Eighth+Grade+Nature+of+Science+Discussions

** Number  ** || **// Write your comments and suggestions in the spaces below. You may wish to list examples of more specific skills/concepts/content that could go with each Big Idea. //** **//  Please end each of your entries with your name and school, e.g. (Smith @ Brody). //** ||  1   ||   Scientists in training study to learn foundational ideas and methods of science. ||   ||   2   ||   Scientists observe, measure and compare natural properties and phenomena. ||   ||   3   ||   Scientists imagine patterns in nature, and imagine underlying reasons for those patterns, and develop investigative questions and testable hypotheses. ||   ||   4   ||   Scientists devise and conduct fair tests (e.g. controlled experiments) of hypotheses. ||   ||   5   ||   Scientists record, organize, compute, display and analyze empirical data chosen as being relevant and reliable. Scientists also evaluate alternative hypotheses using logic and relevant, reliable empirical data. ||   ||   6   ||   Scientists communicate scientific data, ideas and claims in a clear and fair way. ||   ||   7   ||   Scientists distinguish scientific versus nonscientific issues and claims. They strive to judge scientific claims using logic and relevant, reliable empirical data. This sometimes entails rejection or suspension of judgment about a claim when fact and opinion are intermingled, and/or when there is insufficient and/or conflicting data, and/or when faulty or misleading reasoning has been presented. ||   || **  Number  ** || **// Write your comments and suggestions in the spaces below. You may wish to list examples of more specific skills/concepts/content that could go with each Big Idea. //** **//  Please end each of your entries with your name and school, e.g. (Smith @ Brody). //** ||  8   ||   Science is a body of knowledge about the natural world. Science is also a set of human practices used to create, revise, extend and communicate that knowledge. Science strives to figure out how the natural world works. This involves the collection of relevant, reliable empirical data, the use of logical reasoning, and the application of imagination in devising testable hypotheses and naturalistic explanations to make sense of the collected data. ||   ||   9   ||   History demonstrates the nature of science as a human endeavor. ||   ||   10   ||   Science relies on some fundamental assumptions about the natural world; chief among these is that the universe is a vast single system in which the basic rules are the same everywhere and at all times, and that the consistent patterns of the universe are comprehensible through careful, systematic study. ||   ||   11   ||   Science relies on various practices and habits of mind that are used to create, revise, extend and communicate knowledge about the natural world. ||   ||   12   ||    The scientific enterprise is made up of a growing number of interrelated disciplines and sub-disciplines with overlapping goals, areas of interest and methods. ||   ||   13   ||   Science employs a variety of types of ideas (e.g. observations, hypotheses, predictions, laws, theories). These ideas have different properties; they also have different and respectively necessary functions in the scope of scientific inquiry. ||   ||   14   ||   Science, technology, humanity and the environment influence each other in a variety of ways. ||   ||   15   ||   Scientists share ideas and settle disputes in a variety of ways, chief among these being the publication of ideas in refereed scientific journals. ||   ||     ||  **//  Write your comments and suggestions in the spaces below. You may wish to list examples of more specific skills/concepts/content that could go with each Big Idea. //** **//  Please end each of your entries with your name and school, e.g. (Smith @ Brody). //** ||  16   ||    ||    ||   17   ||    ||    ||   18   ||    ||    ||   19   ||    ||    ||   20   ||    ||    ||   21   ||    ||    ||   22   ||    ||    ||   23   ||    ||    ||   24   ||    ||    ||   25   ||    ||    ||   26   ||    ||    ||
 * __ Abilities  __**** of scientific inquiry ** ||
 * __ Understandings  __**** about scientific inquiry **
 * The following statements implies that students can explain ideas in their own words, relate the ideas to other current and future learning goals, and apply the ideas in novel contexts. ** ||
 * // Are __other__ Big Ideas regarding scientific inquiry needed? Write your suggestions below.  //** ||