Cognitive Tasks – A Key Component of the Lesson Plan for Integrated Natural Science Courses

The content of the article reveals the methodology of applying cognitivetasks in chemistry, biology and physics at the lessons of IntegratedNatural Science courses. The authors give examples of cognitive tasksof the descriptive, explanatory, methodological and creative type; theconcept of the "lesson plan" is revealed. The article examines the issuesdealing with the implementation of Integrated Natural Science courses ininstitutions of general secondary education. Special emphasis is put onthe methodological issues of conducting lessons in the classrooms thatare not adapted to the demonstration of physical and chemicalexperiments, as well as biological specimens and dummies, mineralcollections, etc. Also, the authors cover the issue of training teacherscapable of full-time work with model curricula of integrated coursesdeveloped for different Natural Science subjects, especially for Grades 5-6. The described pedagogical experiment proved that cognitive tasks arekey components of the lesson plan for the integrated courses. Thesolution of these tasks contributes to the increase of students' knowledgein chemistry, physics, and biology. The results of the experiment giverise to discussions, statements of hypotheses and their confirmation orrefutation regarding the implementation of integrated courses based onthe concept of the New Ukrainian School.