The first comprehensive exploration of the nature and value of understanding, addressing burgeoning debates in epistemology and philosophy of science.

First comprehensive exploration of the nature and value of understanding, addressing burgeoning debates in epistemology and philosophy of science.

This collection of original essays offers a comprehensive examination of scientific progress, which has been a central topic in recent debates in philosophy of science. Traditionally, debates over scientific progress have focused on different methodological approaches, notably the epistemic and semantic approaches. The chapters in Part I of the book examine these two traditional approaches, as well as the newly revived functional and newly developed noetic approaches. Part II features in-depth case studies of scientific progress from the history of science. The chapters cover individual sciences including physics, chemistry, evolutionary biology, seismology, psychology, sociology, economics, and medicine. Finally, Part III of the book explores important issues from contemporary philosophy of science. These chapters address the implications of scientific progress for the scientific realism/anti-realism debate, incommensurability, values in science, idealisation, scientific speculation, interdisciplinarity, and scientific perspectivalism. New Philosophical Perspectives on Scientific Progress will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working on the history and philosophy of science.

All the subject knowledge you need to teach primary science. The essential subject knowledge text for primary science. Secure subject knowledge and understanding is the foundation of confident, creative and effective teaching. This comprehensive text, covering the whole primary curriculum, includes interactive tasks, self-assessment questions and links to other resources in all chapters. Primary science matters. This 10th edition includes links to the ITT Core Content Framework and new content on children’s common misconceptions in science.

This book, in its first part, contains units of conceptual history of several topics of physics based on the research in physics education and research based articles with regard to several topics involved in teaching science in general and physics in particular. The second part of the book includes the framework used, the approach considering science knowledge as a special type of culture – discipline-culture. Within this approach, scientific knowledge is considered as comprised of a few inclusive fundamental theories each hierarchically structured in a triadic pattern: nucleus-body-periphery. While nucleus incorporates the basic principles and body comprises their implementations in the variety of laws, models, and experiments, periphery includes concepts at odds to the nucleus. This structure introduces knowledge in its conceptual variation thus converting disciplinary knowledge to cultural-disciplinary one. The approach draws on history and philosophy of science (HPS) necessary for meaningful learning of science. It is exemplified in several aspects regarding teaching physics, presenting history in classes, considering the special nature of science, and using artistic images in regular teaching. The revealed conceptual debate around the chosen topics clarifies the subject matter for school students and teachers encouraging construction of Cultural Content Knowledge. Often missed in teachers' preparation and common curriculum it helps genuine understanding of science thus providing remedy of students' misconceptions reported in educational research.

This monograph offers a critical introduction to current theories of how scientific models represent their target systems. Representation is important because it allows scientists to study a model to discover features of reality. The authors provide a map of the conceptual landscape surrounding the issue of scientific representation, arguing that it consists of multiple intertwined problems. They provide an encyclopaedic overview of existing attempts to answer these questions, and they assess their strengths and weaknesses. The book also presents a comprehensive statement of their alternative proposal, the DEKI account of representation, which they have developed over the last few years. They show how the account works in the case of material as well as non-material models; how it accommodates the use of mathematics in scientific modelling; and how it sheds light on the relation between representation in science and art. The issue of representation has generated a sizeable literature, which has been growing fast in particular over the last decade. This makes it hard for novices to get a handle on the topic because so far there is no book-length introduction that would guide them through the discussion. Likewise, researchers may require a comprehensive review that they can refer to for critical evaluations. This book meets the needs of both groups.

An accessible exploration of scientific explanation and how it leads to knowledge and understanding of the world.

"In this second edition, Enger and Yager expand their previous work by suggesting new assessments and more clearly connecting their assessments with the National Science Education Standards. For classroom teachers, this book offers a range of suggestions that can enhance instruction. For science teacher educators, this book is an invaluable and handy resource in working with beginning, new, or experienced science teachers." —Julie A. Luft, Professor of Science Education Arizona State University Create and customize assessments to determine student understanding in six domains of science! Carefully designed assessments can give teachers the information they need to improve instruction and help students meet educational goals and objectives. This updated resource offers a multifaceted approach to measure what students know and can do as a result of their learning experiences. Assessing Student Understanding in Science provides educators with essential methods to best assess student proficiency and performance in science. The authors provide an extensive collection of strategies and examples for elementary, middle, and high school classrooms. Aligned with national science standards, the book includes: Criteria to measure student progress in six critical domains of science—concepts, processes, applications, attitude, creativity, and the nature of science Strategies to evaluate your teaching practice, such as action research, video recordings, and journaling Information about using formative assessments to inform teaching Methods for assessing student work using portfolios, self-evaluations, and rubrics An introduction to using science notebooks as assessment tools With the proven frameworks in this book, teachers can build customized assessments to meet instructional needs and prepare students to succeed in science.

This book explains some of the psychological processes that go into narrative construction and why it is that we have so much variability of historical accounts about a single historical event. A central focus of this book is how historians go from having unconnected units of data to having a coherent, structured, and organized flow of experiences. The author argues that the way these connections are established responds to certain Gestalt psychological principles that allow us to understand not only how histories are constructed but also how this construction can be rather different depending on how these principles are applied. To illustrate how these principles are present in histories, the author analyzes classic historical writers such as Burckhardt, Huizinga, Vico, and Marx. As well as an explanation of why historical multiplicity happens, the book also offers a way to evaluate different historical narratives about the same historical event. To illustrate how the evaluative framework is at play, the author analyzes two views about the so-called discovery of America. The first one explains what happens in 1492 by using the term "discovery." The second one uses the notion of "invention" to talk about the same set of circumstances. The book provides an important epistemic tool to evaluate these different accounts—one that can be applied not only to this case but also others. This book appeals to scholars, graduate students, and upper-level undergraduate students of history and philosophy. In addition, the book may also attract intellectuals, generally considered, who are interested in how philosophy can inform and question historical practice.

Now in its Third Edition, this text provides the background knowledge primary teachers need to plan effective programmes of work and answer children′s questions with confidence. The new edition links explanations of scientific concepts with children′s everyday experiences to help teachers and trainees foresee how they will present the subject knowledge to their pupils. Shaped by the National Curriculum, this text explains key scientific theories and concepts which pupils at primary level, including very able children, need in order to understand the observations and investigations they undertake. A CD ROM of 200 science investigations for young students is included with the new edition, allowing teachers to explore the practical application of topics covered in the book. This is an essential book for teachers, student teachers and anyone interested in the roots and growth of science education.