1. SCE 4350 Principles and Methods: K-9 School Science
Florida Atlantic University College of Education
Fall 2009
Instructor: Dr. Ronald C. Persin
Phone :
Website:

2. What Is Science? Science involves:
“Just as houses are made of stones, so is science made of facts; but a pile of stones is not a house and a collection of facts is not necessarily science.” Henri Poincare French mathematician & physicist ( )
Science involves:
Building theories and models
Constructing arguments
Using specialized ways of talking, writing and representing phenomena
The committee agreed on some basic assumptions about science and goals for science education. These are informed by research, but are more accurately the stance adopted by the committee as it reviewed research.

3. Occam's (or Ockham's) Razor
A principle attributed to the 14th century logician and Franciscan friar William of Ockham. 
"when you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better."

4. Whether A Field is a Science is Based on 6 Criteria
Has an organized body of knowledge
Results are reproducible
Has well-developed experimental methods
Enables predictions, including surprises
Offers hypotheses open to falsification
Deals with natural objects

5. Students who understand science:
Know, use, and interpret scientific explanations of the natural world.
Generate and evaluate scientific evidence and explanations.
Understand the nature and development of scientific knowledge.
Participate productively in scientific practices and discourse.
These are the strands of scientific proficiency development by the committee. They represent a framework for thinking about proficiency. In addition, they provided a device for organizing the quite disparate bodies of research the committee considered.

6. Key Ideas From Ch. 1 (Methods)
Students in grades K-8 can do more in science than is currently asked of them
Science standards and curricula contain too many topics given equal emphasis
Science classrooms typically provide few opportunities for students to engage in meaningful science
Good science teaching requires more than expert knowledge of science content

7. The Scientific Method Define the problem Gather information
State your hypothesis
Test your hypothesis
Form your conclusion
Publish your results

8. The Nature of Inquiry Asking questions Planning investigations
Gathering data
Using scientific knowledge to make sense of data
Communicating results to others
Example: What is the average thickness of a sheet of paper?

9. Recent Important Developments in Science
Numerous space missions and landing of astronauts on the Moon.
Micro-circuitry and high-speed computers.
Imaging techniques used in scientific research and medicine.

10. The Metric System
Created in 1795 by the French Academy of Science to unify existing systems.
Original meter was one ten-millionth of the distance from the North Pole to the Equator measured along the Prime Meridian.
In the 1900’s this was changed to a certain number of wavelengths of light.

11. Some Metric Prefixes Prefix Symbol Power Example
pico p picosecond
nano n nanometer
micro µ microwatt
milli m milligram
centi c centimeter
giga G gigahertz
mega M megajoule
kilo k kilogram

12. The 7 Basic SI Units 1. Meter - length 2. Kilogram - mass
3. Second - time
4. Kelvin - temperature
These are units of the SI System (Système International).
5. Ampere - electric current
6. Candela - luminous intensity
7. Mole - amount of substance

13. Converting measurements
Metric Metric
multiples of 10
move decimal
*area - move twice
*volume - move three times
English Metric
conversion factors
proportion method
unit cancellation method
(examples)

14. Proportion method 1 in. 2.54 cm X 12 in.
12 in. = ? cm it is known that 1 in. = 2.54 cm
Set up in proportion form. Be sure to match units
Cross multiply
then divide
1 in.
2.54 cm X
12 in. =
X = (12  2.54)  1 = 30.48
Therefore, 12 in. = cm

15. Problem Solving (5 steps)
1. Identify the unknown
2. List the important known data
3. Write the formula that relates the unknown to the known data
4. Solve the formula for the unknown
5. Substitute-in the known data
6. Calculate and express answer in proper form
Example – Newton, Law II

16. Scientific Notation
Used for expressing very large or very small values
standard form base x 10exponent
base is from 1.0 to 9.999…
if exponent is positive the value is greater than 1
if exponent is negative the value is less than 1
convert to decimal by moving the decimal the number of places indicated by the exponent
(examples)

17. Proper SI form Used to write numbers in compact form
move the decimal to show a value in the range of 0.1 to 1000
include the metric prefix to indicate the number of decimal places moved
(more examples)
325,000,000 m
= Mm

18. Significant digits The digits reported in a measured quantity
Indicate the precision of the measuring instrument
Calculations should not have more significant digits than the measurement with the least number of significant digits
(examples)
Inquiry Activity: What determines the Force of Friction?