Science is now on the curriculum agenda

Can science have soul? Certainly!

But can science curriculum frameworks have soul? That is my big question at the moment. I am particpating in the writing up of a Tasmanian science curriculum framework. It is being done in a hurry as a response to backlash from parents, community and teachers of the perhaps too visionary curriculum Essential Learnings. The Essential Learnings were an integrated curriculum for K-10 with no mention of traditional learning areas such as science or history.

The Australian Govt and the opposition are pushing an agenda of Back to Basics, of ensuring students experience the great disciplines. But now what falls between the cracks of discipline boundaries? What is the purpose of teaching disciplines? It seems the focus becomes more on inducting students into a discipline - being inducted into the discipline knowledge and way of knowing and thinking, rather than the discipline seen as a context for development of the whole child.

What is science now, and how do we see it? How might we value-add it to include a greater purpose of education... the integral development of the child?

Can a curriculum framework for science capture this, or can it only describe what is needed to induct the child into the world of science?