The OECD Observer
October/November 1998, No. 214

 

Widening the appeal of science in schools
By Edwyn James

 

Science, mathematics and technology are relatively unpopular parts of the school curriculum. In view of their economic and social importance, improving the attractiveness of these subjects will bring clear rewards, both to individuals and society. Several pioneering approaches suggest how these subjects can retain pupils’ interest. (At the end of 1997 the OECD Centre for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI) (http://www.oecd.org/els/edu/els_ceri.htm) completed a large-scale dissemination programme for an international study of innovations in science, mathematics and technology education, the initial findings of which were published in Changing the Subject—Innovations in Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, OECD/Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1996.)

Over the past ten or fifteen years, there have been frequent expressions of concern that so few pupils are taking up mathematics, science, technology and related subjects. This relative lack of interest at school continues into adulthood, as is repeatedly shown both in surveys of scientific literacy (See, for example, Jean-Eric Aubert, ‘Science and Society: Avoiding a Gulf’, The OECD Observer, No. 205, April/May 1997 (http://www.oecd.org/publications/observer/205/ob205e.html), which reports findings that at least 87% of the adults in 14 industrial nations were ‘less than well informed’ about science.) and by the regular calls for more scientists and engineers and more awareness of their work and importance. Although hard to quantify, the variation between countries of adults well-qualified in these areas is remarkable, and the lack of equity between men and women adds to the concerns. (Data for selected countries drawn from Science and Engineering Indicators—1996, National Science Foundation, Washington DC, 1996.)

In an attempt to discover how to increase enthusiasm for science, mathematics and technology, the OECD examined 23 specific innovations in teaching and learning styles in 13 of its member countries. (Australia, Austria, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland and the United States.) Each new approach was carefully investigated, and common trends across them identified, making this study the largest of its kind yet undertaken.

The innovations generally started from the daily-life interests and realities of the students and encouraged them to become involved in a practical sense. They were more student-centred, designed to engage interest and commitment, and in some cases the students were allowed to exercise more personal responsibility for their own learning and its assessment. There was also a willingness to cross the boundaries between conventional subjects such as physics, chemistry and biology, making the presentation more akin to the complex and multi-disciplinary matters of interest in the contemporary world, such as genetic engineering or biotechnology. Neither of these subjects fits neatly into the traditional school sciences, though they involve aspects of all three and also incorporate mathematics.

Evidently, such changes in the learning situation have profound implications for the teacher, who will now have to deal with a wider subject area incorporating elements as diverse as ethics and economics. The OECD study revealed a concept of teacher professionalism which was considerably enhanced, with the teachers being seen not so much as the only available figures of authority, but rather as people who were well connected and thus knew where to seek information and expertise to complement their own. The teachers, indeed, were required to show an ability to cope with uncertainty and to reach informed judgements. That attitude is quite unlike the neatly classified domains of traditional teaching, where teachers are expected to cope in isolation.

The countries participating in the study were concerned to improve the quality of the education they provided and increase the subject-appeal, even though their 13-year-old science students showed average or above-average scores in international comparisons (Figure). ( Data taken from The Third International Mathematics and Science Study report ‘Science Achievement in the Middle School Years’, International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement, Chestnut Hill, MA, United States, 1996.) Japan, for instance, is a country where there is a contrast between strong social conformity, which ensures the pursuit of success on examinations, and the perceived importance of developing creativity and lateral thinking among young people.

The effectiveness of an integrated, open-ended approach was shown in a Swiss study, which used computer modelling to investigate the rate of growth of a plant (the amaryllis) and the spread of an epidemic (AIDS). Fourteen-year-old students became adept at forming hypotheses from their own data-analysis, in situations which did not permit unique or definitive solutions. And an American study, entitled ‘Chemistry in the Community’, set out to integrate scientific, technological and social topics under eight units. One of these, an investigation of how to meet demand for water, dealt with such conventional topics as solubility, acidity and analysis, but on a ‘need-to-know basis’, meaning that the chemical topics were introduced only if they were relevant to the social issues to be addressed, such as environmental and health concerns. The eight units extended across food, climate, health, chemical resources and industry, petroleum and radioactivity, thereby ensuring wide chemical coverage and encouraging the students to become scientifically literate, not merely equipped with a basis of technical chemical knowledge. The students’ reaction was extremely positive.

 

Getting students involved

The studies have emphasised how important it is that the student acquire knowledge from practical involvement. Two further examples come from elementary science teaching in Japan for ten-year olds. One class was taken to a river to count fish but found none, and so instead they recorded the amount of waste materials such as bottles and cans; higher upstream they found fish and less pollution. In a second case, young students watching a video saw a concrete icicle which, as the camera pulled back, was by degrees seen to be formed from a concrete lintel, in a building which they then recognised to be in their own district. The phenomenon, analogous to icicle formation, is caused by the degradation of the concrete as it is attacked by acid in the air. In both instances it was easy to go on to develop aspects of environmental awareness in a way that now spoke to the students. The scene was set for effective and committed work on the causes and consequences of pollution, with the students keen to make moral judgements and explore responsibilities.

An approach confined to the classroom—more abstract and with more limited, purely academic objectives—may serve a minority, but for most students it can lead to passive assent, even disengagement. A contrasting approach in a Norwegian school asked their 13-year-old students to conclude their work on electric circuits by building a headlamp. They worked with such alacrity that their teachers were confident that every one had acquired the desired competence to connect batteries and bulbs appropriately.

Where students operate with more autonomy, they are encouraged to channel their own interests and enthusiasms into the work. Some US students used the Internet to share with schools elsewhere data they had gathered themselves on such matters as amount of rainfall, degrees of acid in local water, and the rate at which domestic waste was generated. The result was personal identification with these important contemporary concerns and an eagerness to undertake further work, such as experimentation, field trips and action in the community. Students who had become aware of the scale of use of packaging materials, for instance, wanted to see social action on reducing their use and recycling.

 

What teachers can learn

One clear lesson from the success of these initiatives is that there should be more emphasis on learning from experience and less on teaching: a more student-centred approach in schools can capture and maintain interest in science, mathematics and technology. Another is that the role of teachers has to be viewed more comprehensively, extending to important activities outside the classroom, such as pioneering innovations and encouraging their development and adoption; meeting colleagues and others for mutual support and to share insights; working with researchers to develop new curriculum approaches. Thus, the US pre-calculus scheme (a one-year introduction to calculus for 17-year-olds) originated from much out-of-hours work by a small group of enthusiasts, who subsequently infected others with enough enthusiasm for the scheme to be spread successfully elsewhere. The Swiss computer modelling innovation likewise had researchers and teachers working together in the classroom and continuing in dialogue afterwards.

Furthermore, at the point of delivery—the classroom—the changes the innovations require imply considerable changes in the role and expertise demanded of the teacher: in subject competence, as integration puts knowledge into a more holistic framework, and in teaching methods, as the traditional rows of desks and pupils listening to the teacher give way to students who are more actively and responsibly involved. The teacher becomes the manager of a more varied learning environment, within which, far more than previously, the skills of assessment can be developed and deployed as an aid to learning and motivation.

Experience can be gained also from the obverse side of the coin, when attempts at reform have been less successful. For instance, teachers are sometimes required to introduce changes that are imposed from above by government without adequate consultation, and which have thus caused tension and unease. If classroom change is to be implemented effectively, professional involvement is essential. In Norway ministry officials and researchers have worked alongside teachers in developing and introducing assessment reform; and in Germany researchers and teachers have collaborated to design, evaluate and modify integrated science curriculum materials. Not all teachers, of course, will want or be able to assume the wide-ranging responsibilities of their new role, but the most forward-looking should certainly be encouraged to contribute in this way.

The series of conferences and seminars arranged around the world by the OECD to promote the effort to increase the popularity of science, mathematics and technology in schools is being turned to practical purpose. A report on a conference in Mexico, for example, will be designed as a handbook for teachers (Publication details not yet available, but intended to be a companion volume to the Spanish edition of Changing the Subject, op. cit., Matemáticas, Ciencia y Tecnología—Innovaciones Educativas, Grupo Editorial Iberoamérica, Mexico, 1997.) and a film of the conference, supplemented with interviews with leading contributors, released on video. This, the last of the international conferences, was the most ambitious, though earlier conferences produced reports that have been widely circulated. (Those of Norway and Japan can be accessed on the Internet, along with other information about the international study: http://www.oecd.org/els/edu/ceri/objective/6/smte/smte_home.htm.) The campaign has also stimulated the publication of a series of articles in academic journals, the educational press and elsewhere in English, French, Japanese, Norwegian and Spanish, thereby stimulating debate among informed and influential people in education and beyond: politicians, academics, researchers, senior teachers and school managers, parents and students. The result has been the birth of a dialogue between many communities of interest, each with its own insights and perspectives.

All these initiatives show a growth in respect for the individual student, and more account being taken of their different backgrounds, starting points and tastes, though there are no standard prescriptions for engaging the interest of every young person in science, mathematics and technology. The implications for teacher professionalism are considerable, and accord well with the notion recently floated by the UK government as well as by other countries of a new grade of teacher with professorial status. Such teachers could support and guide trainees and other colleagues more substantially than hitherto. More diversity of roles within the profession might allow the admission of teacher-assistants, who could perform a valuable function as an extension of the new teacher’s influence without prohibitive cost.

It may appear to be self-evident that increasing the appeal of science, mathematics and technology to young people depends on what is done in schools. But the design of the curriculum is vital. It must set out to engage interest, by starting from present-day experience and concerns, by being practically orientated, by acknowledging the rights and developing the responsibilities of each individual. For such a transformation to be effected, more will be asked of teachers. There must be every encouragement for some of the ablest men and women both to enter and to remain within teaching, which underlines the importance of a more professional career structure and a wider recognition of its stature.

 

Focus

‘Kids did not like what we had before: we were studying light waves, sound waves, doing cells, talking about oceanography [...] but it never made any connections [...] to the kids’ lives.’

From the US study based on the simulated ‘voyage of the Mimi’, in which students act the part of scientists and explorers.

‘I would like them [the students] to be able to think mathematically [...], to look at a problem and ask themselves questions that lead them towards solving or understanding the problem, and not just mechanically and blindly say, ‘I need this formula ... I don’t know why.’

A US teacher talking to colleagues in an ‘Urban Mathematics Collaborative’.

‘In this field [student self-assessment] many have undergone a fine development. They see it can be of use to them and are now honest and clever when assessing themselves. As a result of this they now understand that they must take responsibility for their own learning.’

A Norwegian mathematics teacher.

‘Initially, some of the teachers were apprehensive about dealing with mathematical situations in which there was no right answer. One of them, in fact, [explained] that the reason she had gone into mathematics was that everything had an answer. It was disturbing for her to find out otherwise.’

A US teacher engaged in a novel pre-calculus course developed from applications and real-life problem-solving.

‘By taking [Chemistry in the Community] I realise how important science is. I became a scientist in my own right and thought about important issues that did not seem that important before. [...] I catch myself trying to recycle and being aware of our environment. I am glad I took this class.

They were completely wild about this activity. [...] I have never seen kids so proud. I have one kid who is usually not active in science, he thinks that everything is so boring. But this activity was great for him.’

A Norwegian science teacher.

 

OECD Bibliography

What Works in Innovation: Inservice Teacher Training and Professional Development, forthcoming 1998

John Walshe, ‘The Professional Development of Teachers’, The OECD Observer, No. 211, April/May 1998
(http://www.oecd.org/publications/observer/211/obs211e.htm)

Active Learning for Students and Teachers: Reports from Eight Countries, 1997

Education and Equity in OECD Countries, 1997

David Istance, ‘Education and Social Exclusion’, The OECD Observer, No. 208, October/November 1997
(http://www.oecd.org/publications/observer/208/obs208e.html)

Implementing Inclusive Education, 1997

Quality in Teaching, 1994

The Curriculum Redefined: Schooling for the 21st Century, 1994

Curriculum Reform: Assessment in Question, 1993.

 

Edwyn James: OECD Directorate for Education, Employment, Labour and Social Affairs.