Most states did not have a separate elementary science curriculum guide until the 1940's, this was do to the resistance of the Committee of Fifteen to young children studying the scientific method(Longstreet 1993). At the same time the Committee of Ten was making an increase prominence for the study of science at the secondary level. The Committee of Ten was developed in 1892 and headed by Charles Eliot, the president of Harvard University. The committee was made up of seven college professors and three secondary principles. They proposed at a conference in 1892 that science make up twenty five percent of the high school curriculum(DeBoer 1991). At the turn of the century Alexander Smith, who was a supporter of laboratory-based instruction, identified five potential contributions of science teaching to education which were: 1) training in the powers of observation in the natural world, 2) training in a powerful method of generating new knowledge that is based on observation and experiment, 3) exercise of imagination and creative impulses, 4) training to view problems objectively, 5) the generation of useful information(DeBeor 1991).  Smith also stated the laboratory could be used in two different ways first for the verification of principles and second as a place of discovery.
 
In 1920 science was still having to justify itself in the curriculum. It did so based on the following six principles: 1) science is a valuable realization of good health, 2) all sciences can be oriented toward worthy home membership, 3) science course are valuable preparation for specific vocations and for vocational life in general, 4) science will give citizens a greater appreciation of work, 5) science will contribute to the enhancement of leisure, 6) science will contribute to the development of ethical character. By 1940 the state of student interest was declining because the courses held little interest for the students. The solution to this problem was to make connections between the quantitative relations involved in physics principles and the experiences of the students. After WWII 600,000 G.I.’s came back from the war and enrolled in a science major but there was only 50,000 faculty members to teach them. Most of the scientist left academia for government or industrial work. Those who were left in the classroom were left in poor facilities, overcrowded classrooms, and had very little time for basic research(DeBoer 1991). In 1947 the American association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) was asked for help in developing a science curriculum because the need for a K-12 general science education was recognized.  The government finally started to back the effort of curriculum reform after the Soviets launched Sputnik in 1957. The new curriculum projects were supported by the National Science Foundation during the 1960's, the course earth science came out of the Earth Science Curriculum Project, which was finally published in 1967.  A survey showed that in the 1976-1977 school year only 43 percent of the nations school districts were using the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study(BSCS). This curriculum was developed for the slow learner. According to AAAS article on the evaluation of current biology books, the books are not conveying the big ideas that they are supposed to. This leads me to believe that the books that are being written are not allowing the teacher the freedom to teach his/her class. A teacher should be allowed to let the child discover new ideas not be told what to learn or believe. A student remembers or learns more by doing and learning on their own then they do by constantly being told what to do. “Although the scores do not show it there have been major national and statewide efforts to improve science literacy in schools(Frelindich 1998).” Since the 1980's evidence has been mounting for hands-on, inquiry based materials. A curriculum called Science Place, a hands-on, inquiry based curriculum was developed but educators say it is doomed because teachers are not trained on how to use the new curriculum. James Rutherford, author of Science for all Americans,  “the longer thing, which we think will take twenty-five to fifty years to accomplish, is to really put in place the next system, the next curriculum that will turn out, across the board, students who are really comfortable with math, science and technology, and know how to use and control it and who can participate in a more interesting and safer world(Ahlgren 1990).

The current teaching styles of science are concept learning and inquiry teaching(DeBoer 1991). Concept learning is learning concepts that are presented in a more conceptually meaningful way, Jerome Bruner and Joseph Schwab were the major contributors to this approach. Many people viewed this idea of learning as “the progressive liking of ideas outward to a increasingly more inclusive concepts, while others viewed it as the mastery of discrete bits of knowledge and the hierarchical development of that knowledge into more general concepts(DeBoer 1991). The way the students learn in this situation is just by the teachers presenting the concepts and the students applying them to knowledge that they have already acquired.
The other style that is being used by teachers today is called inquiry teaching. In this situation the teacher provides the “students with facility in the scientific way of thinking, providing an accurate picture of the way scientific knowledge is generated and has been generated in the past, and developing the students basic scientific attitudes(DeBoer 1991).”
 
In an article wrote by James Rutherford in 1964 he said science teachers are against rote memorization of the mere facts of science but by contrast are for “ the teaching of the scientific method, critical thinking, the scientific attitude, the problem solving approach, the discovery method, and of special interest here the inquiry method(DeBoer 1991).”  The support of this idea is more stimulated than what is in practice. Concerns of using this style are discipline, teachers are worried they are not preparing their students for the next level of education, and teachers are staying with their allegiance to teaching fact following the role model of the college professor. Another reason that the inquiry method has not been big in the classroom is largely because of the confusion to whether inquiry was a method of instruction or a description of the nature of science.

The current science curriculum is being developed by a combination of national science associations. The AAAS  has been the major developer with the help of the National Science Foundation(NSF) and the National Science Teachers Association(NSTA). The science community has called for a major reform of the science curriculum. The answer to this call was Project 2061, which can be found online at http://project2061.org. (project 2061). This project was created to formulate a new curriculum that would increase the learners ability to not only learn about science but understand it by integrating across all school disciplines. The project has come up with what a student should know by the end of 2nd grade, 5th grade, 8th grade, and the 12th grade. The project outlines the benchmarks in the following ways:  “The Nature of Science , Human Society, The Nature of Mathematics, The Designed World , The Nature of Technology, The Mathematical World , The Physical Setting, Historical Perspectives,  The Living Environment, Common Themes , The Human Organism,  Habits of Mind.” Then each one of the benchmarks are broken down into different subsections, for example the first chapter on The Nature of Science breaks up into the scientific world view, scientific inquiry, and scientific enterprise. Here are two examples of the benchmarks under the nature of science and the other under the nature of technology:
 
An example of Scientific Inquiry benchmarks:

By the end of the 2nd grade, students should know that:
 
_ People can often learn about things around them by just observing those things carefully, but sometimes they can learn more by doing something to the things and noting what happens.
_ Tools such as thermometers, magnifiers, rulers, or balances often give more information about things than can be obtained by just observing things without their help.
_ Describing things as accurately as possible is important in science because it enables people to compare their observations with those of others.
_ When people give different descriptions of the same thing, it is usually a good idea to make some fresh observations instead of just arguing about who is right.

By the end of the 5th grade, students should know that:

_ Scientific investigations may take many different forms, including observing what things are like or what is happening somewhere, collecting specimens for analysis, and doing experiments. Investigations can focus on physical, biological, and social questions.
_ Results of scientific investigations are seldom exactly the same, but if the differences are large, it is important to try to figure out why. One reason for following directions carefully and for keeping records of one's work is to provide information on what might have caused the differences.
_ Scientists' explanations about what happens in the world come partly from what they observe, partly from what they think. Sometimes scientists have different explanations for the same set of observations. That usually leads to their making more observations to resolve the differences.
_ Scientists do not pay much attention to claims about how something they know about works unless the claims are backed up with evidence that can be confirmed and with a logical argument.
 
By the end of the 8th grade, students should know that:

_ Scientists differ greatly in what phenomena they study and how they go about their work. Although there is no fixed set of steps that all scientists follow, scientific investigations usually involve the collection of relevant evidence, the use of logical reasoning, and the application of imagination in devising hypotheses and explanations to make sense of the collected evidence.
_ If more than one variable changes at the same time in an experiment, the outcome of the experiment may not be clearly attributable to any one of the variables. It may not always be possible to prevent outside variables from influencing the outcome of an investigation (or even to identify all of the variables), but collaboration among investigators can often lead to research designs that are able to deal with such situations.
_ What people expect to observe often affects what they actually do observe. Strong beliefs about what should happen in particular circumstances can prevent them from detecting other results. Scientists know about this danger to objectivity and take steps to try and avoid it when designing investigations and examining data. One safeguard is to have different investigators conduct independent studies of the same questions.
_ New ideas in science sometimes spring from unexpected findings, and they usually lead to new investigations.

By the end of the 12th grade, students should know that:

_ Investigations are conducted for different reasons, including to explore new phenomena, to check on previous results, to test how well a theory predicts, and to compare different theories.
_ Hypotheses are widely used in science for choosing what data to pay attention to and what additional data to seek, and for guiding the interpretation of the data (both new and previously available).
_ Sometimes, scientists can control conditions in order to obtain evidence. When that is not possible for practical or ethical reasons, they try to observe as wide a range of natural occurrences as possible to be able to discern patterns.
_ There are different traditions in science about what is investigated and how, but they all have in common certain basic beliefs about the value of evidence, logic, and good arguments. And there is agreement that progress in all fields of science depends on intelligence, hard work, imagination, and even chance.
_ Scientists in any one research group tend to see things alike, so even groups of scientists may have trouble being entirely objective about their methods and findings. For that reason, scientific teams are expected to seek out the possible sources of bias in the design of their investigations and in their data analysis. Checking each other's results and explanations helps, but that is no guarantee against bias.
_ In the short run, new ideas that do not mesh well with mainstream ideas in science often encounter vigorous criticism. In the long run, theories are judged by how they fit with other theories, the range of observations they explain, how well they explain observations, and how effective they are in predicting new findings.
_ New ideas in science are limited by the context in which they are conceived; are often rejected by the scientific establishment; sometimes spring from unexpected findings; and usually grow slowly, through contributions from many investigators.
 

An example of Issues in Technology benchmarks:

By the end of the 2nd grade, students should know that
_ People, alone or in groups, are always inventing new ways to solve problems and get work done. The tools and ways of doing things that people have invented affect all aspects of life.
_ When a group of people wants to build something or try something new, they should try to figure out ahead of time how it might affect other people.

By the end of the 5th grade, students should know that
_ Technology has been part of life on the earth since the advent of the human species. Like language, ritual, commerce, and the arts, technology is an intrinsic part of human culture, and it both shapes society and is shaped by it. The technology available to people greatly influences what their lives are like.
_ Any invention is likely to lead to other inventions. Once an invention exists, people are likely to think up ways of using it that were never imagined at first.
_ Transportation, communications, nutrition, sanitation, health care, entertainment, and other technologies give large numbers of people today the goods and services that once were luxuries enjoyed only by the wealthy. These benefits are not equally available to everyone.
_ Scientific laws, engineering principles, properties of materials, and construction techniques must be taken into account in designing engineering solutions to problems. Other factors, such as cost, safety, appearance, environmental impact, and what will happen if the solution fails also must be considered.
_ Technologies often have drawbacks as well as benefits. A technology that helps some people or organisms may hurt others——either deliberately (as weapons can) or inadvertently (as pesticides can). When harm occurs or seems likely, choices have to be made or new solutions found.
_ Because of their ability to invent tools and processes, people have an enormous effect on the lives of other living things
 
By the end of the 8th grade, students should know that
_ The human ability to shape the future comes from a capacity for generating knowledge and developing new technologies——and for communicating ideas to others.
_ Technology cannot always provide successful solutions for problems or fulfill every human need.
_ Throughout history, people have carried out impressive technological feats, some of which would be hard to duplicate today even with modern tools. The purposes served by these achievements have sometimes been practical, sometimes ceremonial.
_ Technology has strongly influenced the course of history and continues to do so. It is largely responsible for the great revolutions in agriculture, manufacturing, sanitation and medicine, warfare, transportation, information processing, and communications that have radically changed how people live.
_ New technologies increase some risks and decrease others. Some of the same technologies that have improved the length and quality of life for many people have also brought new risks.
_ Rarely are technology issues simple and one-sided. Relevant facts alone, even when known and available, usually do not settle matters entirely in favor of one side or another. That is because the contending groups may have different values and priorities. They may stand to gain or lose in different degrees, or may make very different predictions about what the future consequences of the proposed action will be.
_ Societies influence what aspects of technology are developed and how these are used. People control technology (as well as science) and are responsible for its effects.
 
By the end of the 12th grade, students should know that
_ Social and economic forces strongly influence which technologies will be developed and used. Which will prevail is affected by many factors, such as personal values, consumer acceptance, patent laws, the availability of risk capital, the federal budget, local and national regulations, media attention, economic competition, and tax incentives.
_ Technological knowledge is not always as freely shared as scientific knowledge unrelated to technology. Some scientists and engineers are comfortable working in situations in which some secrecy is required, but others prefer not to do so. It is generally regarded as a matter of individual choice and ethics, not one of professional ethics.
_ In deciding on proposals to introduce new technologies or to curtail existing ones, some key questions arise concerning alternatives, risks, costs, and benefits. What alternative ways are there to achieve the same ends, and how do the alternatives compare to the plan being put forward? Who benefits and who suffers? What are the financial and social costs, do they change over time, and who bears them? What are the risks associated with using (or not using) the new technology, how serious are they, and who is in jeopardy? What human, material, and energy resources will be needed to build, install, operate, maintain, and replace the new technology, and where will they come from? How will the new technology and its waste products be disposed of and at what costs?
_ The human species has a major impact on other species in many ways: reducing the amount of the earth's surface available to those other species, interfering with their food sources, changing the temperature and chemical composition of their habitats, introducing foreign species into their ecosystems, and altering organisms directly through selective breeding and genetic engineering.
_ Human inventiveness has brought new risks as well as improvements to human existence.(AAAS 1993).