Understanding Science

UNIT 3 PROCESS SKILLS IN SCIENCE

Structure
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Objectives
3.3 Process Skills in Science
3.3.1 Basic Process Skills in Science
3.3.2 Acquiring Skills to Understand the Method and Processes of Science
3.4 Developing Scientific Attitude and Scientific Temper
3.5 Nurturing Aesthetic Sense and Curiosity
3.6 Interdependence of Different Aspects of Nature of Science
3.7 Let Us Sum Up
3.8 Unit End Exercises
3.9 References and Suggested Readings
3.10 Answers to Check Your Progress

3.1 INTRODUCTION
While discussing about aims of science education in Unit 2, you must have noticed
that now focus is on development of process skills among learners. National
Curriculum Framework-2005 has also emphasized on developing these scientific
skills learners so that they can construct their own understanding of science by
using inquiry. Unit will discuss how learners can develop scientific attitude and
scientific temper while learning science. You have to facilitate learners to develop
aesthetic sense while learning science. Unit will help you in it. Curiosity initiates
inquiry. How can you nurture curiosity among science learners? Unit focuses on
this aspect also. While discussing nature of science in Unit 1, you have studied
that science is a body of knowledge, a way of thinking (that needs development
of scientific attitude), and a process of inquiry (that needs nurturing of science
process skills). This unit will help you in exploring interdependence of all these
aspects.

3.2 OBJECTIVES
After going through this unit, you will be able to:
• identify basic scientific process skills to be developed among learners;
• design and develop activities to help learners for developing process skills
in science;
• specify your role in nurturing scientific process skills among learners;
• describe the characteristic features of scientific attitude and scientific temper;
• suggest strategies to develop scientific attitude among learners;
• facilitate learners for nurturing aesthetic sense and curiosity; and
• explore the interdependence of various aspects of nature of science.

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 Process Skills in Science
3.3 PROCESS SKILLS IN SCIENCE
If you ask learners, what is science, you will find a common aspect in their
responses i.e. science is a process of inquiry. Science involves few processes
which may part of a “Scientific Method”. If you look into the way science is
done by scientists, you will find that there is no universal or specific scientific
method. Scientists approach problems by variety of ways which have several
processes common to them. These commonly used processes to conduct scientific
inquiries are termed as ‘Science Process skills’.

In simple words, Science process skills are the processes which are being used
by various scientists while doing science. Some common science process skills
are Observing, Classifying, Communicating, Measuring, Predicting and Inferring.
You may find in some examples some more advanced process skills sometimes
referred as integrated skills like identifying and controlling variables,
hypothesizing, interpreting data, defining operationally, experimenting and
constructing models. At secondary level, your focus should remain on developing
basic science process skills among learners.

Fig.3.1: Science Process Skills

3.3.1 Basic Process Skills in Science

Let us discuss about the basic science process skills, which as a science teacher,
you can develop in your learners.

Observing
Observing is the most basic process of science and creates a base for higher
scientific inquiries. If you ask your learners which sense they are using while
observing, many of them may reply: eyes.
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Understanding Science You have to help them in understanding that “Observing means using our various
senses to obtain information (or data) about objects or events attended”.
Observations are not to be limited to seeing things only. We use more than one
sense organ to collect data (or information) about the objects in our daily acts.
Actions like- looking at the change of colour in litmus solution, feeling vibrations
in tongs by touching it, smelling odour of resultant gas during a chemical reaction,
hearing the change in pitch of sound in a musical instrument and tasting a solution
to find out if it has sugar or salt in it- involve observation using one or the other
sensory organ.

You must train your learners to use all their five senses (sight, hearing, taste,
smell and touch) in our science classes to help them become good observers.
That means, you should give them more and more observation based activities
to help them learn how to use sensory experiences to gather information about
their surroundings.

Properties of different objects like colour, size, shape, hardness, texture, lustre,
sonorous and density, etc. are all observable by using more than one sense.

Ms. Vandana, the science teacher in a secondary school in Noida, asked her
learners to fill in the table, what they will observe during following activities:
Activity Place of What do you Senses
Observation Observe? Involved
Cooking
Bird watching
Monitoring the class
Specimen of a fish
When they completed the table, she asked them to define observation in their
own words.
She further explained few characteristics of observation to her learners with
the help of examples from this activity.

Observation has following characteristics:

• Observation focuses on “What” and “How” and not on “why”.
• Observation is based on facts not opinions.
• Observation should have minimal bias i.e. it should be more objective.
• Observation is a continuous process i.e. it is not completed in one setting
only.
Learners should also understand that observations may be qualitative or
quantitative. For example, if you ask a learner to observe a cuboid-shaped object,
she can come out with both the qualitative as well as quantitative data. She may
tell you her observations about the shape, colour, material, texture (qualitative
data) and dimensions i.e. length, breadth & height, volume, weight (quantitative
data) of the object.

It is better if you provide a conceptual and contextual grounding for the

observations. Random observations may not help learners to attend to the relevant
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details of the object or event. Such as, if you tell your learners to prepare a slide Process Skills in Science
of onion peel mount and ask them to observe under microscope, they may tend
to report the wrinkles of peel, other distortions or air bubbles as their major
observations and may overlook the typical arrangement of plant cells and its
features. However, if they have already seen the diagram of onion peel in their
textbooks or have read about the plant cells before this exercise, they carefully
look for similar structure under microscope and locate the correct object in their
slides. Helping learners develop a theoretical premise prior to observing an object
or event for scientific investigation is always better. This orients learners well to
attend to the relevant details of object/event under observation.

Activity 1
Design some activities through which you can help your learners in
understanding that:
• Observation involves many senses.
• Observation is based on facts.

Classifying
Classification of objects (or events) is a process of imposing order on collection
of objects (or events) based on similarities, differences, and interrelationships. It
is good to organize our observations in ways that carry some special meaning.
Learners in a secondary class have basic understanding of grouping objects into
general categories. Such as, they can classify fruits and vegetables, round objects
and square objects, wooden articles and plastic articles, stationery items and
play material, etc. based on their everyday observations and experiences. But,
they need to be given specific training for learning how to classify objects or
events into scientific categories.

The more they become acquainted with scientific concepts, the better they become
in classifying things/ events in appropriate categories. For example, learners tend
to classify all plants together based on their general features like green colour,
rooted in soil, having leaves, stems and branches, etc. similar to almost every
plant. At times, they call all huge plants as “Tree” and all smaller plants including
bushes and grasses as “Plants” since they group them based on height only.

As a science teacher, you know that this classification is not scientifically correct;
“Plant” being the concept that includes all living organisms which produce their
food through photosynthesis. At elementary level, they have learnt in their science
classes about different ways of classifying plants, such as: trees, shrubs and herbs,
flowering and non-flowering plants etc. at secondary level you have to introduce
some higher order classifications like monocots and dicots.

You must provide the learners with ample number of experiences to observe
similarities and differences among variety of plants found in their surroundings.
Learners must be able to understand the basis of every classification scheme to
classify the objects into correct categories. It is usually a good idea to include
classification activities together with observation activities in your day to day
science classes.

It is critical to ask learners why they grouped objects the way they did to discover
their thinking about the process employed. It helps them to reflect on the act and
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Understanding Science identify the sorting errors, if any. The extent of classification depends on the
depth of similarities and differences observed among a group of objects/events.
You may arrive at parallel classification system or hierarchical systems of
classification. Generally, learners learn parallel classification system in early
grades that results into simpler categories; such as, one given below for example-
ACIDIC BASIC
Lime Juice Baking soda
Vinegar Bleach
.......... ...........
Gradually you can teach them to evolve hierarchical classification schemes also
where they would be able to look at similarities and differences together in a
given set of items. In that case, they learn that the main group starts with the
most general feature and gradually proceeds towards the specific features of
each subgroup it has within it. For example, look at the scheme of classification
given below:

This scheme of classification of matter is hierarchical in organisation, where

each subgroup has been further classified into its subordinate groups.

Activity 2
Ask your learners to classify the following materials as per the above shown
scheme:
Mercury, Soil, Table salt, Sugar, Rain Water, Coffee, Carbon-dioxide, Copper,
Tap water, 20 carat Gold, Iron, Glucose, Vinegar, Steel, Vegetable soup,
Urea, Fountain pen ink, Blood, Gravel

Measuring is concerned with the quantification of our observations. Initially, the

school learners learn to measure five basic entities while learning science- length,
volume, mass (or weight), temperature and time. They should be given ample
opportunities to quantify their data resulting from their observations and
experimentation. You should encourage them to measure entities by using non-
standard as well as standard units. Basically, the idea is to help them in adding
precision to observations, classifications and communications. More of
experiences should be provided for using standard scales and instruments such
as rulers, meter rods, balances, graduated cylinders, calculators, stop watch,
thermometers and electrical instruments, etc. to bring precision in measurements.
Gradually you can help learners to work with conversions of units, such as
selecting suitable units to express or compute the data by converting one unit
52 into another and even expressing conventional units into metric units. For
example, converting miles to kilometers, kilometers to meters, Fahrenheit to Process Skills in Science
Celsius, inches to centimeters, pounds to kilograms, grams to milligrams, liters
to milliliters, hours to seconds, minutes to hours, and so on. Further, you should
note that measuring skill requires not only the precision and accuracy in handling
of measuring devices, but also the ability to carry out calculations with such
instruments. Learners must learn to make judgments about which instrument
and units to be used and in which conditions. They must be able to understand
when to use approximate and when to accurately record a data. Ability to take all
such decisions is a part of measuring skills.

Activity 3
Ask learners to estimate the linear dimensions of their classroom in
centimeters, meters or inches and then tell them to measure it using meter
rod or inch-tape. Let the measurement be done by learners in groups and then
ask them to compare their results. They might not get uniform results in each
group. What could be the reasons? You should then discuss with them the
reasons of varying results and the ways to ensure accuracy in measurement.

Communicating
In most generalized form, communication means sending and receiving the
message through verbal or nonverbal means. People communicate in various
modes such as, speaking, writing, drawing, gesturing, acting, singing, modeling,
story telling, etc.

Communication in science is a specialized skill through with scientific knowledge

is being shared and communicated among scientific community. In order to
facilitate your learners about scientific communication, ask them to perform
following activity.

Activity 4
Ask your learners to collect some descriptions about medicines given in
packets of cough syrups or antibiotics, which they generally through when
they purchase such medicines. Similarly they should be asked to collect some
user manuals of electric equipments or mobile phone. They may be asked to
collect some reports on various diagnostics laboratories or ultrasounds.
Ask them to read all these and compare on following aspects’
Are all are written in same manner?
What are the similarities and differences in these reports?
Why a description of an antibiotic is not easily understandable to them where
as they read and understand a user manual well?

With such activities, you can explain following characteristics of scientific

communication:
– It is systematic.
– Scientific languages are different in different areas.
– Scientific communication varies keeping in mind the reader.
All scientific communication has certain set norms, which scientists try to follow.
Few are: 53
Understanding Science – All the procedures are communicated complete and in understandable
language. You can find many times, that most of the processes are
communicated step-by-step.
– In scientific communication, all observations are recorded and communicated
with accuracy.
– Scientific communications are more in scientific languages and always avoid
fancy and literary words.
– Scientific communications are not biased. They tend to be objective and
accepts all explanations for testing.
You have to help your learners in understanding that science as a discipline has
its own special set of symbols and modes that learners learn to become proficient
in communicating better with scientific community. You know that learners
verbally communicate in science classroom by talking to teacher, group
discussions during some collective task, individual and personal conversations
during an activity, giving oral presentation to whole class and so on. Written
communication in science classroom generally happens through creative writing,
making charts, graphs, posters, maps, diagrams, symbols, equations, etc. You
should develop communication skills in science by encouraging learners to
describe their observations as they perceive, define terms operationally, record
their observations in organized form such as observation tables, equations, use
of suitable charts and graphs, diagrams, and models to convey their understanding.

Inferring
Inferring is using logic to draw conclusions from what we observe and an
‘inference’ is an explanation to our observation about any object or event. In
other words, an inference is a person’s best guess about the cause of an
observation. It is generally based on some evidence also. Most of the time, our
inference is strongly conditioned by our past experiences and knowledge.

As a science teacher, your first task is to help your learners in differentiating

between observation and inferences. Let us see one example.
Ms. Shabina, a science teacher in Central School of Vijaywada, organised a
garden walk with learners and ask them to prepare a report on their visit.
Here are few paragraphs what different learners have reported:
• Today we were asked to walk in garden and observe various plants. I saw
various plants. Few were tall trees like mango and neems, few were shrubs
like rose and few were small herbs. I also noticed that there were very
few plants with fruits and flowers.

• When I walked today in garden, I noticed that most of plants and trees
were without flowers and fruits. This may be due to hot summers and sun
is shining brightly and there was no rain for last 2-3 months. Grass in the
garden has also turned brown; it is not as green as it looks in rainy days.

• Today Shabina mam asks us to visit the garden and prepare the report.
We visited the garden in small groups. In my group, there were 3 students.
We all divided the task on counting types of herbs, shrubs and trees. We
found that in garden, there are 4 types of herbs, 3 types of shrubs and 6
types of trees.
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What do you understand by these examples? Are these simple reporting of facts Process Skills in Science
or do few learners try to infer something from observation. In second example,
learner explained her observation with some logic and facts. Here, she is trying
to draw inference whereas in other two examples learners have reported what
they observed.

You can give a variety of tasks to learners where they can practice skill of inferring.

It is necessary to help learners in making better inferences by guiding their thinking

and help them learn how to make logical conclusions about an observation. For
example, inferring the age of a tree from the tree rings is an activity in which
inferences are drawn by calculating number of annual rings on cross-sectional
pieces of a tree trunk.

Learners should realize that more than one inference can be drawn from a single
set of observations. Previous knowledge and contextual experiences could bring
this variation in inferences from person to person. For this, you should encourage
them to discuss their observations and logically explain their inferences to each
other. Also, they must gradually learn to accept that an inference can be revised
with newer observations and evidences. Such as, early experiences with floating
and sinking objects may lead to inference that heavy objects sink and lighter
ones float. But, when they are countered with other observations and their idea
of weight responsible for floating or sinking is challenged, then their inferences
about the floating/sinking behaviour of objects also get modified.

Predicting
Predicting is to forecast about what a future observation will be. Predictions are
based on our observations, measurements and inferences that we make about
relationships among various observed variables. They are our best guesses based
on the available information/data in hand. You can start with example of weather
forecasts, in which meteorologists predict the weather on the basis of available
information, observations, analysis and prior experiences.

It is essential to learn this skill of predicting for doing science and learners should
be encouraged to predict before they test something. For example, you can ask
them to predict:
• whether some object will sink or float;
• whether some object will be attracted or repelled by magnet;
• whether the bulb will glow or not in specific circuit;
• whether the seed get germinated in a specific condition or not, and so on.
You should help learners in bringing accuracy in prediction by encouraging them
to make careful observations and precise measurements.

Learners’ predictive thinking can be nurtured by asking them to review observed

properties about an object or event and then asking them to tell the future outcomes
if some sort of change is made. You should prompt them more and more for
making predictions by using appropriate questioning like:
• What would happen if you place the potted plant horizontally on surface
and let it grow for few days?
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Understanding Science • What would happen if you put few drops of soap solution on a piece of cloth
stained with turmeric?
• What would happen if blue vitriol is stored in an iron vessel?
• What would happen if you place an onion peel in a hypotonic solution for
half an hour?
Activity 5
Design one activity each for developing following scientific process skills
among your learners:
Observing Measuring Predicting
Implement the activity and prepare a report on effectiveness of the activities
for developing these skills.

Check Your Progress

Note: a) Space is given below to write your answer.
b) Compare your answer with the one given at the end of this Unit.
1) What are basic scientific process skills?
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2) What are important characteristics of scientific communication?
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3) What is the difference between inferring and predicting?
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3.3.2 Acquiring Skills to Understand the Method and Processes Process Skills in Science

of Science
Learners need to acquire basic science process skills in order to understand the
method and processes of science that are used by scientists to do science. Apart
from six basic process skills as described above, there are ‘integrated skills’ as
well in science- those are acquired later by learners once they have learnt using
basic process skills. Basic process skills are prerequisite for integrated skills.
Integrated process skills require higher order thinking and reasoning and hence
they are mainly practiced in upper grades. These integrated skills include:
• Identifying and controlling variables,
• Defining operationally
• Hypothesizing,
• Experimenting,
• Interpreting data,
• Constructing models, etc.
You cannot expect learners to excel in these skills unless they have experienced
or been allowed to practice them consistently. Instead you need to give them
multiple opportunities to work with these skills in different content areas and
contexts. In fact, you need to be patient with the learners having difficulties,
since it requires to have developed formal thinking patterns among them to
experiment in science successfully. The more you make your science classrooms
process oriented, more will be the possibilities for learners to learn ‘how science
is done’.

Your role as a teacher is very significant where you are required to keep in mind
few things while engaging learners in teaching-learning activities. For instance,
you should-
• train learners for use of senses to carry out focused and objective observations
in science;
• help learners learn to record their observations in both qualitative as well as
quantitative manner;
• enable learners to use measuring instruments precisely and using appropriate
units to present their data/ observations;
• encourage learners for communicating observations honestly without
hesitation and feeling no fear while reporting deviated results;
• use appropriate questions to guide learners for making authentic observations
and inferences;
• help learners to classify various objects or events and develop ability to
explain the underlying criteria;
• provide opportunities to use different means of communicating data/ results
of their investigations, such as charts, graphs, models, etc.;
• motivate them to share their observations and inferences with each other;
• encourage them to predict an event and then test it if it’s coming out to be
true or not;
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Understanding Science • create ample opportunities for learners to use science process skills and
integrating them wherever is the scope.

Check Your Progress

Note: a) Space is given below to write your answer.
b) Compare your answer with the one given at the end of this Unit.
3) What is the role of a teacher in developing science process skills among
learners?
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3.4 DEVELOPING SCIENTIFIC ATTITUDE AND

SCIENTIFIC TEMPER
Learning science does not only limit itself to acquisition of conceptual knowledge
or process skills. Having a scientific bent of mind is essential for persons doing
science so that they can evaluate their knowledge, actions and beliefs rationally
and act logically. It is very common to see that even in today’s world, many
people still believe in religious superstitions and baseless rumours. People can
be found believing in their lucky day, wearing lucky stone or lucky number.
They attribute success or failure to their good luck or bad luck rather than practice
or lack of efforts. Some superstitious practices like believing in bad omens- if
cat crosses your way or if you step out during eclipse or following some so
called Godmen blindly and even sacrificing innocent lives for bringing you some
good luck etc., are still prevalent among several people, whereas we claim that
we are living in age of science and technology. It is nothing but absence of
scientific reasoning and logical thinking among such people.

In fact, it is tragic to note that many educated people including those with science
background lack scientific temperament. Hence, it is considered to be an important
goal to develop scientific attitude and temper among school learners so that they
might develop into rational and logical beings and enlightened citizens in future.
It becomes imperative for you as a science teacher to help your learners in
development of critical thinking and logical reasoning through learning science.

Let us first look at the two terms mentioned here- ‘Scientific Attitude’ and
‘Scientific Temper’. These terms are used interchangeably in field of science and
encompass similar traits or features that are required to be developed among
learners through science teaching. Attitudes can be defined as ‘mental
predispositions toward people, objects, subjects, events, and so on.’ (Martin, et
al., 1998, pp.14). The scientific attitude is indicated by certain tendencies or
mental processes in a person, which include- critical and logical thinking,
curiosity, creativity and inventiveness, respect for evidence, open-mindedness,
persistence, truthfulness and honesty in reporting observations, scepticism,
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perseverance, objectivity, universalism and willingness to suspend judgement Process Skills in Science
unless having sufficient evidences.

The term “Scientific Temper” was very prominently articulated by Pandit

Jawaharlal Nehru in his famous book Discovery of India (1946). In this book,
Nehru stated that “The scientific approach and temper are, or should be, a way
of life, a process of thinking, a method of acting and associating with our
fellowmen”. He further explained that the “scientific approach as the adventurous
and yet critical temper of science, the search for truth and new knowledge, the
refusal to accept anything without testing and trial, the capacity to change
previous conclusions in the face of new evidence, the reliance on observed fact
and not on pre-conceived theory, the hard discipline of the mind — all this is
necessary, not merely for the application of science but for life itself and the
solution of its many problems.”

Fig. 3.2: Attributes of Scientific Temper

Let us discuss these attributes in brief; it will help you to develop a clear
understanding.

Critical thinking
It is the ability to analyse our experiences and review our actions through reflecting
on them. It requires an abstract thinking to reflect on our actions. We use critical
thinking to evaluate whether something is adequate, correct, useful or desirable.
You can nurture critical thinking among your learners by encouraging them to
review their work for further improvement. You should discuss with them about
the failures or mistakes in previous work. Also, discuss the alternate ways of
approaching a given problem if one doesn’t seem working. It is better if you ask
open ended questions to encourage your learners to analyze the information and
critically think on the various aspects of a given problem or experience.

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Understanding Science Logical thinking
It requires thinking with logical reasoning. Logical thinking is the essence of
having scientific temper as it makes you focus on your observations and organize
them carefully through reasoning before arriving at any conclusion. You should
give enough opportunities to your learners to reason out their observations.
Learners start looking for patterns in terms of cause and effects before concluding
once they start developing logical thinking.

Respect for evidence

Any judgment or conclusion in science should be based on suitable evidences.
In case, there are not enough evidences to support a conclusion, it cannot be
treated as valid scientific idea. Similarly, if there are evidences contradicting
some idea, then there should be willingness to change the idea itself in the light
of convincing evidences. You should help learners to collect evidences for
verifying and testing their ideas about any object or event and adequately help
them learn how to confront ideas with evidences.

Objectivity
This is referred to the ability of looking at things without preconceived notions,
prejudices or subjective biases. Objectivity will also help in developing respect
for evidences, since an objective person will only rely on unbiased evidences. If
somebody sets for a scientific enquiry with some preconceived notions in mind
then there are obvious chances to obtain biased results. It is better if you help
your learners learn to accept any idea only after testing and verifying it against
sufficient number of evidences.

Open-mindedness
An open-minded person listens to others and is willing to change her/his mind if
warranted. Scientific temper demands that the person should be open-minded
and flexible in her/his approach. The person is required to evaluate all
observations, inferences and explanations carefully; and then accept the ones
which are consistent with the evidences and offers best possible explanation of
the phenomenon. Open-minded person will accept a new theoretical framework,
model or paradigm over the other when she/he identifies the inconsistencies in
the existing theories or the ways of approaching and explaining a phenomenon.
You can help your learners to become open-minded by letting them share their
viewpoints with each other and evaluate them collectively. They should be helped
to show respect for best explanations and review their own conclusions if found
inconsistent with the upcoming observations/evidences.

Honesty in reporting observations

Sometimes you may find learners faking their observations and manipulating
their results while performing a given experiment. Have you thought about the
reason for which they do so? Answer is simple, that we never emphasize on
doing science experiments without fear of verifying or proving something right.
Why should the learners feel pressure of coming out with ‘correct’ results while
performing science experiments? Think of its impact on humanity if scientists
also start doing same in their investigations. Can we really afford its outcomes?
The answer is ‘No’ obviously. Then it is your duty as a science teacher to imbibe
the habit of carrying out a science experiment honestly and report the actual
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results. Focus should be more on processes rather than the results of inquiry. Process Skills in Science
Deviations or discrepancies in the results are obvious but learners should not be
penalised for it. Rather, you should help them think of the possible reasons for
deviations in results obtained.

Scepticism
It is the ability to question accepted beliefs, ideas or facts prevalent in society on
the basis of scientific reasoning or investigations. You should help your learners
to develop this attitude of questioning widely accepted superstitions and myths
in our society in the name of religion, culture, magic and so on. It is better if you
give lot of space in your science classes about discussing such non-scientific
ideas and beliefs to help learners develop into logical and rational thinker.

Perseverance
It is the ability to carry out something with sustained and persistent efforts. History
makes it evident that lots of scientific inventions were the results of persistent
efforts of scientists and for some it took their lifetime even. You must help your
learners to accept their failures, learn from them and motivate for further trials.

Activity 6
Maintain a journal on “Major inventions in science”. Search for the scientists
and the stories behind those inventions from books, newspapers and internet
resources. Reflect on the attributes of scientific attitude and temper that were
evident in each story.

You must have understood that developing scientifically is basically acquiring

positive scientific attitudes. Since, attitudes influence the way people respond to
anything, therefore a child with a positive scientific attitude will perceive science
objects, content, activities, people, etc. positively. You cannot expect your learners
to develop these qualities overnight. The scientific attitude is nurtured over a
period of time resulting through a consistent engagement with relevant learning
activities; like performing various experiments, asking questions, reading
scientific literature, and making science learning more inquiry oriented.

Check Your Progress

Note: a) Space is given below to write your answer.
b) Compare your answer with the one given at the end of this Unit.
4) What are the major attributes of scientific attitude?
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Understanding Science
3.5 NURTURING AESTHETIC SENSE AND
CURIOSITY
A learner of science needs to have ‘aesthetic sense’ that enables her/him to
appreciate beauty of nature and ‘curiosity’ to understand natural phenomenon
that further motivates her/him to reveal mysteries of nature. Aesthetic sense is
concerned with the creation of something as well as ability to identify harmony,
regularity and patterns in the objects or events. We learn so many laws and theories
in science which indicate scientists’ constant quest for searching harmony, order
or regularity in nature and natural phenomenon. Be it Newton, Mendel or Darwin,
everyone had that aesthetic sense and hence was able to come up with theories to
explain that beauty of nature’s creation.

Since scientists possess an aesthetic sense to appreciate creation of nature and

natural phenomenon, therefore, they are able to identify and theorize about them.
Aesthetic sense in science provides you a different lens to look at nature and
natural phenomenon. Famous physicist Richard Feynman once quoted-

‘The world looks so different after learning science. For example, trees
are made of air, primarily. When they are burned, they go back to air,
and in the flaming heat is released the flaming heat of the sun which
was bound in to convert the air into tree, and in the ash is the small
remnant of the part which did not come from air, that came from the
solid earth, instead…These are beautiful things, and the content of
science is wonderfully full of them. They are very inspiring, and they
can be used to inspire others.’

Hence, the aesthetics and sense of wonder is significant for science learning.
You should be able to infuse this ability among your learners. You must encourage
them to read historical accounts of scientists and help your learners to appreciate
the aesthetic sense reflected in their work. While creating science models, toys
and gadgets to understand applications of science concepts, learners also derive
joy and satisfaction from their work. Such opportunities should be continuously
given to learners by you to nurture aesthetic sense among them.

Curiosity is another significant feature of scientists which drives them to solve

mysteries of the natural world. Similarly, learners are also curious to know
different things happening in their surroundings. You must have often found
learners engaged in exploring their environment and questioning ‘what’ and ‘why’
about it. Those teachers, who discourage learner’s questions in her/his class,
will eventually suppress their natural curiosity to know about their environment.
You must encourage them to put up their questions in class and help them to
inquire to find out their answers themselves. You should set up the enabling and
learner friendly environment in your regular classroom to nurture their curiosity.
Also, you should ensure designing your teaching activities to arouse learners’
curiosity in science. Organizing science fairs and science quizzes, taking them
to field visits, showing science movies/documentaries, visit to science centres
and exhibitions, talks with science experts and giving science literature including
books, magazines and newspapers, etc. are few strategies that you can employ to
nurture your learners’ curiosity in science.

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 Process Skills in Science
Activity 7
While teaching a science unit, ask your learners to evolve a list of different
questions out of curiosity that come to their mind related to that unit. You
can paste a chart on a wall of your classroom where each of them can write
and read everyone’s question. Discuss their questions after completion of
the unit and encourage them to investigate for the answers through devising
appropriate strategies. You can ask them to take up small investigatory
projects to be done in small groups. Mentor their investigations and help
them share and appreciate the findings.

Check Your Progress

Note: a) Space is given below to write your answer.
b) Compare your answer with the one given at the end of this Unit.
5) Why should we nurture curiosity of learners while teaching science?
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3.6 INTERDEPENDENCE OF DIFFERENT

ASPECTS OF NATURE OF SCIENCE
You might remember the three major aspects of nature of science we mentioned
in first unit i.e., scientific knowledge, science processes and scientific attitude.
Science can’t be defined in the absence of any of these aspects as they are very
much interdependent on each other. Scientific knowledge is acquired through
science processes and scientific attitude is necessary to deal with the content and
processes of science. Similarly, learning of science helps in development of certain
kind of scientific attitude and temper that helps learners to deal with their
environment more logically and sensibly.
Traditional science classrooms where the focus is only on memorizing scientific
laws, theories, facts and concepts don’t allow learners to acquire science processes
skills and don’t even lead to nurture scientific temper among learners. They
never learn the way a scientist would have approached the problem and inquired
into it. They receive all scientific knowledge in readymade form and memorize
it to clear school examinations only. Would it be called true science education
that you are supposed to provide your learners? Leave aside the science concepts,
would you expect those learners to critically think over everyday matters and
resolve their daily life issues rationally? By the end of this unit, you must be
agreeing that learning science in school should not just keep limited to ‘scientific
knowledge’ which is anyway tentative in nature. Rather, the focus of our science
teaching should be to enable learners “do” science like scientists would do and
“think” like scientists would think. In short, a learner in science must acquire all
of the aspects of science to understand science in its true nature. 63
Understanding Science
3.7 LET US SUM UP
This unit has brought to light the different aspects of nature of science that are
necessary to be developed among learners apart from the content knowledge in
science. You have learnt about important objectives of teaching science that
emphasize on nurturing aesthetic sense, curiosity, scientific attitude and scientific
temper among learners. Development of process skills among learners is all the
more necessary to help them explore and understand their own environment. All
these aspects of science are important to be focused while teachings science and
you need to be strategic enough to provide ample opportunities to your learners
for the same.

3.8 UNIT END EXERCISES

1) Why is it more important to emphasize development of processes than the
content in school science?
2) Collect news reports on recent researches taking place in field of science.
Discuss few of them in your science class and help learners appreciate the
way scientists have identified and approached the given problem.
3) Suggest the ways you nurture aesthetic sense and curiosity among your
learners through teaching concepts of ‘heredity and evolution’.
4) Plan minimum four different teaching activities for class IX learners from a
unit to nurture different process skills in science. Clearly state expected
skills to be nurtured through each of those activities in terms of process
skill based objectives.

3.9 REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READINGS

• Abruscato, J. (2004). Teaching Learners Science: A Discovery Approach.
USA: Allyn and Bacon.
• Collette, A. T. &Chiappetta, E.L.(Eds) (1994). Science instruction in the
middle and secondary schools (3rd Ed). New York: Macmillan Publishing
Company.
• Martin, D.J. (2012). Elementary science methods: a constructivist approach,
USA: Wadsworth.
• Martin, R. et.al. (1998). Science for all learners: methods for constructing
understanding, USA: Allyn and Bacon.
• Shirali, S. (2008). Aesthetics and the sense of wonder in the teaching of
science and mathematics, Journal of the Krishnamurti Schools, 12, 11-22.
• Tyagi, B.K. (2014). Fostering scientific temper, VIPNET News, 12 (2), 1-3.
Retrieved from- http://www.vigyanprasar.gov.in/vipnet/february-2014/
Vipnet-february-2014.pdf.
• Wellington, J. J. (Ed.) (1989). Skills and processes in science education,
London & New York: Routledge.

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 Process Skills in Science
3.10 ANSWERS TO CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1) Observing, Classifying, Communicating, Measuring, Predicting and Inferring
2) It is systematic.
Scientific languages are different in different areas.
Scientific communication varies keeping in mind the reader.
3) Answer on the basis on your understanding of section 3.3.1
4) Attributes of scientific attitude include- critical thinking, respect for evidence,
logical thinking, open mindedness, curiosity, truthfulness and honesty in
reporting observations, scepticism, perseverance, objectivity, creativity and
inventiveness, persistence, universalism and willingness to suspend judgment
unless having sufficient evidences.

5) Curiosity leads to the questions of ‘what’ and ‘why’ in the mind of learners.
In quest for searching answers to these questions, learners feel naturally
motivated and interested to learn science concepts. And, we know that
learners learn more easily if they are interested to learn. Science teacher
must take advantage of this natural curiosity among learners about their
world by engaging them in scientific processes and investigations.

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