Report urges overhaul of science education

[alp227]

Source: San Jose Mercury News

A new national report urges an overhaul of science education, teaching students to focus on core concepts in four disciplinary areas, including engineering and technology, rather than memorizing facts in many topics.

The report by the esteemed National Research Council, led by Menlo Park physicist Helen Quinn of the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, will serve as a foundation for what is taught to students in elementary school through high school, replacing decade-old standards.

"Currently, science education in the U.S. lacks a common vision of what students should know and be able to do by the end of high school, curricula too often emphasize breadth over depth, and students are rarely given the opportunity to experience how science is actually done," said Quinn, in a statement.

The framework differs from previous standards by adding engineering and technology to early education. Students must master the concepts underlying engineering, it says, such as "cause and effect" and "stability and change."

Read more: http://www.mercurynews.com/rss/ci_18517869

[physioex]

1. First thing.....

Get the Church out of science class. Things will get better real fast......

[Smilo]

2. Yup

:D

[awoke_in_2003]

8. +1000. nt

[patrice]

3. We should help young people understand what makes science science, because

that has to do with HOW knowledge (as opposed to opinion) is built. They would benefit from understanding what "the philosophy of science" is so they can see how all science is united by its logic and specific traits of its processes, how rational empiricism IN - forms the tools, methods, processes and environments of science. Apparently too much is being done for the low-level details and not enough for the high-level conceptual unity of what we refer to as knowledge.

[Orrex]

5. Wonderful suggestion!

Such a plan would nicely incorporate instruction in basic critical thinking, which is also conspicuously absent from most current curricula.

[patrice]

7. Many young people suffer from fragmentation & they have no tools for dealing with it

except religion.

[patrice]

9. A side effect of that will be that they can become independently critical consumers of info. nt

[rpannier]

4. Silliness

Everyone knows we only need to focus on the four elements and the humors in the body
Plus, if it's not in the Bible it's probably the product of those Kabbalah Numbers.

[Proletariatprincess]

6. This seems like a no brainer.......but...

there will be strong opposition to any change in education in this country. It is a failed system and the powers to be like it that way. McWorkers are all they need and they shouldn't be taught to use logic or critical thinking. Peasants need to learn their place and not second guess their Betters. Their own progeny will attend private schools to learn how to exploit the earth and distribute it's goods without regard for the rest of us.

[exboyfil]

10. I can give you a a couple of great examples

My older daughter's Biology class evaluated water witching and were responsible for a report on the subject. I pulled several technical papers in which blind tests were done and the statistics were evaluated. My daughter, to her credit, read through some of these papers and absorbed them. She included them as material in her report. The teacher never even made note of the effort, but only docked her for not using the exact words she was looking for. I was floored. These are Masters level papers that a 9th grader was reading, summarizing, and applying to the experiment which the class performed.

My younger daughter, who is a tremendous writer, did a report for her Life Science class. She did not have bold headings on the various subjects, but she did explain the information in a highly literate fashion. She lost four points for not having the headings even though her writing is far beyond her grade level and what was produced by the other students in the class.

Actually the Biology teacher is pretty good, and the Life Science teacher is excellent. I think the Science education in our school system is pretty good, but a lot can depend on the teacher and your class. My older daughter's 8th grade Science was a disaster with a teacher on her way out and an uncontrollable class. My 7th grader took 8th grade Science last year, and she was in the best class and had a wonderful experience. Her class still was not as rigorous as her 7th grade Science class which she took by correspondence from North Dakota Center for Distance Education. There again we had issues with the teacher not recognizing poor distractors in multiple choice tests. You have to read some of the questions like a lawyer to come up with the right answer.

Actually our High School offers four college level engineering classes so you have a great opportunity to get focussed. On the other hand I can't see adding a 6th highly intensive academic class (or in my daughter's case it would have been a 7th). The colleges now days expect five years of Math, five years of Science, four years of English, four years of Social Studies, and four years of a Foreigh Language to compete for scholarships in technical fields (or even to be prepared to the level of the top half of the incoming Freshman class). You add a Physical Education/Health requirement to the mix as well as a desire to do Music and another Fine Art/Communications/Journalism type class - you don't have anytime to breathe let alone take the engineering class. I had my daughter pull back her schedule and replace a Principles of Engineering class with an Orchestra class. She already had the five core plus Broadcast Journalism (which is her passion). She still has eight periods of classes (Chemistry, Algebra II/Trig, Honors English, U.S. History/Government, Spanish II, Orchestra, Broadcast Journalism, and Early Bird Physical Education/Health).

As far as breadth I would restructure the Science curriculum, but to go into Engineering you are going to need all the traditional Science required in a standard curriculum except perhaps Biology, and several of the majors like Biomedical Engineering will require that as well. Our sequence is Physical Science (9th), Biology (10th), Chemistry (11th), and Physics (12th). My daughters advanced the schedule by one year by doubling up or doing correspondence over the summer. The problem you have is that you need to have a certain amount of math to do Chemistry and Physics, and you need a certain amount of Chemistry to do Biology correctly. I have often thought that the 9th grade Physical Science was a waste, but many students are just learning Algebra at this time so I am not sure what to put in its place. You already do Life Science in 7th grade, but you do not add much quantitative rigor to the 10th grade Biology from your 7th grade experience. I have heard proposed that the sequence should be Physics, Chemistry, and Biology, but to do Physics right requires at least Algebra II (and Calculus if you are doing Calculus based Physics).

I already think that Biology takes a Chinese menu approach to the subject. While I like my younger daughter's correspondence Biology course, it does not include fish - no time to get it in. I can't really say what should be thrown out. Several other animal phylum were also eliminated.

[Posteritatis]

13. How can the teachers be good if they won't acknowledge their students' abilities? (nt)

[exboyfil]

14. I am not an absolutist

I cited examples in which one fairly good and one excellent teacher fell short. The fairly good Biology teacher seemed to cover the material adequately, but I am Homeschooling my younger daughter in that subject through NDCDE more for timing than because I did not think her class was worth it. The Biology teacher also projected a desire to be teaching the subject. The Life Science teacher is one of the best teachers at the middle school. With the exception which I cited above, he was been very forward looking, and he was able to cover a vast amount of material in a year (one semester of Life Science and two semesters of Earth Science). He was able to do a good job with evolution. He had a veritable menagerie in his room, and my daughter strived to get the best score on the tests so she could feed the snake his mouse. My older daughter's teacher was not even able to get to evolution because of the disruptions in her class.

I could mention an English teacher for my older daughter had for two years who drove me to decide to pull my younger daughter out of English and Homeschool her in that subject. He absolutely had no passion for the subject (sports was his thing), and, if I had my way, I would fire him (and in a sense I did when I refused to let my younger daughter be educated by him). A World History teacher who also failed to control his class thus destroying the learning experience for my older daughter (another class which I Homeschooled my younger daughter). A Economics teacher who really did treat my older daughter like an elementary school child in 8th grade (he gave us a certificate of citizenship at conference to give to her - it took all of my control not to laugh). I am also Homeschooling my younger daughter in that subject as well.

I will tell you in many cases it does not matter how the teacher presents the information it seems some classes of students are just bad. Almost half of the classes in which my older daughter attended where out of control, but she did have some good teachers who did well in spite of these limitations. Her Physical Science teacher who, while not being that great in Physics, did inspire my daughter in that subject. Her 9th grade English teacher who brought out a passion in English which was there but never mined by her 7th and 8th grade English teacher (see above). Her 9th grade Speech teacher who had an even worse class than the English teacher, but somehow was able to give my daughter opportunities to do a variety of speeches (actually this was probably not a bad experience because if she can give a speech in that environment, then later speeches are going to be easier). Her 8th and 9th grade U.S. History teacher who is old school, but with a love for the subject that comes out in his presentation. Her 7th grade Math teacher who is also old school, but got her ready to skip Pre Algebra and go into Algebra in 8th grade.

I thank goodness that my older daughter is now in 10th grade with three Honors classes in her schedule. Hopefully the garbage from middle school has ended.

I view my relationship with teachers as a partnership. My daughters' education is first and foremost my responsibility. I appreciate our state Homeschooling laws which allow me to Chinese menu their education. My younger daughter has benefitted from the experience. I hope my signaling by removing her from selected classes is sending the appropriate message to the administration.

[johnd83]

11. Too much calculus

I would agree with this, but to truly understand engineering you need to really understand calculus. Without a deep understanding of calculus all you can do is memorize the results and and cannot derive the science from first principles. For this reason high school will always basically just be memorization for science unless we really improve math education.

[JDPriestly]

12. Based on what my scientifically minded daughter say, you are right,

johnd83.

Math is the key.

I did not have a lot of toys for my children (couldn't afford them), so I played a lot of counting games. I think that is why they developed their aptitude for math.

They were also good in lanugages, etc. But I think you have to start children with counting for fun very, very early on -- before they are a year old actually.

[exboyfil]

15. In general I don't see most 9th graders absorbing Calculus

Neither one of my daughters could do it, and they are very good students. My older daughter, after her 10th grade, will have completed all the math which I completed in High School (Advanved Algebra/Trig). It took alot a work by her to get to that point. I was able to complete Mechanical Engineering at Purdue in 3 1/2 years with this Math basis, but Calculus I my first semester was a scare for awhile until it clicked.

The movement to have universal Algebra I in 8th grade is kind of petering out. It is still not typical for my school system, and I had a lot of resistance to getting my older daughter in it (she has already gotten As in both Honors Algebra and Honors Geometry in 8th and 9th grade respectively). You would not believe the number of times I had to fight for both my daughters to make this happen.

Depending on how my older daughter does in Algebra II/Trig I may decide to remove her from the school system for 11th grade math and stick her in College Calculus I. This would open up Calculus based Physics her Senior year in High School. I reviewed her text and syllabus for the Algebra II/Trig class, and I can honestly say she will be where I was after my Senior year in High School.

I still think the more empirical approach seen in Biology and Chemistry is useful. That is how we evolved in these subjects before the coming of the grand master Newton. As an engineer I do view non-Calculus based Physics as a bastardization of the subject, but some of these formulas evolved before the coming of Calculus (Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion for example).

[Igel]

16. They're idiots.

They know their field. They know the end product they want.


They're weren't typical students, by and large. They just know they want things fixed, and have a neat hunch about how others will do it.

We've had a lot of neat hunches tried. I've been in a lot of HS science classrooms. The neat hunches have really screwed things over. Some hunches have been rooted in ideology, others in a deeply-abiding sense of the human dignity of all kids. (It's a school, and educational achievement depends more on effort and smarts than on the researcher's views of human dignity.)

We've tripled funding for education in 40 years. We've had fad after fad after fad, each pronounced by a self-appointed education savior who got tenure but did a grand job crucifying the allegedly saved.

They already try to reduce higher order thinking to things that kids memorize in elementary school with little experience and understanding. They already go through things quickly. Ooh! I know! Let's add more stuff that should be attained by the use of higher order thinking modalities operating on a set of internalized and objectively perceived facts but which, perforce, will be reduced to simplistic, meaning-free slogans that the kids can memorize by rote and recite to demonstrate to their elders' satisfaction that they, the elders, are indeed wise and brilliant educators to have gotten the first graders to think at levels once attained, back in the '60s, by PhDs.

If egos had mass we'd all be in a singularity. Or crushed to quarks by the tidal forces of a 1000 supermassive blac kholes orbiting within a few dozen kilometers of each other.