I've been exploring a bit what an early-primary "atoms up" learning progression variant might look like, if it emphasized atoms as nuclei. I've needed some nuc

I've been exploring a bit what an early-primary "atoms up" learning progression variant might look like, if it emphasized atoms as nuclei. I've needed some nucleosynthesis, and stars and stuff swirling 'round the galaxy in deep time, but not much stellar evolution. Not that you couldn't teach it, but it doesn't seem required here. Hazen's mineral evolution story was made into a NOVA. Some years back, before the NOVA, it had anecdotally been used down to high-school, but he didn't know of any attempts at middle or primary school. But it seems the usual science education dynamic is no one trying, or doing a miserable job of it, rather than hitting a rigid accessibility envelope. The cluefulness cost space can be surprisingly shaped. Teach a 5-year old that sunlight is white, and so is the Sun, and after that second bit, they're already less confused there than most first-tier astronomy and physical sciences graduate students. I suggest we've little idea yet how early much of science might be taught, because we've been half-assing it.