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Science capabilities for citizenship
The science learning area in The New Zealand Curriculum promotes the idea of developing citizenship capabilities. Students (citizens) need to be ready, willing, and able to use their science knowledge to:
- say what science is
- say what its strengths and weaknesses are
- ask informed questions about science issues.
Building knowledge of science content and the processes of science is important, and so is building knowledge of the nature of science. Based on the nature of science strand, five science capabilities have been defined to combine learning in these three areas.
The science capabilities help students practice the types of thinking, questioning, and actions needed to become informed citizens. These are things students need to show they can do; their capabilities are strengthened with practice.
Five basic capabilities in the science learning area have been identified. These are described and supported with teaching resources to develop each capability from curriculum levels 1-5.
Each key competency is a cluster of capabilities. Based on the Nature of Science strand, five foundational science capabilities have been identified. Their relationship with key competencies are explained here.
The research reports in this section support schools and teachers to develop science capabilities for citizenship as stated in The New Zealand Curriculum.