Program Goals

• To support students in becoming active, independent learners with a sense of wonder and curiosity.
• To develop science process skills such as observing, predicting, communicating, classifying and inferring.
• To develop the skills and confidence to design and implement experiments utilizing the scientific method.
• To develop an appreciation and practical use for recorded information such as data, observations, and predictions.

Program Curriculum
The science curriculum is an adaptation of the national Japanese science curriculum.  Students are led through an in-depth exploration of a number of selected topics, guiding them toward an appreciation of the processes and discipline of science while helping them to develop a detailed understanding of the specific topics studied.  The majority of student time is devoted to work within a hands-on, exploratory learning environment.  Students learn both through guided exploration and careful teaching of the scientific method.  In guided exploration, students are encouraged to express their curiosities while practicing making detailed observations. During teaching of the scientific method, students are expected to formulate questions, make predictions, and determine various means for answering their questions.  Students are continually assessed on specific objectives.  Assessments are oral, written, and manipulative at all grades.  

Grade 5
Students design experiments, paying special attention to dependent and independent variables. Focus continues to be on laboratory experimentation. Students keep written records of their experiments, learning to communicate data through various types of graphs and tables. Topics of study include germination of seeds, weather, animal reproduction through breeding fish, levers, phases of the moon, the sun, plate tectonics, and human reproduction. All units include experiments that students help to design. Students also design, conduct, and display their own experimental research for the Middle School Science Fair.

Grade 6
Students study soil and rock formation, plant structures including the xylem and phloem, nutrition and the human body, constellations and star charts, the nature of solutions, combustion, and the interaction of humans and nature. All units include experiments that students help to design. After each experiment all students write up a formal lab report explaining their experiment and results. Students also design, conduct, and display their own experimental research for the Middle School Science Fair.

Grade 7
Students keep formal lab notebooks, write extensive lab reports, and learn more about how scientists report their findings. They also design, conduct, and display their own experimental research for the Middle School Science Fair held each spring. Students in seventh grade further explore the internal structure of plants, the composition of soil and rock formations, the physiological systems of humans and animals, electricity and magnetism, plant classifications, and phase changes and heat.

Grade 8
Students progress toward a more abstract understanding of basic biology, chemistry and physics. The year begins with a chemistry chapter on solutions and properties of gases in preparation for subsequent chapters covering chemical structures, atoms, ions and molecules. Students investigate basic physics including light and sound travel, force and pressure, electricity, and movement and energy. They keep a formal lab notebook containing extensively written lab reports. Also, they design, conduct, and write a formal scientific paper on their experimental research for the Middle School Science Fair held in the spring. For the science fair students also learn how to use the University of Wisconsin-Madison library system for their literature searches.