Chapter 10: How Are Chemical Concepts Represented in the Curriculum?
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Published:29 Apr 2019
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Special Collection: 2019 ebook collection
The Nature of the Chemical Concept: Re-constructing Chemical Knowledge in Teaching and Learning, The Royal Society of Chemistry, 2019, ch. 10, pp. 199-227.
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This chapter considers the process of developing a curriculum for students at a particular level, and some of the key choices to be made in selecting material, and then modelling it at an optimum level of simplification that makes it both accessible to learners, yet also a sound basis for subsequent progression in learning. Key educational ideas, such as the spiral curriculum, threshold concepts, and learning progressions are considered in relation to the highly interconnected nature of many chemical concepts. The role of the teacher as an interpreter of a curriculum document is explored. As an example, a particular curricular model drawn from a National Curriculum – the prescribed notion of chemical reactions to be taught to 14–16-year-olds in English schools – is explored to illustrate how decisions about how to define and simplify chemical concepts may present teachers with challenges in offering a coherent and consistent account of chemical ideas.