The Science Curriculum in Primary and Lower Secondary Grades

The Science Curriculum was reviewed and updated after the evaluation of the school reform in 2011 to provide more knowledge to and higher expectations from students through all grades. In the new science curriculum some of these topics were moved to lower grades and some to higher grades (e.g., in the physics curriculum).²⁴ The national science curriculum consists of separate curricular documents for each science subject: environmental science, science and techniques, natural science, biology, chemistry, physics, and geography. These documents contain:

General goals
Lists of topics to be taught for each grade
Lists of optional topics to be taught according to teachers’ discretion
Lists of basic standards of knowledge that are expected from the majority of students at the end of each three year period
Minimal standards of knowledge for each grade that are required for student advancement to the next grade
Didactical recommendations

Additionally, they describe expected approaches to problem solving, requirements for laboratory and field work, use of ICT, individualizations and differentiation, and development of science competencies, and list cross-curricular topics to be taught to link science with other subjects, as well as policies on assessments.

In Slovenia, geography is not regarded as a pure science subject, and in higher grades content is taught in the form of political geography of Europe and Asia (Grade 7), the world (Grade 8), and Slovenia (Grade 9). In Grade 6, both the geography and natural science subjects comprise the general geography content. In Grade 8, Earth, the solar system, and the universe are taught in physics.

The science topics taught to Slovene students in Grades 1 to 9 are summarized below:

Grades 1 to 3—Natural sciences are taught within the subject of environmental education, designed to show the great complexity, diversity, and interconnectedness of factors active in humans’ natural and social environments.²⁵ Learning about the environment combines processes, procedures, and topics used by students to learn about the world they live in. The subject comprises natural and technical topics (chemistry, physics, biology, informatics, technical science, and technology), as well as social sciences (history, geography, communication science, sociology, economy, and political sciences). According to the curriculum’s standards of knowledge, upon completion of the third grade, students should have learned about the following: themselves and the environment in which they live; their own social history; their connection to nature; the importance of health; how to define the features of materials and objects; and the physical principles of movement and force, Earth and the universe, space and time, weather, and sound.
Grades 4 to 5—Natural science is taught within the subject of natural sciences and techniques.²⁶ Students learn to describe, explain, predict, and understand the impact of natural phenomena, as well as technical and technological procedures of investigation. The main topics of this subject in Grade 4 are classification and properties of matter and changes in matter, forces and motion (e.g., moving and transport), and the movement of planet Earth (e.g., day and night, and the appearance of shadows), phenomena (e.g., streaming matter), general human body functioning, and the classification, growth, and development of living things. The main topics in Grade 5 are matter storage, substances in nature (e.g., water, soil, and air), devices and machinery (e.g., swings, devices using a pendulum and a lever), heat and temperature, wind, the impact of the sun on weather, nutrition and health care, living creatures interacting with their environments, and food chains. In both grades there also is the main topic of science and technical methods and skills (e.g., measurement and use of measuring devices, working with sources, and data display).
Grades 6 to 7—The subject of natural science merges biology, chemistry, and physics.²⁷ Lessons combine theory with methods of direct observation, as well as laboratory, experimental, and field work. Students use information from various sources to discover the core meaning of topics. They compare, accept, and critically consider data and information and they learn how to analyze, connect, and generalize their findings. According to the standards of knowledge, students who complete Grade 7 should know about the following: matter (structure in terms of particles, properties, and their use, differences between pure substances and mixtures, solutions, methods for separating mixtures into their components, physical and chemical properties of substances, and rocks and soil), energy (the sun as the primary energy source on Earth, the production of electric energy, flows and energy, light and colors, sound, and waves), and life science (cells, photosynthesis and cellular respiration, structure and functions of bacteria, fungi, the reproduction, growth, and development of plants and animals, and ecosystems), and the impact of humans on the environment.
Grade 8—Natural sciences are taught as separate subjects: biology, chemistry, and physics. Lessons in all subjects include observation and experimentation, conducted in classrooms or school laboratories. The main topics in each subject are as follows:
- Biology—The main topics are biology as a science, research and experiments, cells and heredity, and the structure of the human body and its functions.²⁸
- Chemistry—The main topics are the structure of matter, the atom and the periodic table, bonding, chemical reactions, and the elements in the periodic table.²⁹ The order of topics taught is an autonomous decision made by the teacher. Teachers also choose from a list of optional topics. The curriculum’s standards of knowledge for individual topics are symbols of elements, chemical formulas, notations for chemical changes, and systems of chemical reactions.
- Physics—The main topics are introduction to physics, light, the universe, uniform motion, forces, density, pressure, and buoyancy.³⁰ The order of topics taught is an autonomous decision made by the teacher. Teachers also choose from a list of optional topics. The curriculum’s standards of knowledge for individual topics are: explanations of physical laws and phenomena using appropriate quantities and formulas, the use of measuring devices in physics, the international measurement system, and reporting measurements by using diagrams, graphs, and tables.

According to the curriculum, Grade 4 students participating in TIMSS 2015 were taught the majority of biology and earth science topics that were included in the TIMSS science assessment framework. The discrepancy between the physics content included in the assessment framework and the Slovenian curriculum is somewhat larger. The distinction between heat and temperature is first introduced in Grade 5 (not Grade 4), when students begin to develop abstract thinking.³¹ Students in Grade 4 do not learn about food chains and predator-prey relationships. Grade 8 students do not learn about acids, bases, nonuniform motion, work and energy, heat and temperature, changes in matter, electricity, or magnetism; these topics are first introduced at a higher level in detail in Grade 9.