Abstract The primary focus of this article is to illustrate how teachers can use contemporary
socio-scientific issues to teach students about nature of scientific knowledge as
well as address the science subject matter embedded in the issues. The article provides an
initial discussion about the various aspects of nature of scientific knowledge that are
addressed. It is important to remember that the aspects of nature of scientific knowledge
are not considered to be a comprehensive list, but rather a set of important ideas for
adolescent students to learn about scientific knowledge. These ideas have been advocated
as important for secondary students by numerous reform documents internationally. Then,
several examples are used to illustrate how genetically based socio-scientific issues can be
used by teachers to improve students’ understandings of the discussed aspects of nature of
scientific knowledge.
1 Introduction