SCIOS

darkness enveloped the landscape and the stars and planets emerged in the mid-day sky

SCIOS: To Know

This journal aims to promote the teaching of science with a focus on classroom practice. It provides a means of communication between teachers, consultants and other science educators. Opinions expressed in this publication are those of the various authors and do not necessarily represent those of The Science Teachers’ Association of Western Australia (STAWA), the editorial committee or the publisher.

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Editorial Committee

Allan Knight

Bailey Brown

Dallas Bruce

John Clarke - STAWA

Lyndon Smith

Mady Colquhoun

Editorial Correspondence admin@stawa.net

Graphic Designer

Kattie Muir - Digital Crayon

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© 2023 The Science Teachers’ Association of Western Australia (STAWA). All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means without the written permission of STAWA. Unsolicited material is welcomed by the Editor but no responsibility is taken for the return of copy or photographs unless special arrangements are made.

ISSN 0157-6488

Contents

Editorial From the President

Chief Executive’s Report

STS – Meet the New Team

Particle 101: Solar Eclipses

Experiencing A Total Solar Eclipse

ICRAR Experience of a Total Solar Eclipse

CONSTAWA 41 - It’s a Wrap!

First CONSTAWA Experience: Primary

First CONSTAWA Experience: Secondary

Powerful Problem-Solving in Science

POGIL - A Student-Centred Instructional Approach

Inorganic Chemistry IUPAC Recommendations

A Week in the Wild with BushBlitz

What can the Chief Examiner Teach Us?

New Senior School Science Courses

The Primed Project

About the Editor

Allan Knight is one of the science curriculum consultants with School Curriculum and Standards. He has taught science, including senior school chemistry and physics, at high school and been a university chemistry lecturer. He has co-authored a number of senior secondary chemistry textbooks and written teacher resources for senior secondary physics for WA and other Australian states.

Editorial

Allan Knight

Welcome to the second issue of SCIOS for 2023. Schools have reached the mid-point of the school year and hopefully teachers are finding some time over the July school holidays to recreate and re-create in preparation for the next school term.

The April school holiday period saw a significant scientific event occur with much of the world’s attention focussed on Exmouth. I am, of course, referring to the total solar eclipse of April 20. Eclipses form part of the Year 7 Earth and Space Sciences curriculum and we reproduce here an article first published in the Scitech publication Particle that provides a ‘101’ on solar eclipses. Science teacher and now Director of Teaching and Learning at Helena College Maree Baddock and Year 10 student Victoria Baddock share their experiences of being in Exmouth for the total eclipse. As well, the manager of the SPIRIT program, and a researcher from The International Centre for Radio

Astronomy Research (ICRAR) who were at Exmouth share their wonder at being present to experience totality. The SPIRIT initiative allows schools to access the same tools used by researchers and astronomers to observe and collect astronomical data. This totality in WA occurred almost 100 years after another very significant total solar eclipse in the north west of WA. The measurements made at Wallal Downs in 1922 provided support for Einstein’s general theory of relativity. You can listen to David Blair’s (UWA Emeritus Professor of Physics) discussion of the history of this event in the ABC’s Radio National Science Show

Another significant science event (at least in the calendar of STAWA) occurred in WA two days before the solar eclipse – CONSTAWA. Ashleigh Tomasetig, STAWA Early Career Primary Science Scholarship recipient, and Kieran Broadbent, Jeff Cahill Early Career Teacher Award recipient, provide us with their perspectives as firsttime attendees at CONSTAWA, and Mady Colquhoun, Convenor of CONSTAWA 41 gives a snapshot of the activities teachers engaged with during the event and the images of the after-party, otherwise known as the Sundowner. We also celebrate the achievement of preservice teachers by acknowledging the winners of the Curtin University Teacher Awards.

Lucas Black and Shyam Drury, Professional Learning Consultants at Scitech, and science teacher Aneeta Dogra explain the pedagogical approaches Powerful

Problem-Solving in Science and ProcessOriented Guided Inquiry Learning, respectively. These pedagogical approaches can add to a teacher’s ‘tool kit’ of teaching strategies allowing them to choose approaches to best suit the topic and the students in their classes.

Lyndon Smith provides an update on IUPAC (International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) nomenclature, terms and definitions for inorganic and physical chemistry relevant to the teaching of Years 11 and 12 chemistry. An update for organic chemistry will appear in a later issue of SCIOS.

Bek Armishaw, primary science specialist, reflects on participating in Bush Blitz TeachLive. Bek observes that this exciting professional development opportunity allowed her to create “meaningful links for myself and my students regarding the synergies between science, nature, and the classroom”; something I am confident all teachers would like to be able to do for their students.

Julie Weber, a colleague at The School Curriculum and Standards Authority, and I provide information about two new senior school science courses – ATAR Agricultural Science and Technology and General Science in Practice – being offered for beginning in Year 11 in 2024 and in Year 12 in 2025. Jo Tregonning and Nathan Curnow share information about new resources developed under the PRIMED project for Years 7-10 Science (and HASS and Technology). These resources provide a primary industry, including agricultural, context in which to deliver the Years 7-10 Science curriculum.

I hope readers find in this issue something to stimulate them for the upcoming term and that may help them to engage their students in the learning of science.

Allan Knight

Welcome to the July Issue of SCIOS.

This year has seen the continuation of the war in Ukraine affecting so many lives, endless RBA cash rate headlines, and the seemingly ever-increasing irresponsible behaviour of people in society. As such I thought I would bring to our attention a number of recent scientific breakthroughs that have not been in the headlines.

Nuclear fusion has seen recent advances as scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California have produced the first fusion reaction that created more energy than was used to start it. This could have enormous implications for future carbon emission free energy production. The James Webb Telescope continues to send data about galaxies to Earth from 13 billion years back in time. A universal flu vaccine is being developed using similar technology that produced the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine that will hopefully immunise people against several strains of influenza at once. NASA managed to use its Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) to deflect a giant space rock from a collision course with Earth. This technology could protect the planet from asteroids and other space material. I have only mentioned a few great scientific feats, but I can’t complete my list without mentioning Artificial Intelligence or AI.