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Find out how West View Primary uses hands-on inquiry to teach Science, helping pupils explore, question, and reason beyond textbook facts.

Last updated 14 August 2026

Teaching Science as inquiry must go beyond merely presenting the facts and the outcomes of scientific investigations. Through inquiry learning, we hope that every pupil from West View will:

be curious about their environment
question their observations around them
investigate and explore the scientific concept further
reflect on their findings with reasoning

Investigate and Explore (I & E) Activities
Through I & E activities during science lessons, teachers actively engage the pupils by leading them to acquire:

fundamental science concepts, principles and theories
application of skills and processes of scientific inquiry
develop attitudes and values that are essential for scientific inquiry.

I & E activities seek to enhance the learning experiences for pupils. Rather than memorising facts, pupils are given opportunities to explore the concepts collaboratively. This will bring about curiosity among the pupils. Eventually, we hope our pupils will develop a passion for Science through this investigative and explorative approach.

Investigate and Explore (I & E) Activities 1

Explicit teaching of scientific process skills
Scientific process skills are critical for pupils to investigate and explore scientific concepts further. As such, opportunities are provided for pupils to use scientific concepts and integrate skills and processes to inquire about the things around them. Explicit teaching of process skills are conducted termly with progression of skills as pupils advance through the different levels. Hence, these level-appropriate skills packages are designed to customise to the needs of the pupils based on their readiness.

Questioning
As facilitators in the classroom, teachers adopt various questioning techniques to invoke the spirit of curiosity among the pupils. Opportunities are also provided during Science lessons for pupils to ask questions. Through this two-way communication and questioning between teachers and pupils, it allows teachers to gather information on the pupils’ ‘frame of mind’ and the quality of their understanding.

Four classroom scenes showing teachers instructing young students, who use laptops, raise hands, and work on activities.

Answering strategies
To support pupils in the application of knowledge and skills in the context of the questions/situations, the following answering strategies were developed. These provide a thinking structure for the pupils in organising their thoughts as they demonstrate application of knowledge and skills in the context given in the questions.

The answering strategies are progressive in nature and are in tandem with the explicit teaching of process skills to ensure alignment to pupils’ readiness level.

Multiple-choice questions (MCQ): KEY

Open-ended (OE) questions: KISS

MCQ rubric table with three KEY criteria rated on a 1 to 3 scale covering key information, elimination, and checking.

Study guide slide showing two steps: highlight key information and eliminate wrong options, with tables and concept links.

Poster titled Have YOU Checked showing Step 3 with three levels for checking your work, each with a checkmark.

A rubric table titled Open-ended OE questions Rubrics for KISS with three scoring levels across three criteria.