Planning science instruction: from insights to learning to pedagogical practices

This paper sets out an approach to conceptualizing, planning and implementing science instruction, based on a sociocultural perspective, which recognizes the central importance of carefully identifying learning goals during the different phases of a teaching sequence and addressing these through different kinds of classroom talk. Two key planning tools are introduced. Firstly there is the concept of learning demand (Leach and Scott, 2002) which provides a way of identifying the nature of the intellectual challenges involved in coming to understand specific aspects of scientific conceptual knowledge. Secondly there is the concept of communicative approach (Mortimer and Scott, 2003) which allows the specification of different kinds of classroom discourse. How this approach to planning science instruction might appear in practice, and the impact of the instruction on science learning, will be illustrated through reference to a recently completed research project (Millar et al. in press).