10 TEACHING SCIENCE IN THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

clusively on nature lore, often on the quaint or spectacular fea-
tures of plants and animals. Today all the major areas of science
are introduced; the earth, the universe, the conditions neces-
sary for life, living things and their activities, chemical and
physical changes, and man's attempt to control his environment.
 B. Recognize the importance of developing a scientific
attitude. Many teachers are learning to watch for and capitalize
upon the informal opportunities that arise in the course of every-
day classroom living to help children develop a scientific attitude
toward their problems. At the same time teachers find science
an excellent area in which to plan deliberately for the inclusion
of activities that will give opportunity and need for the develop-
ment of the scientific attitude.
 C. Recognize the importance of developing ability to solve
problems. The procedure for securing truth is of utmost im-
portance. Children can learn to define problems that have
meaning to them, to suggest and test explanations (hypotheses),
to draw tentative conclusions, and to check conclusions with
authentic material. Science instruction does not consist pri-
marily of giving to pupils and then eliciting from them a series
of pat answers. It is rather a way of solving significant
problems.
 D. Utilize current problems. Current problems of health,
 safety, social adjustment, and interpretation of environment
 are often the starting point for developing science understand-
 ings. Subject matter is challenged as to what it can contribute
 to the learner. To illustrate: the child is no longer required to
 memorize the technical names of certain plants merely for iden-
 tification, but rather the child sets up and solves the problem,
 "How do these plants affect our living?"
 E. Use identification and observation as means to inter-
 pretation, not as ends in themselves. The over emphasis on
 identification and labeling that characterized some science teach-
 ing of the past has given way to the use of identification as a
 means to interpreting the environment. Children feel a need
 to assist in the process of identification. It is not merely a
 memorization task set for them.
 F. Use the immediate environment for the development
 of understandings. Many principles in science sound abstract,
 remote, and complex when stated as generalizations but prove
 to be readily comprehensible to children when the principle is
 seen at work in some familiar part of their environment.
 G. Recognize the vital quality of content in science. Science
 has an appeal to nearly all children if it is approached from their
 level of understanding. Their thinking, if it has not been stifled,
 abounds in questions relating to science. The teacher does not