- Demonstrate a sustained intellectual curiosity about a scientific topic or problem of personal, local, or global interest
- Make observations aimed at identifying their own questions, including increasingly abstract ones, about the natural world
- Formulate multiple hypotheses and predict multiple outcomes
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- By creating intelligent hypotheses for labs – adding new elements to test the effect
- By asking questions in class that show an understanding and curiosity of the experiment/project
What does extending look like?
- The hypothesis is informed by prior knowledge about the subject
- Multiple hypotheses that test different aspects of the subject
- During the lab/project, developing new hypotheses as you learn new information
Planning and conducting
- Collaboratively and individually plan, select, and use appropriate investigation methods, including field work and lab experiments, to collect reliable data (qualitative and quantitative)
- Assess risks and address ethical, cultural, and/or environmental issues associated with their proposed methods
- Use appropriate SI units and appropriate equipment, including digital technologies, to systematically and accurately collect and record data
- Apply the concepts of accuracy and precision to experimental procedures and data (significant figures, uncertainty, scientific notation)
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- Making sure to collect both quantitative (numbers) and qualitative (observations) during labs and projects
- By designing well-controlled science experiments
What does extending look like?
- Not making mistakes with significant figures, units, and including directions for vectors
- Using the most accurate and precise measurement tool possible
- Averaging multiple trials to get more accurate results (Isaac Newton)
- Designed experiments isolate the variable(s) of interest properly
Processing and analyzing data and information
- Experience and interpret the local environment
- Apply First Peoples perspectives and knowledge, other ways of knowing, and local knowledge as sources of information
- Seek and analyze patterns, trends, and connections in data, including describing relationships between variables, performing calculations, and identifying inconsistencies
- Construct, analyze, and interpret graphs, models, and/or diagrams
- Use knowledge of scientific concepts to draw conclusions that are consistent with evidence
- Analyze cause-and-effect relationships
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- Using graphs when appropriate, with proper labels and trendlines if needed
- Using significant figures and units properly, and including directions for vectors
What does extending look like?
- Averaging multiple trials to get more accurate results
- Making strong links between the theoretical (equations, etc.) and the practical (real-world applications)
- Draw high quality conclusions from the data
Evaluating
- Evaluate their methods and experimental conditions, including identifying sources of error or uncertainty, confounding variables, and possible alternative explanations and conclusions
- Describe specific ways to improve their investigation methods and the quality of their data
- Evaluate the validity and limitations of a model or analogy in relation to the phenomenon modelled
- Demonstrate an awareness of assumptions, question information given, and identify bias in their own work and in primary and secondary sources
- Consider the changes in knowledge over time as tools and technologies have developed
- Connect scientific explorations to careers in science
- Exercise a healthy, informed skepticism and use scientific knowledge and findings to form their own investigations to evaluate claims in primary and secondary sources
- Consider social, ethical, and environmental implications of the findings from their own and others’ investigations
- Critically analyze the validity of information in primary and secondary sources and evaluate the approaches used to solve problems
- Assess risks in the context of personal safety and social responsibility
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- By doing in-depth research using reliable sources (not Wikipedia)
- By finding differences between mathematical models and real-world results
- By being skeptical of information that can only be found in a single source
- Finding connections between physics concepts and real-world applicatoins
- Critically evaluating sources of information in light of your own experiences
What does extending look like?
- Thinking about sources of error before the experiment, and reducing/eliminating them before collecting any data
- Being very specific about sources of error (not vague, like “friction is a source of error”)
- Identifying which sources of error are important, and which are not likely to have a big impact
Applying and innovating
- Contribute to care for self, others, community, and world through individual or collaborative approaches
- Co-operatively design projects with local and/or global connections and applications
- Contribute to finding solutions to problems at a local and/or global level through inquiry
- Implement multiple strategies to solve problems in real-life, applied, and conceptual situations
- Consider the role of scientists in innovation
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- By choosing topics for projects/labs that are related to real-world problems
- Asking community members for their opinions and ideas
- Considering the environmental impact of your experiment (waste, etc.)
- Working well with your classmates
What does extending look like?
- Applying your knowledge to real-world problems
- Sharing your work so that others can learn from it
- Using 2 different methods to try to get the same answer, so that they confirm each other
Communicating
- Formulate physical or mental theoretical models to describe a phenomenon
- Communicate scientific ideas and information, and perhaps a suggested course of action, for a specific purpose and audience, constructing evidence-based arguments and using appropriate scientific language, conventions, and representations
- Express and reflect on a variety of experiences, perspectives, and worldviews through place
How can this skill be demonstrated?
- a
What does extending look like?
- b