5 Content of these materials

The programme is organised into thirty lessons. Each lesson contains information for teachers and technicians to help in planning the lessons, and materials to use during the lessons with pupils, divided into:

Overview

A brief description of the main purpose of the lesson, linking it to the psychological theory.

New key words

The vocabulary that is essential to the development of children’s thinking through the lesson activities. These words need to be continually reinforced in that specific lesson and, where appropriate, all subsequent Thinking Science and other science lessons.

Equipment required

This section is written particularly for technicians and teachers who are responsible for setting up their own practical activities and reso

Lesson plan

This is a step by step guide for teachers, for use the first time they teach the lesson. There are suggested times for each activity within the lesson. After teaching the lesson for the first time, we would recommend that teachers ‘personalise’ the lesson plan, amending timings and highlighting difficulties, for the next time they teach this lesson.

Notesheets

These are for groups of pupils to use. There is no need for each pupil to have a personal copy. It is best to provide one or two per group of pupils so that they are encouraged to work together collaboratively but each can still read the Notesheet if necessary. Each group can appoint a ‘scribe’ who will record results and jot down the groups’ answers to questions after discussion. Some teachers prefer pupils not to write on the Notesheets at all, they give pupils ‘learning diaries’ or ‘thinking jotters’ to encourage notes and ideas to flow. It is not intended that Notesheets are marked (see ‘The teaching model’).

Workcards

These give information and instructions for group activities. Pupils are not supposed to write on them,and they should be reusable. Often one Workcard can be shared between two or more pupils. Unless two classes are doing the same activity at the same time, you will need no more than one class set of Workcards.

In addition some lessons also have: ‘More thinking about…’ pages

These are problems which require pupils to use the same reasoning pattern as in the main lesson. They can be used in a variety of ways: as a source for homework questions although it is not necessary to give homework as part of the programme; as part of the lesson if the timetable allows more than 1 hour for each lesson; or as extension activities for faster or more able groups, thus giving some differentiation. Usually the problems get harder towards the bottom of the page, so appropriate questions can be selected for different ability groups.

OHP Masters

These have additional stimulus materials to be used with pupils.

Templates

These are for creating reusable cards or gauges.

License

Introduction to Thinking Science Copyright © by Philip Adey, Michael Shayer, and Carolyn Yates. All Rights Reserved.

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