Two science education articles that I read this morning are quite interesting in juxtaposition.
First, there's a plea for science teachers to stop faking their science knowledge!
Over the past few years, [Bill Robertson has] written a series of books aimed at encouraging K-12 teachers to enhance their understanding of science, on such basic concepts as sound, light, and energy. This particular session is on force and motion. His books, published by the NSTA under the title, Stop Faking It! Finally Understanding Science So You Can Teach It, ask instructors to divest themselves of a few myths. One is that science topics are invariably hard to understand. Not so, if teachers can grasp the underlying concepts behind them, Mr. Robertson says. A second is that educators can teach science without understanding it. Teachers need to have a mastery of the fundamental principles behind the science they cover, the writer says—not just an ability to recite facts...
Educators and others have decried the lack of subject-matter expertise among science teachers for years, though opinions vary on what contributes most to those shortcomings.
At the same time, though, some schools want their science teachers to expand their scientific curriculum with information that may not really be science:
The way they used to teach the origin of the species to high school students in this sleepy town of 1,800 people in southern Pennsylvania, said local school board member Angie Yingling disapprovingly, was that "we come from chimpanzees and apes."
Not anymore.
The school board has ordered that biology teachers at Dover Area High School make students "aware of gaps/problems" in the theory of evolution. Their ninth-grade curriculum now must include the theory of "intelligent design," which posits that life is so complex and elaborate that some greater wisdom has to be behind it.
The new curriculum, which prompted two school board members to resign, is expected to take effect in January...
The idea of intelligent design was initiated by a small group of scientists to explain what they believe to be gaps in Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, which they say is "not adequate to explain all natural phenomena"...
The intelligent-design theory makes no reference to the Bible, and its proponents do not say who or what the greater force is behind the design. But Yingling, 46, who graduated from Dover High School in 1976, and other supporters of the new curriculum in this religiously conservative slice of rural Pennsylvania say they know exactly who the intelligent designer is.
"There's only one creator, and it has to be God," said Rebecca Cashman, 16, a sophomore at Dover High. She frowned when asked to recollect what she learned about evolution at school last year.
"Evolution -- is that the Darwin theory?" Cashman shook her head. "I don't know just what he was thinking!"
Maybe Mr. Robertson could clarify that for her.
Posted by kswygert at December 1, 2004 10:08 AM