English
Respond to a range of texts - spoken, written, visual and electronic.
Science Faculty
The Science curriculum at Parafield Gardens High school should develop students' ability to do the following:
- Use the skills of scientific investigation, reflection and analysis to generate or refine knowledge, find solutions and pose more questions.
- Apply scientific knowledge and understanding of some of the key scientific theories, principles, concepts, models and ideas to explain and predict events in their everyday endeavor's and in the physical and biological world.
- Communicate scientific understanding to different audiences for a range of purposes.
- Use scientific language to communicate effectively and to further understanding.
- Apply and evaluate scientific knowledge and understanding across a range of contexts.
- Understand and appreciate the evolutionary nature of scientific knowledge, its relationship to other human endeavors and its contribution to society.
- Appreciate that science is an activity in which all people participate in their everyday lives and which contributes to their well being.
- Make decisions that include ethical consideration of the impact on people and the environment of the processes and likely products of science.
All science courses have a strong practical emphasis. Concepts are introduced and explored via research, laboratory observations, experimentation and audio-visual media.
Middle School Courses (8-10)
Science is offered as a full year compulsory subject at each year level. In the Middle School the science curriculum is organized in 4 conceptual strands:
- Matte
- Life Systems
- Energy Systems
- Earth and Space
The Key Ideas for each strand in the Middle School course are as follows:
Matter:Students communicate understandings about the properties and personal uses of materials. They research future availability of Earth materials for human use, and explore possible sustainable alternatives to current patterns of use.
Students pose questions to investigate ways in which physical and chemical processes can be altered in order to achieve desirable outcomes, such as food preservation.
Life Systems: Students develop a shared understanding of the characteristics and behaviour of living things and how they are interrelated and interdependent. They appreciate and report on the place of humans in the Earth's ecology, and develop their understanding of, explore future possibilities for, and act to contribute to, sustainable environments.
Students examine the ways organisms reproduce, grow and change over generations. They engage with, and appreciate different positions on, ethical issues such as those associated with ecological sustainability and gene technologies.
Energy Systems: Students collect data about, and critique, their own patterns of energy use in terms of its environmental impact.
Students use the concepts of force, energy and transfer of energy to investigate and explain phenomena and changing patterns of events in the natural world.
Earth and Space: Students investigate, through fieldwork and research, the central importance of the Earth's role in sustaining life and how changes impact on life; and understanding the interaction of he atmosphere, the oceans and the Earth's surface.
Students select and use observational instruments and digital and electronic technologies to develop understandings about structures and events in the universe. They appraise, and share opinions about, the ethics of space exploration.
These strands reflect the traditional organization of Science into the distinct areas of study of Biology, Chemistry, Physics and Earth Science.
Topics at each year level include:
YEAR 8: Laboratory Safety (Science is......), Cells and Microscopes, The Senses, Classification, Solids-Liquids and Gases, Elements-Compounds and Mixtures, Forces, Heat-Light and Sound Energy, Solar System.
YEAR 9: Lab Safety ( Small Scale Techniques), The Human Body and Transport Systems, Plants, Building Blocks of Matter, Physical and Chemical Changes, Acids and Bases, Electricity, Investigating Heat, Inside Earth.
YEAR10: Lab Safety ( Scientific Methods), Genetics, Fitness- Health and Diseases, Ecology, Atomic Structure, Periodic Table, Chemical Reactions, Light/Electromagnetism, Energy and Global Issues, The Fragile Crust, Mining and Minerals, Solar System.
Science Outcomes
Students aim to:
- Develop skills in using laboratory equipment such as Bunsen burners and balances and practice safe techniques.
- Use simple equipment to take quantitative measurements and use appropriate skills.
- Display results in tables, graphs and diagrams and draw reasoned conclusions from observations.
- Compares properties of materials before and after physical or chemical change by planning, conducting, evaluating and communicating an investigation.
- Use a simple particle model to explain the structure and properties of solid, liquid and gases.
- Relate simple procedures for preparing and separating mixtures.
- Investigates and explains the functioning of living systems from the microscopic to the macroscopic.
- Explain the biological basis of classification of organisms into major groups.
- Investigates ways of obtaining, transferring and using energy (including from sustainable energy sources and from fossil fuels) for particular uses.
- Identify the action of forces in everyday situations.
- Identifies and investigates changes, both natural and human-induced, on the Earth and suggests ideas which encourage the preservation of the natural environment for all living things.
- Compare the characteristics of members of our solar system and describe how the position of the planets. Moon, Sun and stars affect natural phenomena.
Students aim to:
- Continue developing skills in using laboratory equipment to take measurements and to represent results in tables and graphs.
- To form hypotheses, identify and control variables and draw conclusions.
- Recognises and describes conditions that influence reactions or change in materials.
- Relate properties of common substances to their suitability for particular use.
- Explores how living things have changed over geological time and debates the value of species diversity and the ethics of human intervention.
- Describe ways of producing chemical change and influencing its rate.
- Relate the structure and organization of different cells to their function.
- Explain how plants and animals obtain, transport and use nutrients.
- Identify relationships between living things which help them to survive in their habitat.
- Plans and evaluates investigations that focus on the transfer and transformation of energy.
- Investigates and analyses astronomical features and changes as seen from the Earth and debates the ways scientists examine and explain these.
Students aim to:
- To plan, construct and report upon experiments in a clear, appropriate and concise way.
- Uses the partical model to explain physical and chemical properties and change of matter.
- Classifies chemical reactions and identifies their importance in providing materials for present and future generations.
- Interprets and uses information about the structure and function of living systems and their relationship to survival of ecosystems.
- Applies theories and conceptual frameworks associated with evolution, biodiversity, genetics, and the cycling of energy and matter in biological and physiological systems.
- Analyses aspects of energy sustainability, including energy resources, energy production and distribution, and challenges for future ?worldwide' uses of energy.
- Explains energy input/output devices using concepts of work, force and power, and explores, through investigations, various systems for the transfer and transformation of energy.
- Researches and analyses contemporary theories about geological features, such as plate tectonics, and investigates their effects on sustaining life on Earth.
- Critically examines theories of astronomy and how they have contributed to our understandings about the universe, and articulates personal theoretical preferences.
