Kevin Carr, Assistant Professor of Teacher Education at George Fox University, has taught physics at secondary and college level for fourteen years. Dr. Carr leads science teacher preparation at George Fox, administers science education programs such as NASA Project NOVA, and teaches physics in GFU’s science department. He earned his Ph.D from the University of Idaho.
“What is truth?” Pilate asked. (John 18:37-38)
“I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” He replied (John 14:3)
How do we come to know Truth? Jesus taught that to know Truth was to know Him, through relationship. Parker Palmer, in his book The Courage To Teach1, makes a compelling case for curriculum as a form of relationship building between the student and the subject being learned. Taking seriously Jesus’ call to know Him, Palmer suggests that this relational model of knowing extends to all knowledge, whether the “subject” is Jesus, or science, the study of His divine creation.
A spiritually grounded theory of teaching and learning science envisions an active relationship between the learner and creation that parallels our relationship with Jesus. In a very real sense, good science teachers are spiritual leaders. The teacher’s role is to actively introduce all students to God’s creation, nurturing and leading the learning relationship to greater and more meaningful depths. Much as a strong spiritual leader models and demonstrates an abiding, growing, and attractive relationship with Christ, strong science teachers model a strong learning relationship with their science area of expertise, challenging students to join the science community as active members2.
It’s not surprising that powerful science teaching echoes Jesus’ methods of discipling His followers. Jesus rarely lectured, but he often told parables and asked questions meant to challenge the disciples’ assumptions and create in each one a searching and curious state of mind. Rather than telling them in abstract terms about His kingdom and His mission (when He did tell them they failed to understand) he simply called out “follow me,” inviting them into a community of learning meant to transform rather than simply inform. This article outlines some aspects of the a complex, dynamic, and transforming activity of science teaching and learning.
The State of Science Teaching
How are we doing as a science teaching community when measured against the vision of teaching science as a spiritual journey? Beginning with the Sputnik launches in the early 60’s, through the Nation at Risk3 report in the early 80’s, to the 2000 Glenn Commission report, Before Its Too Late4, we have been reminded that American science education has been, and continues to be, in serious trouble. The need to reexamine and improve how we teach science to our children is reflected in not only low standardized test scores, but in low interest and knowledge in science among students at the college level.
Poor achievement in science not only hurts us as a nation competing in a global economy, but hurts society internally by creating greater social and economic gaps among its citizens. The preamble of A Nation at Risk reminds us that:
“All, regardless of race or class or economic status, are entitled to a fair chance and to the tools for developing their individual powers of mind and spirit to the utmost. This promise means that all children by virtue of their own efforts, competently guided, can hope to attain the mature and informed judgement needed to secure gainful employment, and to manage their own lives, thereby serving not only their own interests but also the progress of society itself.”
Science literacy is no longer a luxury to be afforded to the few students who ultimately seek careers in science. Strong knowledge of science is a prerequisite for understanding complex political issues such as genetic research, energy policy, environmental management, space exploration, and the Internet. No voting citizen can afford to be left behind in the ability to critically understand, evaluate, and apply conscience to these and many more science-related issues. All children deserve the opportunity to learn of God’s creation.
What have we learned, in the 40 years since Sputnik, about teaching and learning science? Our initial efforts drew from cognitive psychology, most notably from the work of Jean Piaget. More recent efforts have re-introduced the situative perspective, reminding us that to learn science is to be an apprentice scientist, inducted into the craft of doing science. Both perspectives are part of learning science as a spiritual journey, transforming not only the mind of the learner, but his/her identity as well.
Misconceptions Research: Teaching the Facts Isn’t Enough
One major finding in the last 30 years is that many science concepts are poorly understood, even by the very highly educated. One famous and influential study, A Private Universe, carried out by the Annenberg Foundation, asked graduates of Harvard three questions involving science concepts taught since grade school. Take this short quiz5 and see how you fare (see Fig. 1):
In the study, 23/30 randomly selected graduates, faculty, and alumni of Harvard University could not explain the cause of the seasons. The results were even more discouraging for the other questions. Many extensive studies have documented literally hundreds of similar misconceptions in biology, physics, and chemistry. In every case, it is found that, even after extensive educational experience, understanding of many basic science concepts remains unchanged. We literally continue to explain our world much as we did upon entering kindergarten.
From these studies, it has become clear that we begin to develop our understanding of the world from the moment of birth, so that we arrive in school with fully formed ideas about how the world of our experience works. Unfortunately, the concepts we develop as young children interacting with the world are often scientifically inaccurate. To make matters worse, many common science misconceptions are highly resistant to change, even after many years of school and even college-level instruction.6,7 We cling to our primitive understanding of the world until we are forced by direct experience to abandon it. This phenomenon was understood by Piaget as a direct consequence of the way our bodies and minds are designed—to make sense of our world.
The Cognitive Perspective—How the Brain Learns and Understands Science
How, then, are science misconceptions firmly engrained from an early age finally changed? Much of what we know about how learners come to understand science concepts is grounded in Jean Piaget’s work in cognitive psychology.8 Piaget’s contribution to science teaching and learning was to show that learners actively make meaning of their environment, constructing ideas and theories about the world around them. A great deal of research has sought to identify both the way learners interact with the world, as well as common misconceptions in science learned by young children before beginning school. By combining knowledge in these areas, we can begin to design instruction in a way that fits the learner.
Piaget viewed learning as a continuous, dynamic, and ultimately biological process of making sense of the world. Piaget viewed this process as genetically driven, an inherent part of the way human beings are created. He likened learning to the building and remodeling of cognitive structures in response to inputs and experiences from the environment. Piaget demonstrated in thousands of scientific studies, that people learn by actively confronting the environment and rebuilding their pre-existing mental structures to fit what is being experienced.
Piaget used the term cognitive disequilibrium to describe the state of simultaneous confusion and curiosity that arises when our understanding of the world is challenged by experience. He suggested that the human brain designed to respond to cognitive disequilibrium by altering its own cognitive structure to accommodate new experiences. To Piaget, learning is driven by cognitive disequilibrium and the innate human desire to re-create meaning of what we experience.
The Learning Cycle Model
Piaget’s work tells us that teacher explanations are not necessarily the most important factor in learning science. Direct instruction focused on teacher explanations has, over the last 30 years, been found to be ineffective at helping students actively confront misconceptions.
An alternative, and widely accepted curriculum model that helps students successfully confront and alter their misconceptions is the Learning Cycle Model. The learning cycle model appears in a variety of forms in curricula9, but all share an emphasis on student learning through the re-
construction of prior understanding. Curricula based on the learning cycle begins instruction with hands-on experiences and open-ended questions before moving to a focus on teacher input (see Figure 2). Students develop a questioning and curious attitude, and an awareness of prior knowledge, before attempting to assimilate new concepts and language.10
Learning Science Through Apprenticeship: The Inquiry Cycle
The learning cycle has been implemented effectively at all levels of science instruction, but stops short of teaching students to carry out complete scientific investigations. Skill in science inquiry is now part of the curriculum frameworks of many states (see Figure 3). Rather than just studying about science, students become apprentice science researchers, sometimes even teaming with local experts in higher education and industry to carry out field projects Science inquiry, traditionally reserved for talented and gifted students interested in pursuing careers in science, is
now a core part of the science curriculum in the early grades. Science fairs have become, in some schools, an annual capstone for the science curriculum across the grades.
Figure 3: Inquiry Cycle (Adapted from Pearce, Nurturing Inquiry: Real Science for the Elementary Classroom)11
A Partnership Model for Creating Change in Science Instruction
Effective science teaching implementing inquiry calls for the development of a broad community of learning, extending beyond the walls of school, involving local community colleges, 4-year colleges, and informal science centers such as museums, observatories, and zoos12. George Fox University partners with local home school students, Christian schools, needy public schools, and local school districts to provide support for science instruction. Our students and faculty teach courses, facilitate family science nights, student teach and intern in local science classrooms, and loan equipment to local teachers. We have an “open phone” policy; any teacher can call between 3 and 5 in the afternoon to get assistance in teaching science.
In the same way that “telling” is an ineffective way to teach science, we have found that excellent science teachers are made through an ongoing commitment to relationship with others with the same goals. In a sense we are growing a “church” for those desiring to bring students into a strong relationship with science. Our “church” has no building, but is nevertheless a functioning community of support and learning.
Recommendations
- Implement the Learning Cycle model. Begin to plan science instruction using the Learning Cycle model as a framework. Most common lesson and unit planning formats can be modified to “speak the language” of the learning cycle. Initiate at your school a “Learning Cycle Group” of teachers interested in exploring science instruction.
- Hold a public science event. Consider initiating an annual “science fair” or “family science night” in your school, displaying inquiry projects. The best way to get students to identify with science is to have them do what scientists do, which is to experiment, demonstrate, and teach science.
- Build partnerships with a local 2 or 4-year college or university. Contact the chair of the science and/or teacher education departments at your local institution and ask to be put in contact with a faculty member interested in science education. You may be surprised to find an enthusiastic professional ready and willing to help connect your program with a variety of resources ranging from equipment to highly motivated students who can visit and teach in your school.
References
1 Parker Palmer, The Courage To Teach (San Francisco: Jossey Bass, 1998)
2 See Frank Smith, The Book of Learning and Forgetting (New York: Teachers College Press) for a discussion about the role of “membership” in learning.
3 See the original 1983 report A Nation at Risk
4 National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century, Before Its Too Late: A Report to the Nation from the National Commission on Mathematics and Science Teaching for the 21st Century (Jessup, MD: U.S. Department of Education, 2000).
5 Answers: 1=(a), 2=(c), 3=(c). The Annenberg Foundations video and material related the study
6 For an overview of research on student misconceptions, see Dorothy Gabel (Ed.), Handbook of Research on Science Teaching and Learning (New York :Macmillan, 1994), p. 177-211.
7 For a thorough on-line list of common misconceptions on science.
8 Jean Piaget wrote 66 books and thousands of research papers on cognitive psychology. For an overview of Piaget’s ideas that contribute to our understanding of science education see Dorothy Gabel (Ed.), Handbook of Research on Science Teaching and Learning (New York :Macmillan, 1994), p. 131-176.
9 see, for example, John Layman, Inquiry and Learning: Realizing Science Standards in the Classroom (New York: The College Board, 1996), or Jack Hassard, Science as Inquiry (Parsipanny, NJ: Good Year Books, 2000)
10 Jesus used the learning cycle principle when He taught in parables, encouraging curiousity and cognitive disequilibrium before (reluctantly) offering explanations.
11 see Jack Pearce, Nurturing Inquiry: Real Science for the Elementary Classroom (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1999)
12 see the National Research Council’s report Educating Teachers of Science, Mathematics, and Technology: New Practices for the New Millenium (Washington, D.C. : National Academy Press, 2000).
Beyond Sputnik: What the Past 40 Years Has Taught Us About Teaching Science 5.2