Social, environmental and scientific education

Social, environmental and scientific education encompasses History, Geography and Science and places great emphasis on the exploration of the local environment of the child and of the school.

 Science

The curriculum for Social, environmental and scientific education incorporates an exciting new Science programme for the primary school. SESE Science builds on the sound foundations of the social and environmental studies programmes which schools are currently teaching and sets our a science curriculum that is broad and flexible.

Content of the curriculum

The five strands of the curriculum are:

1. Living things: Human life, Plant/animal life

2. Energy and Forces: Light, sound, heat, magnetism and electricity, forces

3. Materials: Properties/characteristics, Materials and change

4. Environmental awareness, Science and the environment, Caring for the environment.

5. Working Scientifically

Practical investigation is central to learning in the Science curriculum and at each level children will be encouraged to investigate and explore their physical and natural surroundings =. This first-hand experience helps pupils to realise that they can provide their own answers to problems and that they can learn from their interaction with things around them. The fundamental skills of enquiry will include: observing, asking questions, suggesting, explanations, predicating outcomes, and planning investigations or experiments to test ideas.

 Designing and Making

This innovative aspect of the science curriculum will provide opportunities to explore the practical application of scientific ideas in everyday situations. The children will be challenged to explore, plan and make artifacts and models that provide solutions to practical problems. Designing and making simple magnetic games, wind/water mills, floating vessels, telescopes, useful containers, electrical circuits and so on will give pupils an awareness of the value of technology in the world in which they live.

 History

Through local history children become familiar with the local environment and they learn to appreciate the elements of the past, which have given them and their locality a sense of identity.

A very important new emphasis in this is curriculum is the focus on the skills of the historian.

Through investigating, using evidence, recognising sequences, exploring cause and effect, noticing change and synthesising the information they have gathered, the children will come to interpret the past for themselves.

The history curriculum provides great flexibility for the school so that a broad and coherent programme can be developed. The programme should:

- include studies from local, national and international contexts

- ensure that children explore the past from a range of perspectives

- reflect the contributions of different ethnic and cultural groups, social classes and religious traditions

- include episodes from a range of historical periods

- provide for balance between skills development and acquisition of knowledge

- promote the use of a wide range of historical evidence

- strive to achieve balance between a broad sweep of history and more intensive studies of limited periods

- foster the child's sense of local, national and European identity

Geography

The geography curriculum will enable children to learn about the natural and human elements of local and wider environments, while also helping them to develop a range of geographical skills and concepts.

The fostering of important attitudes is also a key purpose of the Geography programme.

The strands of the Geography curriculum are

- Human environments

- Natural environments

- Environmental awareness and care

The skills and concepts fostered in the Geography curriculum are:

- A sense of place and space

- Maps, globes and other graphical skills

- Geographical investigation skills

Children should experience a programme that:

- includes a broad range of local studies at all levels

- gradually extends children's awareness of environments in the county, in Ireland, Europe and the wider world

- ensures that children learn about the lives and environments of people in other countries

- provides for the systematic development of graphical skills; use of graphs, charts globes, atlases, photographs and electronic images

- fosters the child's sense of local national and European identity