Clean Water: a Limited Non-Renewable Resource

Clean renewable

Vaille Dawson

Water : A li

resource

mited

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Using the topic of Water to develop Year 7 Students’ Critical Thinking Skills to make Informed Decisions

Six months into the COVID-19 pandemic it is apparent that young people need sufficient scientific literacy to be able to navigate the socioscientific issues that they face now and in the future. These issues may be personal (e.g., genetic testing) or global (e.g., climate change, COVID-19, population growth). It is not possible for school science to ‘cover’ every possible issue. However, there are generic transferable skills such as critical thinking which are used when making decisions about socioscientific issues.

The curriculum resource; Clean water: a limited non-renewable resource, is intended for science teachers who wish to use the topic of water to incorporate the Science as a Human Endeavour strand into Year 7 Chemical Sciences or Earth and Space Sciences (Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA), 2020). The resource enables science teachers to develop an understanding of how to use socioscientific issues to develop their students’ critical thinking, decision-making and argumentation skills.

Produced by Vaille Dawson, Professor of Science Education at The University of Western Australia, all of the activities have been trialled successfully with Year 7 students. The curriculum resource is freely available from (https://api.research-repository.uwa.edu.au/ portalfiles/portal/72696513/Water_Resource.pdf) or by emailing vaille.dawson@uwa.edu.au