| Summary: | This study aims to deepen the understanding of which opinions and perceptions the teachers in the study have about the national goals, as well as local, when they plan their lessons in science studies for the younger ages. We wish to illustrate which goals these teachers find most important, their opinions on how they use these and how the different goals affect their design of teaching. The study also aims to examine which syllabuses, national or local, the teachers believe have an effect on their planning. Data were collected by interviews with four teachers, combined with questionnaires sent to 25 teachers teaching in science studies in forms 1-6. To analyse the data, key terms from Vygotsky and a sociocultural theory was used, such as situated learning, artifacts, the zone of proximal development, thinking in group and mediation. The data was also interpreted and examined by recent studies regarding this subject. The results show that the teachers find their own knowledge, the national syllabus and their colleagues as most important for their planning. Approximately half of the group of teachers, who answered the questionnaire, expressed that their school has a local syllabus, but only a few of these state that they find this document important for their planning. The interviews, however, showed that these documents were regarded as very important by the teachers using them. The teachers also claimed that too little time was set aside for working with the local and the national syllabus. The study also showed that goals to strive for were considered most important and influential on the teacher’s design of lessons in science. The teachers however expressed that they find these goals hard to understand and pursue. The results also show that when working on goals to strive for, discussions in groups, experiments and observations were the most used methods.
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