This chapter explores a number of researchers’ ideas about the ‘big ideas’ in primary science education. The most recent iteration (version 9.0) of the Australian Curriculum: Science, released in May 2022, is deconstructed to identify what is recommended, and how implementation in schools is enacted by states and territories. Key concepts linked to the three curriculum strands of Science Inquiry, Science Understandings and Science as a Human Endeavour are identified and mapped to conceptual learning progressions so developmental sequences can be clarified to enable planning. Many alternative science conceptions are held by students so you are invited to reflect on your own understandings of a range of key science concepts, to compare them with students’ alternative conceptions as found in the literature, and to consider where and how your own personal conceptions may have come about.
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