Why’s it so hard to identify and sequence disciplinary knowledge?

In Finding the optimum: the science subject report, Ofsted reported that the biggest problem with curriculum design was the identification and sequencing of the disciplinary knowledge (or working scientifically skills). This was not an enormous surprise because identifying and sequencing the disciplinary knowledge included in the National Curriculum is difficult for a number of reasons.

First and foremost, it is hard for schools to translate the working scientifically statements in the National Curriculum into specific working scientifically skills to teach. It is even harder to establish what the progression in those skills looks like across the phases from Key Stage 1, through lower Key Stage 2, to upper Key Stage 2.

If you solve those problems, then you have to take into account the clear instruction in the National Curriculum that the disciplinary knowledge must not be taught as a separate strand but through the substantive knowledge. This means that you have to identify the working scientifically activities that each topic in each year-group presents for teaching and practising working scientifically skills, and then work out whether the activities you have chosen provide appropriate coverage of all the skills, bearing in mind you can only focus on one or, at most, two skills in any lesson. Spoiler alert! To add to the complexity, not every topic will feature working scientifically activities that can be used to teach or practise every working scientifically skill.

Finally, the working scientifically statements in the National Curriculum cover a two-year phase, not a single academic year, so it is difficult for teachers to picture what their pupils need to be capable of to be on track to be assessed as secure at the end of each phase.

Where can I get help?

PLAN has just published new working scientifically resources. They are designed to clarify the disciplinary content in the National Curriculum and support schools with the challenges highlighted above. The new resources are made up of:

• eight Working Scientifically Skills that break down the National Curriculum working scientifically statements into learning intentions for lessons

• Planning Working Scientifically documents that identify the working scientifically activities for each topic in each year-group that feature most frequently in schemes of work and the PLAN Working Scientifically Skills they can be used to teach

• Working Scientifically Matrices for each PLAN Working Scientifically Skill in each year-group that identify the key learning for the skill and illustrate the expected outcomes that a pupil needs to demonstrate to be secure

• an Assessing Working Scientifically document that that shows how teachers’ formative assessment of the individual PLAN Working Scientifically Skills links to the National Curriculum working scientifically statements to enable them to make summative judgements

• a progression in each of the PLAN Working Scientifically Skills from Key Stage 1, through lower Key Stage 2 to upper Key Stage 2.

  
  

How do these resources help?

Working Scientifically Skills

The working scientifically statements in the National Curriculum are what we have to assess pupils against, but they are too complicated to be shared with them or to be used as learning intentions. Consequently, PLAN has broken down the statements into eight Working Scientifically Skills that can be used as learning intentions for lessons and shared with pupils so they can use them as part of a common language for talking about how they work as scientists. The eight Working Scientifically Skills are set out below, and all the new working scientifically resources are based on them.

• Asking questions

• Planning an enquiry (Key Stage 2 only)

• Making predictions (Key Stage 2 only)

• Gathering data

• Recording data

• Presenting data (Key Stage 2 only)

• Drawing conclusions

• Evaluating an enquiry (Key Stage 2 only)

As you can see, some of the skills only feature in the National Curriculum in Key Stage 2.

To make the Working Scientifically Skills more accessible for pupils and to reinforce learning through visual association, we have created icons for each of the skills. These can be used when planning and teaching individual skills within working scientifically activities. Digital versions of the icons can be downloaded from this online folder and we have also produced a set of A4 posters (one for each skill and its related icon) which are available to download from our website.

Planning Working Scientifically

To help schools plan the coverage of the disciplinary knowledge, the Planning Working Scientifically documents identify where, in the topics for each year-group, there are opportunities to teach the different Working Scientifically Skills. They do this by listing the working scientifically activities for each topic in each year-group that most frequently feature in schemes of work, and indicating which of the Working Scientifically Skills they can be used to teach. Many of the working scientifically activities can be used to teach more than one of the Working Scientifically Skills, so schools will not only need to decide which working scientifically activities to do with their pupils but also which skill(s) to focus on.

When reviewing the documents, you will notice that not every topic in a year-group lends itself to teaching all the Working Scientifically Skills, so it is important to bear this in mind when planning out where particular skills will be taught through the year to ensure complete coverage.

Schools should not expect to complete all of the working scientifically activities featured in the Planning Working Scientifically documents with their pupils. They should select enough activities, across the year, for their pupils to learn and practise each skill sufficiently to become secure in using it independently by the end of the phase.

The Planning Working Scientifically documents are Word documents so they can be amended to record the working scientifically activities chosen for each topic and the working scientifically skill(s) that are to be the focus for those activities. The result should enable schools to demonstrate their coverage of the disciplinary knowledge in the National Curriculum.

Working Scientifically Matrices

To help teachers understand what they need to teach their pupils for them to be secure in each Working Scientifically Skill, there is a Working Scientifically Matrix for each skill in each year-group. Each matrix provides the key learning for that skill in that phase, as well as the expected outcomes for each element of the key learning that pupils need to demonstrate to be secure in it.

Each element of the key learning is illustrated by annotated examples of work. These support teachers with modelling the expected outcomes to their pupils, but also provide a benchmark against which to assess their work. It is not necessary for pupils to have demonstrated all the key learning in each year-group, just a sufficient amount for it to be possible to provide evidence for assessment of all the key learning by the end of the phase.

Assessing Working Scientifically

To help schools and teachers make summative assessment judgements of their pupils' disciplinary knowledge against the National Curriculum statements, the Assessing Working Scientifically document show how teachers can link their formative assessment judgements against the key learning for the Working Scientifically Skills back to the National Curriculum working scientifically statements for that phase.

Progression in Working Scientifically Skills

To help subject leaders explain how their curriculum develops their pupils’ disciplinary knowledge across the school, the Progression in Working Scientifically Skills shows how the key learning for each of the Working Scientifically Skills builds across the phases from Key Stage 1 to the end of Key Stage 2.

Where can I get the resources?

All the PLAN working scientifically resources are free to download from the PLAN website in either the 'Subject Leader' or 'Teacher' sections. Currently, the Planning Working Scientifically documents and Working Scientifically Matrices are only available for Years 1, 3 and 5.