As a major topic to be covered in Year 10, any lack of knowledge for students due to teacher’s lack of knowledge in the topics of ACSSU190 would have profound impacts on students progressing to science subjects in their senior years. Any lack of knowledge in parts of ACSSU190 will have ripple effects affecting the learnings of “Motion” and “Energy” during senior years. As Year 10 is just one year away from senior years, it is important that students should be afforded with sufficient opportunities to ascertain that the expectation as per the curriculum is met and the topics encompassing the elaborations of ACSSU190 are well taught. Being a topic with abundant opportunities to show demonstrations, and to implement constructivist teaching strategies, direct dependence on teacher can be reduced considerably while learning topics within ACSSU190. …show more content…
The teacher can include demonstration of a pendulum to show conservation of mechanical energy in the very first lesson of ACSSU190. The transfer of forms of energies (e.g. from kinetic to potential and vice versa) and estimation of quantities of energies can be learned by simulating the motion of a roller coaster. An outdoor activity of this simulation in real life could also enhance science inquiry skills (ACSIS166, ACSIS200) since students make meaning based on information from data loggers, while reducing dependence on teacher.
As a teacher, with the knowledge I can acquire from my preparations using the comprehensive set of documents at www.stem.org.uk and from the textbook chapter, coupled with high proportion of constructivist learning approaches, any gap in knowledge that would surface, in the worst case, can be