who actively engage with course material will end up retaining it for much longer than they would have otherwise, and they will be better able to apply their knowledge broadly. But the evidence began to draw widespread attention only around the turn of the century - not least thanks to Carl Wieman, who suddenly became one of the movement's most visible champions when he was awarded the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics for his co-discovery of Bose-Einstein condensates. "I started way before the Nobel prize," says Wieman, who is now at Stanford University in California. "It's just that people didn't pay attention to me until then."

Wieman's conversion began in the late 1980s, when he noticed something about the graduate students coming into his atomic-physics lab - then at the University of Colorado Boulder. "They had done really well as undergraduates, but couldn't do research," he says. Over the years, they learned how to be good scientists, "but that had little to do with how well they had done in their courses".

In trying to figure out why, Wieman came across the already huge body of empirical research on learning - most of it totally unknown to science departments. Among the most striking findings, he says, was one that explained his own observation. It showed that in the traditional way of teaching, students could pass the test, but did not get a basic conceptual model of the subject, he says.

Other scientists were coming to much the same realization, and they were starting to experiment with other ways to teach. By the time Wieman's Nobel shone a spotlight on the efforts, many fields had started what is now known as Discipline-Based Education Research: investigations into active methods for teaching concepts specific to each branch of science.

Other powerful advocates included biologist Bruce Alberts, then president of the US National Academy of Sciences. In 2004, Alberts consolidated several academy panels into the Board on Science Education: a group of senior scientists, initially chaired by Wieman, that has gone on to release a series of reports on education reform. The most recent of those, published in January 2015, is essentially a how-to manual for applying active learning in undergraduate settings.

Culture shock

Yet there is still plenty of scepticism, says Linda Hodges, a biochemist and head of the Faculty Development Center at the UMBC, and author of a forthcoming book on overcoming obstacles to education reform. One big reason, she says, is that for many scientists, active learning is sharply at odds with their beliefs about teaching.

Researchers often feel that a teacher's job is simply to communicate content: the factual knowledge covered in the course. That is a big stumbling block for active learning, because time spent on team discussions and the like can seem like time taken away from that content. Getting past that requires compromise, says Jeff Leips, a geneticist who teaches ecology and evolution at the UMBC. "You have to accept that you can't cover everything to the same level." But the pay-off is that the students retain much more of the material that is covered, and are able to use that knowledge much more effectively.

Another common belief, says Hodges, is that it is the professor who should be in control of the classroom. "A lot of these pedagogies ask you to relinquish some of your control and hand it over to a bunch of novice students," she says. "And that sounds odd to a lot of faculty." It definitely requires a different set of skills, agrees Leips. "A lecture is like a performance: you know the script." But an active-learning class is more like improvisational acting, he says. "You have to go with the flow", responding to questions and situations as they arise. And not everyone is comfortable with that.

Adding to the resistance is that many faculty members who try active learning hastily back off when the techniques do not seem to work, or when students start to turn in teacher evaluations that say, 'I had to teach myself!' or, 'Just tell me what I need to know!'.

"At this point it is unethical to teach any other way."

One faculty member, who asked not to be named so that she could speak freely about her institution, tells the story of a chemistry instructor who told his students to 'work together', and then spent the rest of the class time reading. "Active learning done badly is worse than a good lecture," says Leips. A 2011 survey of biology teachers at 77 US universities found that, even though most of them claimed to be using at least some active-learning methods, few of them were doing it properly.

Proponents of active learning say that change will come only when innovations are made at every level of a university system (see page 282). To help interested biology teachers to do better, the US National Academies has been running a series of five-day workshops every summer since 2004. "We've had about 1,000 people go through by now," says William Wood, a biologist at the University of Colorado Boulder, and co-director of the programme for its first ten years.

One of the big lessons, says Wood, is that teachers should develop their lesson plans in the same way as they design experiments. Instead of following a textbook or syllabus, they should start with a clear goal - the concepts and skills that they want the students to learn. Then they should choose the instructional methods that will achieve that goal, as well as the methods they are going to use to assess the students' progress.

The summer institutes have undoubtedly done a lot to raise people's awareness, says Leupen, but simply attending a workshop is not enough. "If they come back to the same department full of the same people doing the same things - they will go right back to teaching the old way."

Continuing the support back home is crucial, says Lue. "Science is a team sport. If you're a neuroscientist or a soft-matter physicist, you have seminars, colloquia, luncheons - places you can go on campus to meet with like-minded people and trade best practices." His centre at Harvard is trying to create that kind of community for teaching and learning, he says, and many other US universities are doing the same.

As helpful as such efforts are, they do not get at what many regard as the biggest challenges for active learning. One is the lack of coordination across borders. Educational innovations are clearly happening across the globe (see page 276) and interest in active learning is high. Dirks has received an enthusiastic response to workshops she ran on pedagogy and the responsible conduct of science in Jordan, Turkey, Egypt, India and Malaysia. And leaders such as Wieman say that they regularly get invitations to talk in Europe, Asia and Australia.

Even so, the international flow of ideas is only a fraction of what it could be. The education systems differ between nations, and it is not obvious how lessons learned in one place can be applied elsewhere. What is more, researchers who are trying to get innovations into universities tend to publish in their own languages.

And then there is what Wieman and others regard as the most fundamental obstacle: the university incentive system. Too often, they say, publications and funding are the only things measured for promotion and tenure decisions, which in effect penalizes time spent on classroom innovation. "Until we commit to having teaching be a key role in tenure decisions," says Lue, "we're just paying lip service."

Some scientists say that the increased intellectual respectability of good teaching is beginning to make itself felt. Many small universities such as the UMBC are making it a key part of hiring and promotion decisions. "In our department, you don't get teaching points in tenure decisions unless you've been innovating," says Leupen. Even large research-focused universities such as Harvard are beginning to place more emphasis on instruction. "Because there is a movement, and programmes to impart this knowledge," says Dirks, "people are starting to get it."

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Why we are teaching science wrong, and how to make it right

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Illustration by Vasava Outbreak alert: six students at the Chicago State Polytechnic University in Illinois have been hospitalized with severe vomiting, diarrhoea and stomach pain, as well as wheezing and difficulty in breathing. Some are in a critical condition.

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Piece on how to build on students misconceptions and assumptions (epistemology) 

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Piece on how to build on students misconceptions and assumptions (epistemology) 

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No one ever said science education was easy. Certainly the concepts we teach, like conservation of momentum or quantum mechanics, can be hard to grasp. But what really complicates the endeavor is that we're also trying to teach a deeper lesson at the same time-to help students understand the nature of science itself.

All too often, young people get the impression that science is about learning certain "laws" and then applying them to different situations. After all, that's what we make them do on tests, to show that they've been doing the work. But that's not it at all. Science is the process of building these concepts through the collection of experimental evidence.

And while I'm on it, let's call these concepts what they really are-not laws, but models. Science is all about building and testing models. It's difficult to help students understand that aspect of science when we just give them the models to begin with. Sure, in physics we often include historical or mathematical evidence to support big ideas, but that often isn't enough.

Of course, we can't start from scratch. If students had to build their own models from the ground up, it would be like trying to learn programming by inventing computers. As Isaac Newton is supposed to have said, we stand on the shoulders of giants. We must take models built by others and go from there.

But there's still another challenge in science education that is less often recognized: Students often enter a course with their own unarticulated ideas about how the world works. We call these "misconceptions," but it's important to realize that these are also models, based on their life experiences, and that they must "make sense" to the student.

What I'd like to suggest is that this actually provides a great way into the adventure of science and an opportunity to meet our objectives as educators. If you can create a situation that challenges students' assumptions and produces conceptual conflict, that's a great opportunity for learning.

This Little Light of Mine

Here's a fun example that I've used, on the topic of light rays. I set up a point light source and put a piece of cardboard in front of it. There's a small pinhole in the cardboard and a white screen behind. What do you expect to see?

No surprise: A light shining through a pinhole makes a dot on the screen. Now I'll ask the students: What if I have TWO light sources with the same single hole?

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The Power of Wrong Answers in Science Education

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No one ever said science education was easy. Certainly the concepts we teach, like conservation of momentum or quantum mechanics, can be hard to grasp. But what really complicates the endeavor is that we're also trying to teach a deeper lesson at the same time-to help students understand the nature of science itself.

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2018 article on the state of Irish science education 

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2018 article on the state of Irish science education 

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Science education has come a long way. Before the primary school's last major revision, almost 20 years ago, science education was patchy at best while, at the same time, the post-primary syllabus was centred around facts with very little experimentation or focus on the scientific method.

Today, educators and policymakers recognise the importance of engaging young minds from an early age. They recognise the importance of showing that STEM (science, engineering, technology and maths) isn't some secret ancient language indecipherable to all but a few of the brightest minds, but is open for everyone to learn.

So, what type of subjects are covered at primary, secondary and third-level? What sort of projects are students exposed to, and what difference can it make?

Primary

In primary school, children focus on themes rather than branches of science. Instead of looking at "physics", "chemistry" and "biology", they explore the world around them by looking at "energy and forces", "materials" and "living things" as well as "environmental awareness and care."

Margie McCarthy is head of education and public engagement at Science Foundation Ireland, which runs PrimaryScience, a programme that supports the primary school science curriculum. "In our experience, the energy and forces strand is the most challenging for teachers, especially for teachers who may not come from science backgrounds. The SFI Primary Science programme is focused on making those teachers comfortable with not knowing everything and giving them a level of comfort whereby they can explore that knowledge with the children through inquiry-based learning."

The Primary Science programme delivers continuous professional development for more than 1,000 students every year. "The focus is student-led learning," says McCarthy. "It is based around helping kids identify what they want to know about a theme or topic and helping the teacher to carry out experiments instead of being focused entirely on the blackboard. It is designed to be cross-curricular".

SFI also runs an annual programme of science and maths awards, with around 600 primary schools sending in logbooks with evidence of how much they have learned about Stem in the past year, and showing how they presented this; it could be a science fair, a presentation from the older to the younger classes, or perhaps a science activity that was done on a school tour. This is a free, Government-supported programme.

"We send a facilitator to these schools three times every school year, and task the school to implement what they have learned," says McCarthy. "Because of this, teachers talk to one another about their lessons, creating a collaborative environment."

Over 55 locations in Ireland, including Fota Island, Dublin Zoo and Midlands Bogs, have become "discover centres", offering workshops and outreach programmes for primary schools, and McCarthy says it has led to an increase in primary schools engaging with science.

Brain Freeze, a series of short Irish-made children's shows with a focus on science, and which air on CBBC and RTE2, are also being used in primary schools across Ireland. "They ask questions such as why do hair or nails grow and are really enjoyable for children and adults," says McCarthy. "Teachers can find it really useful to show and then hang a class off it."

Overall, McCarthy says, the aim is to move away from learning and regurgitation. "Kids have a natural curiosity and aptitude for Stem. We have to be careful that the culture in Ireland is still open to saying 'I'm bad at maths'; we'd never say it about any other subject. And actually we are good at it, and kids love finding out, discovering and investigating - just as any professional scientist or engineer loves to do. We are trying to capture and nurture this by bringing it to life. While we still do need basic facts, including the times tables, the focus on education is shifting to enquiry and curiosity-based learning."

PrimaryScience.ie has a selection of activities that families can do at home.

Post-primary

At second-level, students should be arriving with much of the basics and the aim of the syllabus is to build on their prior learning. Not all schools, however, are able to offer a full science or technology programme, especially smaller schools in rural areas.

Science Foundation Ireland's Smart Futures programme, run in partnership with over 200 organisations including academic institutions, professional groups and industry partners, provides information on Stem to second-level schools around the country. As well as running a website, professionals working in Stem visit schools to give students information about careers.

"Our research shows that students choose a course back on whether they think they would fit in and whether it would suit their personality," says McCarthy. "If a young woman has a perception that all scientists are men like Einstein, then she may struggle to identify with that, so we wanted to show young people those who are doing amazing work in the sector. It's about showing them role models. We also run an online programme where children can ask questions online."

Luke Saunders is a science teacher and founder of online exams website Studyclix.ie. "Since I was a child, I was always curious about how the world works, why the sky was blue and why the river meandered, and secondary school science gave me the answers to those questions," he says. "The junior cycle science course has been recently revised to include five strands: the physical world, the chemical world, the biological world, Earth and space and one which covers how to be a scientist and the scientific method. This latter strand is focused on how science works, rather than just giving students facts."

Saunders says that the best way of teaching young people about science is through experiments. "This could be freezing water and showing how it expands, or a student may set up an experiment and make a prediction and then see if they get the expected result. In a world where we are flooded with sources of questionable quality, it is really important that we develop the research and critical analysis skills of students and the new junior cycle does this."

Third-level

Dr Aoibheann Bird, engagement and public engagement manager at the Insight Centre for Data Analytics, says that Stem education at third-level is a whole different ball game.

Bird, who studied applied physics in DCU in 2001, enjoyed being able to carry out experiments during her time in college. "I loved the labs and the projects we did in first year, including the physics of the playground and the dynamics of falling toast and whether it really does land butter side-up and how many rotations that takes. We did project work together, which sometimes worked well and sometimes not as much, but it taught us the skills of time management, teamwork and people management while, at the end, we had to communicate our results to the class."

After winning a placement on a US exchange programme and following time spent at Intel, Bird went on to work with Nasa in Florida for three months. It was, she says, a brilliant learning experience and her motivation to study for a PhD. Today, she is one of the strongest advocates for young people to study Stem at third-level.

"It can be challenging to showcase the breadth of Stem," Bird says. "One of the best options is to go for a general entry science or engineering degree, because as you go through the years you can see what you are really interested in and can stream yourself into a particular area. My partner went into the general degree and then moved to applied physics; it can take time to catch up if you have missed the first year but you do have the broad experience which is very useful. Knowing what you want to do is just as valuable as knowing what you don't want to do: I only realised in third-year what astrophysics is really like and found it wasn't for me."

How can a student know if Stem is right for them? "If you like experimenting, mixing chemicals, seeing how bodies work, how to climb a tree, how to make apps on your phone, it might be the right fit. There is so much under the Stem umbrella and it opens up so many doors, with some Stem graduates even moving into business. Here at Insight, we work with physiotherapists, computer scientists, mechanical engineers and software developers, so it is quite diverse work."

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What are young people learning about science?

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Science education has come a long way. Before the primary school's last major revision, almost 20 years ago, science education was patchy at best while, at the same time, the post-primary syllabus was centred around facts with very little experimentation or focus on the scientific method.

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On the junior cycle science specification.

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Chapter on education and inquiry

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Chapter on education and inquiry

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Feedback I received from some students. 

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Feedback I received from some students. 

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'If you can't explain something to a child, then you don't understand it well enough'

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Quantum Physics for 7 Year Olds | Dominic Walliman | TEDxEastVan

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More from Neil deGrasse Tyson (longer) - an educator I admire

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More from Neil deGrasse Tyson (longer) - an educator I admire

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This is Exactly How You Should NOT Raise Your Kids! | Neil deGrasse Tyson on Impact Theory

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Interesting perspective from Neil deGrasse Tyson

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Interesting perspective from Neil deGrasse Tyson