J Sci Educ Technol (2011) 20:537–549
DOI 10.1007/s10956-011-9312-5
The Importance of Teaching and Learning Nature of Science
in the Early Childhood Years
Valarie L. Akerson • Gayle A. Buck •
Lisa A. Donnelly • Vanashri Nargund-Joshi •
Ingrid S. Weiland
Published online: 24 May 2011
 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011
Abstract Though research has shown that students do not
have adequate understandings of nature of science (NOS) by
the time they exit high school, there is also evidence that they
have not received NOS instruction that would enable them to
develop such understandings. How early is ‘‘too early’’ to
teach and learn NOS? Are students, particularly young stu-
dents, not capable of learning NOS due to developmental
unreadiness? Or would young children be capable of learning
about NOS through appropriate instruction? Young children
(Kindergarten through third grade) were interviewed and
taught about NOS in a variety of contexts (informal, suburban,
and urban) using similar teaching strategies that have been
found effective at teaching about NOS with older students.
These teaching strategies included explicit decontextualized
and contextualized NOS instruction, through the use of chil-
dren’s literature, debriefings of science lessons, embedded
written NOS assessments, and guided inquiries. In each con-
text the researchers interviewed students prior to and after
instruction, videotaped science instruction and maintained
researcher logs and field notes, collected lesson plans, and
copies of student work. The researchers found that in each
setting young children did improve their understandings of
NOS. Across contexts there were similar understandings of
NOS aspects prior to instruction, as well as after instruction.
There were also several differences evident across contexts,
and across grade levels. However, it is clear that students as
young as kindergarten are developmentally capable of
V. L. Akerson (&)
G. A. Buck
V. Nargund-Joshi

I. S. Weiland
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA
e-mail: vakerson@indiana.edu
L. A. Donnelly
Kent State University, Kent, OH, USA
conceptualizing NOS when it is taught to them. The authors
make recommendations for teaching NOS to young children,
and for future studies that explore learning progressions of
NOS aspects as students proceed through school.
Keywords Early childhood
Nature of science

Teaching strategies
Introduction
Though an appropriate understanding of nature of science
(NOS) has been recommended for all as a component of
scientific literacy (DeBoer 1991), it is clear from recent
studies that students continue to graduate from high school
with many misconceptions regarding NOS (Bell et al. 2003).
What is also clear from recent research is that rarely do
students receive instruction in the K-12 grades that contrib-
ute to better understandings of NOS unless their teachers
have had some kind of professional development for teach-
ing NOS (Akerson et al. 2009; Bell et al. 2003). This begs the
question of whether K-12 students simply are not develop-
mentally ready to conceptualize NOS ideas, or whether their
lack of understanding NOS ideas is due to not being taught in
a way that enables students to conceptualize them. Indeed, if
students at the twelfth grade level have not achieved an
appropriate understanding of NOS, than how can we expect
young children to conceptualize NOS ideas? Metz (1995)
argues that thinking of developmental stages (e.g. Piaget) as
a way to teach children science can actually be detrimental
because teachers will presume students cannot conceptualize
ideas beyond those stages. Teachers will then be confined to
classroom activities that focus on concrete explorations of
materials that use process skills. This focus could limit what
children could gain from science instruction due to teachers’
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expectations that young children cannot conceptualize any-
thing more than concrete skills, that in fact, ideas about what
they are manipulating may not be fully accessible to them
until they reach the next developmental stage.
Certainly young children will differ from adults, and
likely older children, in how they conduct science inves-
tigations, and in how they conceptualize these ideas due to
experiences and background knowledge. However, through
appropriate science instruction we have found that young
children can participate in experiences that contribute to
their understandings of science and NOS through the
support of a teacher who can scaffold them. According to
national reforms (e.g. National Science Teachers Associa-
tion [NSTA], 2000) at the conclusion of twelfth grade
students should have adequate or informed conceptions of
science as tentative but robust, subjective (theory-laden),
culturally embedded, creative and imaginative, is based on
empirical evidence, is a product of observation and infer-
ence, and should know the distinction between theory and
law. So, if these are the recommendations for what students
should know at the end of their school careers, what should
be taught at the beginning of their school years? And will
they be able to conceptualize these ideas in a way that they
can better understand refinements and finer details about
each of these ideas in their subsequent school years?
We contend that through appropriate instruction young
children can conceptualize these aspects of NOS to a certain
level, in a way that they have a better understanding of these
aspects than many adults who have not received such
instruction, and therefore retain misconceptions about NOS
aspects. We certainly acknowledge that adults who receive
appropriate instruction throughout their school careers would
have better and more refined understandings of NOS aspects
than young children who have not yet had much exposure to
these ideas, yet also believe that even young individuals who
receive appropriate instruction can conceptualize these
aspects, most likely better than individuals—even more
experienced individuals—who have had no explicit NOS
instruction. In fact, beginning to teach NOS at the early grades,
and then continuing to emphasize and even teach more NOS
throughout the school career, should help students exit high
school with NOS conceptions as are recommended in the
reforms. The first step to determining whether students can
exit high school with informed conceptions of NOS aspects is
to decide when to begin teaching these ideas. We contend that
these NOS aspects can, and should be taught in the early
grades. We believe it is never ‘‘too early’’ to begin teaching
accurate understandings of NOS aspects.
Through research we have conducted in a variety of con-
texts we have explored the kinds of understandings young
children can develop about NOS aspects when they have the
opportunity to participate in explicit NOS instruction as part of
their science learning. We have explored first grade students’
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NOS understandings in an urban setting, kindergarten, first,
and second grade students’ NOS understandings in an infor-
mal science setting, and third grade students’ understandings
of NOS in a suburban at-risk school. Through similar, yet
context appropriate instruction, each teacher taught NOS
explicitly using contextualized as well as decontextualized
instruction (Clough 2006). An example of a decontextualized
activity that was used was the ‘‘Tubes’’ activity (Lederman
and Abd-El-Khalick 1998). The advantage of such a decon-
textualized activity is that it can provide a foundation for
contextualized instruction which connects NOS aspects to
science content during instruction. The advantage of contex-
tualized instruction is that students can see NOS as part of
science content and also can be considered part of science
instruction rather than an ‘‘add on’’ to science lessons. An
example of contextualized NOS instruction is to ask students
to describe how their inferences regarding a scientific phe-
nomenon, such as the creation of an electrical circuit, may
have changed through their investigation and collection of
empirical evidence. The teacher can then connect the tentative
NOS by illustrating to students how scientists might also
change their ideas through collecting new data, and even
through reinterpreting their existing data.
Through using common instructional strategies across
different settings as well as common research strategies we
have been able to reveal the kinds of NOS understandings
young children can develop. In the following sections we
will describe the contexts, instructional strategies, and
NOS understandings held by the students as a result of
instruction. We then explore understandings across grade
level and across context, illustrating what students do
understand about NOS as a result of instruction. We con-
clude with a discussion of our results, making recommen-
dations for strategies for improving young children’s
conceptions of NOS.
Research Contexts
We have explored young children’s NOS conceptions as a
result of instruction in a variety of contexts. We have
included a discussion of the following contexts in this
paper: (a) Informal Saturday Science K-2 program,
(b) Urban, Low SES, Girl’s Academy, and (c) Suburban,
Low SES public school. See Fig. 1 for a representation of
these contexts and the teaching strategies used to improve
NOS conceptions in each setting.
Context: Informal Saturday Science Program
This study (Akerson and Donnelly 2010) explored kin-
dergarteners’, first-graders’, and second-graders’ NOS
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(Phase II) 20 Days of explicit-reflective
contextualized unit
Context 2: Urban, Low, SES,
Girls’ Academy
Learning NOS in three
different early childhood
contexts
Context 3: Third Grade at-
risk Classroom
Contextualized NOS discussion, Readings,
Hands on activities, journaling
Fig. 1 NOS research and teaching contexts
views before and after instruction during an informal sci-
ence enrichment Saturday Science program entitled, ‘‘What
is Science? Exploring the True Nature of Science.’’ The
course included six sessions that each lasted 2.5 h.
Although each session addressed a different science con-
tent area (e.g. earth science, life science, and physical
science), the instructors employed explicit reflective
instruction throughout each of the guided inquiries and
emphasized how scientific knowledge is empirical, devel-
oped using creativity and imagination, tentative but robust,
subjective, and derived from inferences from observations.
Although 27 students were enrolled in the course,
research consent was secured for 19 students. Complete
data were obtained for 18 students. There was one kin-
dergartener (male), nine first-graders (6 male, 3 female),
and eight second-graders (7 male, 1 female).
A variety of data sources were collected and analyzed to
explore students’ NOS conceptions. First, the Views of
Nature of Science D (VNOS-D) (Lederman and Khishfe
2002) which targets observation/inference, subjectivity,
creativity, empirical, and tentative NOS aspects was
employed pre and post instruction. The VNOS-D is an
adaptation of the VNOS-B (Lederman et al. 2002) designed
for use with elementary students. The pre-instruction
VNOS-D was administered orally in small-groups (4–5
students) because these young children likely had very
little knowledge of nature of science and could not write
their responses on surveys. We were not able to interview
the students individually prior to the program beginning, so
elected to use group interviews during the course using
trained volunteers at the start of the program in essence of
time prior to instruction. At the end of the course, the 18
participants were individually interviewed (and audio-
taped) using the VNOS-D protocol. Student work on var-
ious activity logsheets was collected. These logsheets
539
specifically prompted students’ NOS views in the context
of the subject matter (e.g. mealworm observations) for that
session. Finally, each class session was videotaped to
ensure that the instructors were employing explicit nature
of science instruction. Data analysis consisted of rating
VNOS-D responses as inadequate, adequate, or informed,
coding student work for comprehension of NOS aspects
and attribution of these NOS features to the work of sci-
entists, and reviewing session videotapes while noting
explicit reflective instruction.
Context: Urban, Low SES, Girls’ Academy
This study explored first-graders’ NOS views before and
after instruction during a unit in a girls’ academy in a low
SES urban district. The unit included 10 days of explicit,
decontextualized NOS instruction followed by a 20-day
unit that contextualized the NOS concepts into a plant unit.
The participants included 23 African–American girls
from one first-grade classroom. All participants attend a
gendered elementary school in a large urban district in the
mid-western United States. The school has a population of
99% Black and 1% Multiracial. Additionally, 88% of the
students qualify for free lunch.
To determine their views of the nature of science,
we administered the Young Children’s’ Views of Science
(YCVOS) to the students on a pre- and post-intervention
basis. We followed the protocol determined by Lederman
et al., (2009) for elementary students using the YCVOS.
YCVOS protocol was designed to use as a group interview
with young children to determine their views of nature of
science. To track the development of the students’ under-
standings of NOS elements, we collected copies of their
work. The work was designed to have the students reflect in
writing, for instance, on scientists’ creativity, certainty of
scientific knowledge, examples of observations and infer-
ences, examples of data, and how background knowledge
influences interpretations. We videotaped each class ses-
sion to allow us to track our explicit NOS instruction over
the course of this unit. We kept researcher logs in which we
recorded reflections of our students’ learning.
We coded the YCVOS interview data using the protocol
recommended by Lederman (2009). We performed a con-
tent analysis on the journal entries from the students. We
coded all copies of students’ work throughout the inter-
vention, noting whether and when students improved their
views of NOS. We coded their writing work for (1) whe-
ther they were describing the NOS aspect adequately, and
(2) whether they attributed the NOS aspect to the work of
scientists. To ensure we used explicit reflective NOS
instruction as we intended, we watched the videotapes of
our instruction. We made notes when we were explicitly
addressing NOS, which elements we emphasized more
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often, and interactions between students and teacher that
we may have missed in our researcher logs.
Context: Third Grade Classroom
This study took place over one school year in a multi-
subjects third grade classroom at a suburban at-risk ele-
mentary school. The school had not met Adequate Yearly
Progress for several years, and included a diverse group of
male and female students. Eighty percent of the 24 students
in the class were on free or reduced lunches, and there were
five African American (three males and two females) two
Latino American students (one male and one female), and
one Native American male student. The remaining students
were Caucasian (nine females and six males). To track
students’ NOS conceptions, we administered interview
versions of the VNOS-D2 (Lederman and Khishfe 2002) of
all students prior to and after instruction. The VNOS-D2 is
an instrument also modified from the VNOS-B (Lederman
et al. 2002) to measure elementary students’ conceptions of
NOS. The interview data was transcribed and analyzed by a
team of researchers for themes of NOS understandings by
NOS aspect. We collected copies of student science work,
and videotaped all science lessons to track strategies of
explicit NOS instruction. The teacher taught science most
days of each week and embedded NOS into all science
lessons in a contextualized manner. Because the at risk
school was in a transient school district we have a complete
data set for the entire school year for ten students, and thus,
we are reporting on them.
Teaching Strategies in Each Context
In this section we will describe more specifically the kinds
of instruction that enabled the young children to improve
their conceptions of NOS. We describe the instruction for
each research and teaching context. See Table 1 for a
listing of NOS teaching strategies used in each context.
Teaching Strategies: Informal Saturday Science
Program
Several research-based teaching strategies were employed
to promote student growth in their NOS views. The
instruction was designed to incorporate contextualized and
decontextualized instruction (Clough 2006). Initially, stu-
dents completed several decontextualized activities such as
the ‘‘Draw a Scientist’’ activity and ‘‘Tricky Tracks’’
(Lederman and Abd-El-Khalick 1998) as a way to intro-
duce NOS concepts. These activities, which can be found
in the document cited, are designed to teach students ini-
tially about NOS aspects without being embedded in
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science content. Then NOS instruction became more con-
textualized in earth, physical, and life science content. We
addressed the five targeted NOS aspects (creativity, tenta-
tiveness, empirical NOS, observation/inference distinc-
tions, and subjectivity) multiple times and in multiple
contexts.
Explicit reflective NOS instruction (Akerson et al. 2000)
was used throughout the course. After each guided inquiry
students were prompted to reflect on how their work was
similar to that of scientists. We employed several questions
during these debriefing sessions to specifically target par-
ticular NOS aspects. For example, we asked ‘‘What were
your observations of the mealworm?’’ and ‘‘How were your
observations different from your inferences?’’ These
questions were embedded into the oral debriefing sessions
following inquiries as well as the activity logsheets so that
students were assessed formally and informally. The
embedded NOS prompts allowed the instructors to jointly
assess students’ conceptions and then specifically plan a
portion of the next Saturday session to address inadequate
NOS views that had emerged, a strategy we termed
‘‘double-debriefing.’’
Within the instructional sequence, students conducted
guided inquiries, engaged in readings and explicit reflective
debriefings for various children’s books, designed and
implemented individual investigations in small groups, and
participated in a mini-conference presenting findings from
individual investigations. Week One was devoted to
assessing students’ pre-conceptions about science in
decontextualized ways. In small groups, students discussed
the VNOS-D questions with an adult table leader, and
completed and debriefed the ‘‘Draw a Scientist’’ and
‘‘Tricky Tracks’’ activities. The first activity required stu-
dents to draw a picture of a scientist working. The Tricky
Tracks activity sought to teach students the distinction
between observation and inferences by asking students to
make observations of markings on a paper and inferring
what those marking were. Week Two continued the
decontextualized NOS activities and then focused on Earth
Science. Students engaged in the decontextualized Mystery
Tube activity which required students to make observations
of strings being pulled from a tube and to subsequently
infer what might be inside the tube and then build a model
to determine whether their inference worked as did the
target tube. They then completed and debriefed a ‘‘Real
Fossil/Local Fossils’’ inquiry. During Week Three, the
instruction wrapped up the Earth Science explorations with
a ‘‘Make Your Own’’ fossil activity where students con-
structed Play-Doh imprints, traded these ‘‘fossils,’’ and
made inferences using other groups’ ‘‘fossils.’’ Week Three
also transitioned into Physical Science with explorations of
solids, liquids, and gases culminating in an Oobleck guided
inquiry and NOS debriefing. Week Four was devoted to
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Table 1 NOS teaching strategies used in each context

NOS aspect Activity Objective

Context 1: Informal Saturday Science K-2 program

Observation vs. Draw-a-scientist activity (Lederman and Abd-El-Khalick, To help students understand differences between
Inference 1998) observation and inference in a de-contextualized
Tricky Tracks Activity (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998) manner
Think Tubes (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998)
Mystery file folder activity (Contextualized discussion
of NOS)
Make your own fossil (Using play-doh)
Oobleck activity
Observing mealworms (and inferring what environment
do they prefer)
Social & Cultural Real Fossil/Local Fossils These activities helped student understand how social
Embededness/ Oobleck activity and cultural background plays a role in data
Subjectivity interpretation
List of books used for teaching NOS
Read Dr. Xargle’s Book of Earthlets (Willis, 2002)
Read book Seven Blind Mice (Young, 1992)
Read Batholomew and the Oobleck (Suess, 1949)
Creativity Make your own fossil (Using play-doh) Students created their own fossils using play-doh. We
Classification of various items as living/non-living discussed how scientists act similarly way to generate
inferences based on fossils
Classification of living organisms
Students displayed creativity during classification and
Creating comfortable environment for mealworms
environment creating activity
Read The Dinosaur Alphabet Book (Pallota, 1990)
Empirical Classification of various items as living/non-living Help students make connections between different
Evidence Classification of living organisms observations to draw inferences and understand how
science is empirically based
Classification of fruits and vegetables
Tentative Sound: Pitch These activities focused on making students understand
Owl pellet activity how inferences/interpretations change over time as we
collect more data
Read book What Do you do with a Tail Like This?
(Jenkins & Page, 2003)
Context 2: Urban, Low, SES, Girls’ Academy
Observation vs. Draw-a-scientist activity (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998) To introduce students to observation skills and the
Inference Dog among spots activity (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998) difference between an observation and an inference
Old Woman/Young Woman activity (Lederman & Abd-El-
Khalick, 1998)
Tricky Tracks Activity (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998)
Opposite Cube Activity (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998)
Think Tubes (Lederman & Abd-El-Khalick, 1998)
List of books used for teaching NOS Books were discussed explicitly with students to help
Read Dr. Xargle’s Book of Earthlets (Willis, 2002) them understand differences between observation and
inference
Read book Seven Blind Mice (Young, 1992)
Read book What Do you do with a Tail Like This?
(Jenkins & Page, 2003)
Social & Cultural Read Bringing the Rain to Kapita Plain (Aardema, 1992) To describe how different cultures view planting and
Embededness Draw a scientist plant growth
To introduce the girls to ideas of how science is socially
and culturally embedded and the subjective nature of
science
Subjective Oobleck Activity (Sneider & Beals, 2004) To provide an experience for the girls to make
Read Batholomew and the Oobleck (Suess, 1949) observations and inferences

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Table 1 continued
NOS aspect Activity Objective

Empirical Students set up plant (flowers) experiment with three variables

Evidence (sun, water, air)
Discussion of what plants need to grow
Discussion of variables to figure out what plants need to grow
Tentative Read The Dinosaur Alphabet Book (Pallota, 1990) To provide the girls with an experience in which their
Read A Mealworms Life (Himmelman, 2001) initial ideas changed due to new evidence
Introduce George Washington Carver and his ideas about To describe how Carver’s ideas about planting changed
soil and purpose of soil the way scientists viewed the purpose of soil
Context 3: Suburban, Low SES public school
Observation vs. Rocks and Minerals To help students understand differences between
Inference Jumping bean investigation observation and inference in a contextualized manner
Oobleck (colloidal suspension)
Electricity (Light a bulb Circuit)
Owl pellet activity (Infer what Owl has eaten)
Force and motion
Sound: Vibrating forks
Sound: Pitch
Sound: Pitch and Volume
Magnets
List of books used for teaching NOS Books were discussed explicitly with students to help
Earthlets as Explained by Dr. Xargle (Willis & Ross, 1988) them understand differences between observation and
inference
Read book Seven Blind Mice (Young, 1992)
Read book What Do you do with a Tail Like This?
(Jenkins & Page, 2003)
Social & Cultural Mystery samples These activities helped students understand how social
Embededness/ Sound: Pitch and Volume and cultural background plays a role in data
Subjectivity interpretation
Presentations (Fossils, light, solids/liquids, sound, fungus/
Jupiter)
Creativity Making Poster (ideas from Ramp lesson) Students learned about force and motion/electricity in
Making flashlight the previous lesson and based on that knowledge they
developed ramps. Explicit discussion lead students to
understand the importance of creativity in science
Empirical Magnets (circle magnets, bar magnets, horseshoe magnets, Help students make connections between different
Evidence speaker magnets) observations to draw inferences and understand how
Spinning (forces and motion with tops) science is empirically based
Presentations (Fossils, light, solids/liquids, sound, fungus/
Jupiter)
Circuit
Tentative Sound: Pitch These activities focused on making students understand
Owl pellet activity how inferences/interpretations change over time as we
collect more data

Life Science, and students began with a guided inquiry in
which they classified various items as living/non-living and
then further classified the living organisms. Students then
made observations and inferences about mealworms before
designing and conducting controlled experiments about
mealworm preferences. Week Five began with a decon-
textualized Mystery File Folder activity where students
inferred what random shapes might be placed inside a file
folder by observing colored papers through holes punched
in the folders. Students were then given general guidelines
for how to develop and conduct individual investigations.
The instructors provided student groups with materials to
explore and eventually prompted students to design their
research questions and procedures before carrying out their
investigations. Week Six culminated a mini-conference
where students presented findings to their peers. Students

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also engaged in a fruit/vegetable classification guided
inquiry and post-class interviews.
Teaching Strategies: Urban, Low SES, Girls’ Academy
There were two phases of the unit completed at the
girls’ academy. Phase 1 was a 10-day explicit-reflective
de-contextualized unit which was based on the study noted
above (Informal Saturday Science Program). The purpose
of the decontextualized phase was to introduce the NOS
aspects and provide experiences for the girls with these
ideas. The first day began with a story, Seven Blind Mice
(Young 1992), selected to emphasize a NOS concept; a
format which was followed throughout the remainder of
the first phase of the unit. This story was followed by a
discussion of scientists and how scientists use journaling.
The girls decorated their own science journals which were
used through the remainder of the unit. Over the course of
the next 9 days, the learning experiences included many
decontextualized NOS activities designed to explicitly
introduce/reinforce NOS concepts. These activities inclu-
ded the ‘‘Draw a Scientist,’’ ‘‘Tricky Tracks,’’ ‘‘Old
Woman/Young Woman,’’ ‘‘Cube Activity’’ and ‘‘Oobleck’’
activities described in the above section. When each NOS
concept was addressed and discussed, a word card was
made and added to a word wall and remained up
throughout the entire unit. At the end of this phase, the girls
were given the YCVOS (described below) and interviewed
about individual items on the survey. In addition to serving
as a data collection tool, these interviews helped the girls
further develop their conceptual understandings of the
NOS concepts addressed during the first phase of the unit.
A class discussion of these concepts was used to start the
second phase of the unit.
Phase 2 was a 20-day explicit-reflective contextualized
unit. The focus of this unit was to address the state stan-
dards on the living environment (plants) through NOS
aspects. This phase was conducted over an 8-week period
due to scheduling conflicts and the length of time needed to
grow plants. Thus, the instruction was not always on
consecutive days. The first day of the unit began with girls
drawing a plant and using that plant to lead a discussion on
what they knew about plants, as well as questions they had
about plants. Next followed a discussion on which ques-
tions they could investigate and what those investigations
would involve. The instructional focus switched to
debriefing how the plant discussion did/did not reflect the
various aspects of NOS. These initial stages of inquiry into
plants served to focus the remainder of phase 2 of the unit.
During that time, the girls completed observations and
inferences of various plants and plant seeds, structured
class inquiries on plant growth, as well as researched and
completed structured inquiries on hydroponics and lima
543
beans. The girls read Bringing the Rain to Kapita Plain
(Aardema 1992) and learned about George Washington
Carver and Barabara McClintock. The culminating learn-
ing experience was the completion of a semi-structured
experiment on peanut plants. Throughout the unit, the
concepts explored during the first phase were often
explicitly discussed in context of the plant inquiries. For
example, during the activities on George Washington
Carver, the girls explored how science is tentative and
socially and culturally embedded.
Teaching Strategies: Third Grade Classroom
We used different strategies throughout the year to
implement NOS teaching to third graders in the suburban
at-risk school. We taught NOS in contextualized manner to
connect to the science curriculum at the school. We
adapted the science curriculum to embed NOS aspects. We
used KWL charts in our lessons to identify what kids knew
about NOS before starting a lesson and then connected
their previous knowledge to newly learned concepts and
NOS aspects. We also implemented hands-on inquiries,
which helped students learn science concepts. Using the
hands-on inquiries provided us a science context through
which we could discuss NOS aspects. We encouraged
students to record their thoughts in journals and provided
them prompts which helped them reflect on their NOS
learning. To us scientific inquiry is how scientists develop
scientific knowledge, and so without engaging in scientific
inquiry there is no way to fully conceptualize NOS. We
used inquiry teaching to foster NOS understanding con-
nected to the essential features of classroom inquiry
described in National Science Education Standards
(National Academy Press 1996). Their view of the essential
features of classroom inquiry are that learners (a) are
engaged by scientifically oriented questions, (b) give pri-
ority to evidence, which allows them to develop and
evaluate explanations that address scientifically oriented
questions, (c) formulate explanations from evidence to
address scientifically oriented questions, (d) evaluate their
explanations in light of alternative explanations, particu-
larly those reflecting scientific understanding, and
(e) communicate and justify their proposed explanations.
We purposefully emphasized these features in the science
instruction as a way to ensure students were engaging in
scientific inquiry and to help ensure there would be a
context in which they could learn NOS.
We also used productive questioning such as asking
students to describe how what they were doing in science
investigations included elements of NOS as well as asking
students to reflect on how their investigations were similar
to what scientists do in their investigations. We included
children’s literature to make connections between science
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content, NOS aspects and reading. These literature-based
strategies proved to be effective because all the elementary
students were engaged and were able to identify NOS
aspects present in the stories upon questioning by the tea-
cher. We held discussion sessions at the conclusion of
science investigations which enabled students to share their
findings as well which aspects of NOS they identified
through their explorations. We used a NOS chart hanging
in the front of the room to debrief science lessons to enable
students to draw connections between content and NOS
aspects.
NOS Conceptions Held By Students in Each Context
In this section we will describe the NOS conceptions held
by students in each context after instruction. Some con-
ceptions are similar and some are different across contexts,
yet it is clear to see that the conceptions have improved as a
result of instruction.
Findings
The early elementary students from all contexts held
inadequate views of NOS prior to instruction. For example,
students largely maintained that creativity was important
for artists but not scientists (an inadequate view of creative
NOS) and that scientists learned new things when they
‘‘looked them up’’ (an inadequate view of empirical NOS).
Post instruction we found that students of all contexts
developed better understandings of certain aspects of NOS
than others. Below, we describe the gains afforded by these
students throughout their contexts, according to each of the
five targeted NOS aspects.
Creativity
Students in the informal Saturday Science Program made
gains in their understandings of the creative aspect of NOS
as evidenced by their collected work throughout the course.
By week 2, fifteen students (1/1 K, 6/9 1st-grade, 8/8 2nd-
grade) maintained that they were being creative when they
developed their models during the ‘‘Real Fossils’’ activity.
Similarly, students were asked if they were being creative
like a scientist while doing their work following a Week 3
Play-Doh fossils activity. Sixteen students (1/1 K, 7/9 1st-
grade, 8/8 2nd-grade) thought they were being creative
during the activity, and seventeen students (1/1 K, 8/9 1st-
grade, 8/8 2nd-grade) maintained that scientists were cre-
ative when they worked. During the Week 3 Oobleck
activity, nine of thirteen students indicated that they were
being creative like scientists during this investigation. They
said that they were being creative when they used their
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senses, played with or manipulated materials, investigated
the Oobleck, or made predictions about the identity of
Oobleck. During a Week 4 activity where students cate-
gorized living and nonliving things, fourteen students
(77.8%) thought they were being creative and fifteen stu-
dents (83.3%) thought scientists were creative when they
made categories for living things.
During the post-instruction VNOS-D interviews, only
the kindergartener held the inadequate view that scientists
were not creative. He said, ‘‘scientists are not creative and I
don’t know why.’’ The remaining students all indicated that
scientists were creative. The first graders described how
scientists ‘‘think about stuff in their heads and then share
their ideas’’ and ‘‘scientists use their imaginations to figure
out things, like why the dinosaurs died.’’ The second
graders described how scientists were creative when they
‘‘think about things they can’t see,’’ are ‘‘not sure about
things in their experiments so they have to figure it out,’’
and ‘‘do science because they think about new things and
think about ideas they have.’’
In the urban setting, the gains regarding scientific
creativity were less. After the decontextualized explicit
and reflective NOS instruction, six girls still held naı̈ve
views of imaginative and creative NOS, referring to cre-
ativity in terms of doing art. For example, Andrea stated,
‘‘I think [scientists] are creative because they use different
colors, they play with different, well, don’t play, but they
use different colors of stuff and they do use different
colors and they play, well, get different colors.’’ Leah,
Zakay and Connie still held adequate views after decon-
textualized instruction. Leah stated ‘‘They could like
create stuff like that thing right there, like if it was full of
whatever then they could put two together and two more
together.’’ Ebony made substantial gains in her under-
standing of creativity. In her pre-interview Ebony stated
that scientists are creative when they take pictures, ‘‘They
take pictures of [what they are observing]. And they show
the other people that find one.’’ In her post-instruction
interview, she stated that scientists are creative, ‘‘When
they smell, observe, talk about it and animals, they talk
about dinosaurs. And they think about it. And they have
ideas and inferences.’’
After the contextualized NOS instruction, four girls in
the urban setting retained naive views of the imaginative
and creative NOS. One of those four girls had just arrived
transferred into the class. Seven girls revealed adequate
views. Naja’s views improved from naı̈ve both before and
after the decontexutalized instruction to informed after
contextualized instruction. She stated that scientists
‘‘search the bones and then they make things with the
bones. Like animals and the dinosaurs are very strange and
they figure it out.’’ Rianna’s views remained informed after
the contextualized NOS instruction.
J Sci Educ Technol (2011) 20:537–549
In the suburban at risk third grade classroom gains were
substantial after a full year of instruction. By the end of the
school year, most students not only understood how sci-
ence is creative, they were able to give examples how
scientists are creative throughout the entire process of
doing science. Students also understood how creativity is
part of science and scientists use their creativity and
imagination at every stage of a science investigation.
During their interviews, one student stated, ‘‘Scientists are
creative by putting together bones, to see what it might
look like. They look at the things in different ways and be
creative.’’ Indeed, nine out of ten students recognized the
roles of creativity and imagination in the development of
scientific knowledge when scientists form inferences or
explanations. Five of out nine demonstrated informed
views. When asked when scientists use their imagination,
one student (female) responded, ‘‘They use their imagina-
tion when they try to figure out stuff to see where it fits.’’
Tentativeness
Students in the informal Saturday Science Program made
large gains in their views of the tentative NOS. During the
Week 2 fossils activity, students were asked questions
about ‘‘how sure’’ they were about their conclusions, so
that we could later draw parallels between the uncertainty
in these investigations and uncertainty in scientists’ work.
After this activity, 16 students described not being sure
what the fossil was, and 12 indicated that they were not
sure where the fossil had once lived. They described how
‘‘no one’’ knows for sure, many explanations exist, they
hadn’t seen the organism (an inadequate view of the
inferential NOS), and they had only examined part of the
organism. During the Week 3 Oobleck investigation, stu-
dents were prompted to reflect on if their ideas about matter
had changed as a result of their work. Of the 11 responders,
only 6 said that their ideas had changed. In the fourth week,
students drew pictures of mealworms, collected data about
mealworms, and then drew the mealworms a second time.
Students were asked if their ideas about mealworms had
changed as a result of collecting this data. Of the 16
responders, 9 said that their ideas had changed. Later stu-
dents were asked to devise and implement investigations to
identify mealworm habitat preferences. After these inves-
tigations, students said that their ideas about what meal-
worms preferred had changed, and most reasoned that their
findings did not match their predictions. They were also
asked about how sure they were about mealworm prefer-
ence following the investigation. Nine indicated that they
were sure (an inadequate view), and they explained their
certainty ‘‘because we did experiments.’’
By the post-instruction interviews, the vast majority (1/1
kindergarten; 6/9 1st-grade, 7/8 2nd-grade) of students in
545
the Saturday Science Program held adequate views of the
tentative nature of science. The kindergartener indicated
that what scientists know will change in the future but did
not provide further explanation. The first graders thought
that scientists’ knowledge changed because they gained
new information or had new technology. The second-
graders most often reasoned that scientists’ knowledge
would change as they learned more or invented new things.
After the decontextualized unit, four girls in the urban
setting retained naı̈ve views of science and five girls held
adequate views of science. The girls that held naı̈ve views
stated that science never changes. Naja stated, ‘‘It always
stays the same.’’ The girls who held adequate views could
offer more explanation. Lelia described that learning new
knowledge could help the scientists change their minds
when she says, ‘‘They could read something new in the
book and then figure that the way they put the dinosaur
together needs to change.’’ Here, Lelia offers a specific
example of how learning something new might inform
some ideas from previous knowledge.
After the contextualized plant unit, five girls from the
urban setting retained naı̈ve views of the tentative NOS and
did not think that science would change. Interestingly, Akia
stated, ‘‘because then they would be wrong.’’ Akia sees
changing one’s mind as being wrong and she does not
believe scientists can be wrong. Shamia held an adequate
view of the tentative NOS. She thought that scientists could
change their minds about the way they construct models of
dinosaurs but could not explain how. Janay transitioned
from a naı̈ve view to an informed view of the tentative
NOS by the end of the unit. Layla described the tentative
NOS when she said, ‘‘Scientists are always working on
new things so their ideas change.’’ When asked how their
ideas could change she said, ‘‘Well, they could learn
something new that they didn’t know before and so they
need to change what they thought.’’
Nine out of the ten students who were interviewed in the
suburban at risk third grade classroom believed that sci-
entists are not certain about their inferences at the end of
the school year. They understood that the bones and fossils
found are parts of dinosaurs and there are other parts that
have not been discovered such as skin, and the unseen parts
make inferences uncertain. When asked whether scientists
are positive about the shape of dinosaurs, one student
(Native American male) said, ‘‘[Scientists] are not positive.
They knew what [dinosaur’s] bones look like….but they
can’t ever find out what [dinosaur’s] skin is like.’’
Empirical
Most students in the Saturday Science Program showed
gains in their views of the empirical NOS. During the
Week 2 fossil activity 13 students concluded that scientists
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could not just make up any picture of a proposed organism
after looking at the fossils. However, at this point, most
students could not provide an explanation as to why this
was the case. The Week 3 Play-Doh fossil activity
prompted students to describe the evidence they were using
in their investigations. Twelve students provided adequate
examples of evidence including fossils, rocks, leaves, etc.
In the fifth week class session, students worked in six
groups to develop their own investigation and reflect on
how their work was like or not like the work of scientists.
Five of the six groups described how their work was sim-
ilar to scientists in terms of the empirical NOS in that they
experimented, investigated, used data, and tried to figure
out answers.
During the post-instruction interviews, most (1/1 kin-
dergarten; 5/9 1st-grade; 6/8 2nd-grade) students had
integrated the empirical NOS into their descriptions of
science and the work that scientists do. The kindergartener
described science as ‘‘learning and figuring stuff out about
the world.’’ The first graders with inadequate views largely
described how scientists make new things without appre-
ciating how these inventions could be grounded in data.
First graders with adequate views described how scientists
‘‘figure stuff out about the world’’ or ‘‘figure out things by
testing them.’’ While all second-graders described how
scientists ‘‘study’’ things, two of these students held inad-
equate views about the objects of these studies (e.g.
‘‘writing.’’) The six students who held adequate empirical
NOS views described how ‘‘scientists figure out things they
never knew before’’ and that they ‘‘learn things through
observations and experiments.’’
After the decontextualized unit, five students in the
urban setting retained naı̈ve views of empirical NOS, seven
revealed adequate views, and six revealed informed views..
Jenny’s naı̈ve view was demonstrated when she said that
the bird woman was acting like a scientist, ‘‘‘cause she
feeds the birds.’’ Layla’s adequate view of empirical NOS
when she stated, ‘‘She travelled all around the world and
watched [the birds].’’ Zakay’s informed view was demon-
strated with the following, ‘‘Yes [she is a scientist],
because you can look at beaks, you can draw a picture of
them, like if you walking around.’’ Finally, after the con-
textualized plant unit, two girls still held naı̈ve views, five
revealed adequate views, and nine revealed informed views
of empirical NOS. Andrea revealed her informed under-
standing when she stated that the woman was acting like a
scientist ‘‘because she was watching what the birds were
eating,’’ and Rodrianna stated, ‘‘She was observing.’’Con-
nie’s views changed from adequate in the pre-interviews to
informed after the contextualized unit. She stated in her
final interview, ‘‘She is a scientists cause she searched
everywhere for birds- she observed with her eyes.’’
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Most students in the at-risk suburban third grade class-
room had conceptions of empirical NOS that were
already adequate. For example, in her pre-interview, a
Euro-American female stated, ‘‘Scientists found dinosaur
bones-used bones to determine how they looked.’’ Students
generally knew that scientists base their claims on evidence.
By the end of the school year, all students in the third
grade classroom understood that empirical data is a crucial
part of the development of scientific knowledge. Students’
growth in understanding this aspect of NOS is demon-
strated in the complexity of their answers. When asked how
scientists know that dinosaur existed, they all said that
scientists had found fossils of bones and tracks. Moreover,
when asked how science is different from other school
subjects, nine out of ten students referred to the prominent
role of empirical data by mentioning that in science they
have to collect and record data.
Observation vs. Inference
Students in the Saturday Science Program made gains in
their understandings of the distinctions between observa-
tions and inferences throughout the course. During the
second week’s Mystery Tube activity, students were asked
to develop their own models of the tube such that it
behaved similarly to the one we demonstrated. Students
realized that they could infer models without necessarily
having to see inside the tube. In the third week, students
were asked to make observations of Oobleck and to infer
about whether it was a solid, liquid, or gas. All 15 partic-
ipating students made observations, but only 11 were able
to make inferences. The four students who did not make
inferences left this prompt blank, possibly because they did
not remember what an inference was. During the Week 3
Play-Doh fossil activity, 11 students incorrectly provided
inferences when they were asked to make observations of
the prints, and 12 students provided inferences when
prompted to infer what made the prints. Following the
Week 4 mealworm investigations, all students provided at
least one observation of their mealworm, but several stu-
dents also provided inferences for this prompt.
By the post-instruction interview, most (0/1 kindergar-
ten, 8/9 1st-grade, 8/8 2nd-grade) students had adopted a
more adequate view of the distinction between observa-
tions and inferences. Most students understood that scien-
tists made inferences about dinosaurs and weather on the
basis of observations. However, seven students were able
to distinguish between observations and inferences also
held an inadequate ‘‘seeing is believing’’ conception. For
example, one second-grader described how scientists
‘‘aren’t exactly sure because they didn’t really see them
[dinosaurs].’’
J Sci Educ Technol (2011) 20:537–549
After the decontextualized unit, three girls in the urban
setting retained naı̈ve views of the distinction between
observation and inference, two girls held adequate views,
and eight girls held informed views of observation and
inferences. Girls who held naı̈ve views could not make or
describe observations. However, Rodrianna and Janay held
adequate views of observation vs. inferences and stated that
they observe in science and were able to make observations
but could not describe how these observation informed
inferences. Three of the girls held informed views of
observations vs. inferences and stated that to observe,
‘‘You can taste, you can look, you learn, you can feel, you
can smell’’ and then described these observations as,
‘‘clues’’ to help you understand. After the contextualized
plant unit, three girls in the urban setting retained naı̈ve
views of the distinction between observation and inference,
eight girls held adequate views, and four held informed
views. Brianna, who retained a naı̈ve view, could not
describe what observations were or how scientists used
them. The girls who held adequate views described
observations as ‘‘looking at our plants’’ but did not describe
how scientists use observations to make inferences. Connie
held an informed view of observations vs. inference as
illustrated by her statement, ‘‘Cause she is a scientists
cause she searched everywhere for birds- she observed with
her eyes. She figured out what the birds were eating by her
observations.’’
At the beginning of the year, some of the students in the
traditional third grade classroom were not aware of the role
of inferences in scientific work. A Euro-American male
stated, ‘‘[Scientists] have bones and they put them together
to make a different creature.’’ Many students expressed
similar thoughts and were not aware of relationship
between observation and inference. However, at the end of
the school year all students from the third grade classroom
recognized the role of observation and inferences in sci-
entific work. They understood that scientists use fossils and
bones as evidence to show the existence of dinosaurs in the
past. When asked how scientists know there were dinosaurs
in the past, one student said, ‘‘[scientists] find those [fos-
sils, rocks, and bones] and then they study them and figure
out that there were huge animals used to live a long time
ago.’’ This student believed that scientists were not sure
about shape of dinosaur because scientists do not have
dinosaurs’ skin and he said, ‘‘[scientists] might have mixed
up the bones. The T-Rex might actually look like a long-
neck or something.’’
Student responses to the final interviews indicated
improvement in third grade students’ conceptions of
observation and inference. Most of the students could
identify difference between observation and inference and
used these words in their own conversations. All students
recognized that scientists make observations and use
547
evidence to form inferences. One student (African Amer-
ican female) said that science is different from other school
subjects because we make observations and inferences.
Moreover, all students knew that scientists found bones,
put them together and inferred the shape of dinosaur, and
realized that we would never know for certain what dino-
saurs were like because we had inferred from evidence.
Subjectivity and Social/Cultural Embeddedness
Although the subjective NOS was emphasized in several
contexts throughout the Saturday Science Program, this
NOS aspect was only formally assessed during the Week 4
Living/Non-living activity. After students developed their
own categories of living things and shared these categories
in front of the class, they were prompted to explain why
different groups had different categories. Eleven students
revealed an adequate view of the subjective NOS in their
responses. These adequate responses entailed how
‘‘everyone has different minds’’ and ‘‘because we don’t
have the same ideas.’’
The post VNOS-D interviews prompted students to
explain why scientists do not all agree about the cause of
the dinosaur extinction even though they are examining the
same evidence. Half (0/1 kindergarten, 6/9 1st-grade, 3/8
2nd-grade) of the students provided responses that indi-
cated an adequate view of the subjective NOS. The kin-
dergartener did not respond to the question, possibly
because he did not understand it. The first-graders with
inadequate views responded that the scientists did not agree
because they ‘‘didn’t know’’ or that ‘‘they need more facts,
then they would agree.’’ First-grade students who held
adequate views of the role of subjectivity in science
described how different scientists think differently about
the same bones. Five second-graders held inadequate views
of the subjective NOS, and students expressed that scientist
don’t agree ‘‘because there are different ways’’ or that they
‘‘were not there.’’ Second-graders with adequate views
connected their ideas to the tentative NOS by describing
how scientists ‘‘all have different ideas because they don’t
know who—they don’t even know if—if all of them are
dead yet.’’ None of the students articulated how scientists’
background knowledge and perspectives influence their
interpretations of data, but students with more adequate
views of the subjective NOS described how different sci-
entists have different ideas when confronted by the same
data.
After the decontextualized NOS unit, eight girls in the
urban setting retained naı̈ve views of the social and cultural
embeddedness of NOS, and one girl held a partially ade-
quate view. Nali shared her partially adequate view, ‘‘I
guess because some of the scientists are making different
observations.’’ This response was coded as a partially
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adequate view because she was aware that not all scientists
take note of the same observations, which implies that
there is something within the scientist that causes them to
make different observations. After the contextualized plant
unit, eight students retained naı̈ve views of the social and
cultural embeddedness NOS.
Students in the at-risk suburban third grade classroom
held inadequate views of the subjective NOS prior to
instruction. Five out of sixteen students either provided
irrelevant answers or no responses during the interview.
Three students thought that different evidence used by
different scientists lead them to disagreement about causes
of dinosaurs’ extinction. Only four students were able to
relate the disagreement to different ideas or opinions held
by scientists; however, they had difficulty making a con-
nection to the influence of scientists’ background knowl-
edge to their conclusions.
By the end of the school year, all of the students realized
that scientists could disagree about the interpretations of
evidence because they have different background knowl-
edge. Many students explained subjectivity as ‘background
knowledge of a person’ and in the classroom discussions
talked about differences regarding interpretations of
observations are because of their own different background
experiences and knowledge. When asked to elaborate on
their responses of what influences scientists to have dif-
ferent perspectives, five students demonstrated their
informed views of subjective NOS by stating that scientists
have different ways of thinking and different prior
knowledge. For example, one student (Caucasian female)
stated, ‘‘[Scientists] have different ideas about [why dino-
saurs became extinct] because they are different scientists
and they know different things.’’ When asked to describe
whether scientists know for sure what dinosaurs looked
like, another student said, ‘‘We do not really know what it
looks like. We just see bones and use what we already
know to help us figure it out.’’
Discussion
From our work it is clear to see that children as young as
five can begin developing appropriate conceptions about
NOS when they are actually taught these ideas through
science investigations that emphasize these ideas and
connect them to content taught at those grade levels. Even
students in a short term setting, such as the informal set-
ting, improved their NOS conceptions through instruction.
Certainly students in the class that emphasized NOS for a
full year had greater opportunity to develop their NOS
understandings, but all students in each context improved
their NOS conceptions.
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Some NOS aspects appear more easily accessible to
young students than others. For example, students appeared
to be better able to conceptualize scientific creativity,
tentativeness, observation and inference as well as empir-
ical NOS than the subjective and social cultural NOS. For
example, fifteen of the eighteen students in the informal
setting improved their conceptions of NOS (one of these
was the kindergarten student), only four students in the
urban setting retained naı̈ve views, while nine of ten stu-
dents in the at-risk class held adequate or informed NOS
conceptions of creativity following instruction. Similar
patterns are found across the NOS aspects of tentativeness,
observation and inference, empirical NOS, with the kin-
dergartner exhibiting the most difficulty in attaining ade-
quate understandings of all NOS aspects than students in
any context. However, for the subjective and social cultural
NOS aspects the growth in understanding was less—only
half of the students in the informal setting developed
adequate conceptions, while in the urban setting eight girls
retained naı̈ve NOS conceptions, and it was only in the at-
risk third grade setting where students were older (8 and
9 years) and received instruction for a full year that all
students developed adequate or informed conceptions of all
NOS aspects. What is not clear is whether the difference in
attainment of NOS conceptions by aspect is due to differ-
ences in teaching (e.g. because subjectivity and social
cultural NOS was not emphasized as early or as often in
each setting) or whether these conceptions are more diffi-
cult to attain for young children. More research is needed
in this area.
Along a similar vein, it is clear from our work that the
older students (8 and 9 years old) in the third grade class
developed more informed conceptions of all NOS aspects
through our instruction. However, we debate whether this
is actually a developmental issue, or a time issue. The
oldest group received the most NOS instruction, with NOS
being emphasized in their science curriculum for an entire
school year. We wonder whether students of other grade
levels and in other contexts would develop similar
informed NOS conceptions if they had similar length of
instruction. More research on NOS instruction at various
age/grade levels is needed to determine whether it is the
length of time of instruction vs. developmental readiness of
the student that most influences attainment of NOS
understandings.
We have also shown through our research that either a
combination of contextualized and decontextualized NOS
instruction or simply contextualized NOS instruction is
effective at improving young children’s NOS conceptions.
The informal and urban settings both used a combination of
decontextualized and contextualized NOS instruction,
while the at-risk third grade class only used contextualized
NOS instruction. In all cases students improved their NOS
J Sci Educ Technol (2011) 20:537–549
conceptions toward adequate and informed, with those in
the at-risk third grade class showing the greatest growth
(though they had longer term instruction). Common to all
settings was explicit reflective NOS instruction, leading us
to conclude that the main strategy for teaching young
children is to teach NOS explicitly and continuously,
emphasizing them aspects over time.
Because we have found through our work in the third
grade setting that it is not necessary to teach NOS in a
decontextualized manner for young children, we realize
that NOS does not need to be something ‘‘added on’’ to the
curriculum. Rather, it can be taught in a contextualized
fashion in a way that it connects to the science content
already being taught. In essence, it can be connected to
each science content area that is taught in the curriculum
showing that it is indeed, a way of thinking scientifically
that is connected throughout all science.
Recommendations
Based on our research we believe that NOS instruction
should begin when science instruction begins. Certainly
there does not seem to be a reason to ‘‘wait until they are
developmentally ready.’’ It appears that even young chil-
dren can improve their NOS conceptions through instruc-
tion. We believe that connecting NOS to science
instruction from the earliest grades will enable students to
continue developing their NOS conceptions over time and
years in school, enabling them to improve and refine their
NOS understandings to informed levels by the time they
graduate high school.
As was found works with older students we recommend
explicitly teaching NOS through contextualized methods,
or a mixture of contextualized and decontextualized strat-
egies. These explicit strategies seem to work best when
used over time and are emphasized in a variety of science
content areas. From our research, we recommend that
teachers begin with more accessible aspects, such as
observation and inference, and the empirical NOS, and to
continue emphasizing these aspects while introducing less
accessible aspects such as subjectivity or the social cultural
NOS. We also noted that students as young as 8 or 9 can
develop informed NOS conceptions of these less accessible
aspects when these concepts were emphasized over time
through instruction in their science lessons. We are certain
that young students are not developmentally constrained
from improving their NOS conceptions.
Regarding future research, we recommend studies that
explore in more depth what young students can learn at
549
each grade level or age, as well as the kinds of strategies
that most improve their understandings. We recommend
determining the kinds of learning progressions about NOS
that students can attain given appropriate instruction. We
recommend studies that explore different strategies for
NOS instruction, the amount of time required to improve
NOS understandings, and how these ideas may develop
over the course of students’ school careers should they
receive explicit NOS instruction throughout their
education.
Acknowledgments We would like to thank Cassie Quigley for her
support with work at the urban site and Khemmawadee Pongsanon for
her support with work at the suburban third grade site.
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