Science and Inquiry

According to the National Academy of Sciences, students should be supported at very early grades to raise questions and discuss methods to address those questions. These abilities should transfer to similar situations in which students deal with information search and use problems and test methods to address those problems. Set within the framework of the Scientific Method, the Academy recognizes the following progression of abilities to deal with activities related to scientific inquiry:

By Grade 4

• Ask a question about objects, organisms, and events in the environment
  
• Plan and conduct a simple investigation
  
• Employ simple equipment and tools to gather data and extend the senses
  
• Use data to construct a reasonable explanation
  
• Communicate investigations and explanations

By Grades 5 to 8

• Identify questions that can be answered through scientific investigation
  
• Design and conduct a scientific investigation
  
• Use appropriate tools and techniques to gather, analyze, and interpret data
  
• Develop descriptions, explanations, predictions, and models using evidence
  
• Think critically and logically to make the relationships between evidence and explanations
  
• Recognize and analyze alternative explanations and predictions
  
• Communicate scientific procedures and explanations
  
• Use mathematics in all aspects of scientific inquiry

By Grades 9 to 12

• Identify questions and concepts that guide scientific investigations
  
• Design and conduct a series of scientific investigations
  
• Use technology and mathematics to improve investigations and communications
  
• Formulate and revise scientific explanations and models using logic and evidence
  
• Recognize and analyze alternative explanations and models
  
• Communicate and defend a scientific argument

Fundamental to these abilities are some basic understandings that students should be engaged in for discussion and application as early as grade school:

• Scientific investigations involve asking and answering a question and comparing the answer with what scientists already know about the world.
  
• Scientists use different kinds of investigations depending on the questions they are trying to answer.
  
• Scientists develop explanations using observations (evidence) and what they already know about the world (scientific knowledge).
  
• Scientists make the results of their investigation public; they describe the investigation in ways that enable others to repeat the investigations.
  
• Scientists review and ask questions about the results of other scientists’ work.

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