There is a strong body of evidence that science was not taught consistently to primary-aged children across England and that their memories of science prior to 1989 centre around the "nature table." While secondary initial teacher education (ITE) before the National Curriculum had a strong subject focus, this was rarely the case for…

The author's favourite film musical is "The King and I." Of the several catchy songs in the film her favourite is "Getting to know you," which is sung firstly by the governess to the children and then the children to her. The author hereby declares this to be "The Song of Science," with "you" being the "system" being studied (e.g. plant, elastic…

How happy are you about teaching science? Building on similar work from the Leverhulme Primary Project and the Primary Horizons, the authors pursued this question with 303 head teachers, science coordinators, and class teachers across England in a recent questionnaire survey. The findings point to very real progress being made in many areas of…

In this article, the author describes the educational potential of a garden project. When the opportunity to visit a school in Amsterdam arose as part of her primary science PGCE course, the author jumped at the chance to experience science learning in another country. The majority of teaching that took place was topic-based, and science was…

The author shares her personal view about when it is useful for children to record their work in science, what helps their learning, and what switches them off, describing some fairly common scenarios. In her role as an Ofsted inspector, the author is privileged to observe, talk to, and learn from dedicated, inspirational, and gifted teachers who…