Fulfilling the Promise Biology Education in the Nation's Schools (1990) / Chapter Skim
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2. Where Are We Now? The Motivation for Change
2. Where Are We Now? The Motivation for Change
Pages 5-12
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From page 5... ...
Some degree of familiarity with how scientific knowledge is obtained, with certainty and uncertainty, with the living and nonliving world, with basic mathematical ideas (numeracy) , with how an understanding of nature and of the human body contributes to healthy lives and a safer world in short, the basic foundation that is referred to as scientific literacy has become an educational necessity.
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From page 6... ...
Instead, they arrive with poor attitudes toward science and often a need for remedial instruction, and, as noted earlier, they leave knowing little more than when they arrived. Their previous schooling not only has devoted little time to the study of science, but has usually been misdirected toward rote learning and textbook-centered lessons.
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From page 7... ...
Until the middle 1950s, the life-science course drifted toward a diluted version of high-school biology or was a maze of discrete topics distributed throughout general-science textbooks. The initial educational objective of meeting the developmental needs of early adolescents vanished and was replaced by the notion that life science in junior high schools should manage to prepare students for high-school biology.
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From page 8... ...
The conventional wisdom among teachers in the middle grades is that, "if you expect children to know some science, it is best you teach it." In addition, the socializing forces that influence the growth and development of early adolescents today are different from those of past generations (Carnegie Council on Adolescent Development, 1989; Institute of Medicine, 19891. For example, by the time students enter a middle or junior high school they have spent more time viewing television than being in school.
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From page 9... ...
In addition, a course in health science is required of middle-school students in most school districts; typically, those who teach it have no training in science. Teacher and Student Perspectives on Life-Science Courses Many teachers perceive the purpose of teaching life science as preparing students for the next grade or for high-school biology (Moyer, 19891.
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From page 10... ...
Biologists may be on the threshold of tackling successfully two of the most intractable and basic problems presented by living things: how a fertilized egg grows into an adult organism and how a collection of nerve cells learns and remembers. Biology is a mature discipline underpinned by basic explanatory concepts about how matter is organized in cells and organisms, how genetic information is encoded and transmitted across generations, how parts of organisms are related functionally, how organisms interact with each other and with the environment, and how different kinds of organisms change over time.
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From page 11... ...
Another study reported that only 12% of Ohio biology teachers surveyed correctly defined the modern theory of evolution and that more than one-third advocated the teaching of creationism in public schools (Epstein, 1987~. Those data and many others could be cited indicate that the understanding of science by both students and teachers is deficient and demonstrate the need for more effective teaching and learning at all stages in the educational process.
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From page 12... ...
The opportunities for intellectual "retooling" in a rapidly changing science like biology, as well as opportunities for sharing experiences with other professionals (once available to science teachers in summer institutes sponsored by the NSF) , have withered.
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