Using the History of Science Teaching to Understand Modern Science Education Reforms

• In Event: How We Teach Science

Abstract

John Rudolph’s book highlights how tensions about “what counts” as science in classrooms have been part of conversations, and debates, throughout the history of American schooling. Rudolph’s most important contribution is to elevate hidden questions for readers: Whose science is present in classrooms, and why? Such questions may initially seem nonsensical; science – in schools and in public – is often presented as unaffected by the values and interests of its context (Longino, 1990). However, science is inherently bound to a community – scientists and learners engage in the work valued and promoted by their particular set of contextual circumstances (Hankinson-Nelson, 1990). Linking the development of disciplinary work to contextual circumstances problematizes the view of science promoted in many schools, that all sciences share a universal practice, often called “the scientific method”. However, many science educators have pushed to discard “the scientific method” because it misconstrues how science practice develops in the “real world” (Duschl, 2008; Windschitl et al., 2008). By discarding the assumption of a universal science practice, however, a new conundrum emerges: Whose science practice should be privileged in learning settings? This question considers disciplinary work from the perspective of power and authority. Science Studies scholars argue that who is theorizing matters for the practice develops over time (Hankinson Nelson, 1990). Rather than engage in science practice as determined by those with power, some scholars press for “science from below” in which disciplinary practice is initiated by those typically excluded from such work (Harding, 1993). In science education, Medin and Bang (2014) offer an example by describing the development of ecologically oriented and community-based science education programs, both of which promote non- privileged cultural groups’ knowledge-making practices. Thus, an answer to “whose science practice” can include opportunities for students to co-develop and legitimately participate in disciplinary work.

Rudolph’s book also highlights the difficulty of providing evidence to schools, parents, and policymakers that teachers are providing students with opportunities to learn science. For example, Rudolph highlights debates about learning as the acquisition of science knowledge or the participation in science practices. In the fields of science education and teacher education, such debates are long-standing, and involve two major families of learning theories. First, cognitive perspectives view learning as an individual process in which information is acquired from local contexts and environments, organized into internal structures such as concepts or schema, and change states over time. Second, sociocultural perspectives generally view learning in terms of on-going changes in practice (Danish & Gresalfi, 2018). Learning, then, embodies complex processes by which people develop discourses and practices that involve speaking, acting, and being in the world. Rather than framing knowledge as concrete entities that can transfer from setting to setting, sociocultural perspectives view knowledge as mediated between actors who create, shape, and negotiate meaning and practices in social activity. Thus, debates about cognitive and sociocultural learning theories – and what counts as evidence of student learning – have great bearing on the policy, curricula, and pedagogical decisions in classrooms.

Author

• David Stroupe, Michigan State University