Ingo Eilks

The meaning of ‘relevance’ in science education and its implications for the science curriculum

‘Relevance’ is one of the key terms related to reforms in the teaching and learning of science. It is often used by policy-makers, curriculum developers, science education researchers and science teachers. In recent years, many policy documents based on international surveys have claimed that science education is often seen (especially at the secondary school level) as being irrelevant for and by the learners. The literature suggests that making science learning relevant both to the learner personally and to the society in which he or she lives should be one of the key goals of science education. However, what ‘relevant’ means is usually inadequately conceptualised. This review of the literature clearly reveals that the term relevance is used with widely variant meanings. From our analysis of the literature, we will suggest an advanced organisational scheme for the term ‘relevance’ and provide helpful suggestions for its use in the field of the science curriculum.

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and chemistry education

The years between 2005 and 2014 have been declared as a worldwide Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD) by the United Nations. DESDs intended purpose is to promote and more thoroughly focus education as a crucial tool preparing young people to be responsible future citizens, so that our future generations can shape society in a sustainable manner. All educational levels and domains are to be involved in contributing to ESD, including chemistry. This paper reflects upon the meaning of the UNs challenge and on what ESD pedagogy will mean for chemistry education. Additionally, it provides an overview of different models suggesting how such integration of sustainability issues can be compatible with chemistry education. Various consequences and implications arising from this approach will also be discussed.

An Example of Learning about Plastics and Their Evaluation as a Contribution to Education for Sustainable Development in Secondary School Chemistry Teaching.

This paper describes the development and evaluation of a secondary school lesson plan for chemistry education on the topic Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). The lessons focus both on the chemistry of plastics and on learning about the societal evaluation of competing, chemistry-based industrial products. A specific teaching method was developed and applied for the latter purpose: the consumer test method. This method mimics the authentic societal practice of evaluation performed by consumer testing agencies. Applying the consumer test method in the context of this paper is directly tied to the three dimensions most often occurring in prominent sustainability models: ecological, economic and societal sustainability. This paper justifies embedding learning about plastics into the ESD-perspective by using the socio-critical and problem-oriented approach to chemistry teaching. An overview of the lesson plan is given. Experiences and feedback from teachers and students based on the cyclical development by Participatory Action Research are discussed. They reveal the lesson plans potential to contribute to higher levels of student motivation and ESD understanding.

A case study on German first year chemistry student teachers beliefs about chemistry teaching, and their comparison with student teachers from other science teaching domains

This paper gives insights into the beliefs of 85 German first year chemistry student teachers about chemistry teaching and learning at the beginning of their teacher education. The study is based on student teachers drawings of themselves in a typical classroom situation and four open questions. The approach evaluated: (I) Beliefs about Classroom Organisation, (II) Beliefs about Teaching Objectives, and (III) Epistemological Beliefs. The tool, evaluation pattern and the results of the 85 first year chemistry student teachers evaluated by Grounded Theory are discussed and compared with similar studies from secondary biology, secondary physics, and primary science education, respectively. The results show that the first year chemistry student teachers in this sample hold heterogeneous beliefs about science teaching and learning. A minority are oriented around modern theories of learning, especially in their epistemological beliefs; the majority tend towards more traditional beliefs of chemistry teaching, not in line with modern educational theory. The latter tendencies are not as strong as they are among their physics colleagues. Beliefs of their biology colleagues and even more so among first year primary science student teachers from our sample are much more student-centred, oriented towards scientific literacy and constructivistic learning. Implications for teacher education are discussed.

Sustainable development and green chemistry in chemistry education

Sustainable development is one of the most frequently used terms in today’s political debate. Our current understanding of sustainable development as a regulatory idea was basically defined by the Agenda 21: ‘‘Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.’’ As a consequence, all our individual and political actions should be reflected in the light of their societal, economical and ecological sustainability. This claim concerns every field of society, among them particularly chemistry and chemistry education. Both fields should reflect on how chemistry and chemistry education can contribute to more sustainability in our society, today and in future. One of chemistry’s contributions to meeting the challenge of more sustainability in the development of our society is the promotion of a sustainable chemistry, in research and industrial production. Under the name of green chemistry (or in Europe also sustainable chemistry) a lot of effort has been undertaken to make future chemistry less poisonous and less hazardous. Green chemistry aims at making chemistry more energy efficient, at reducing waste disposal, and/or producing innovative products with less consumption of natural resources. Alternative processes and reaction pathways are designed, new materials and products are developed contributing to meet our needs today, but with taking more care of the interests of future generations. Modern chemistry education is challenged by both the political aim of a sustainable development of our society in general as well from the call for green chemistry strategies in chemical research and industry in particular. School chemistry education should promote competencies of the young generation to become scientifically literate. This means chemistry education has to contribute to making students capable of actively participating in society. Competencies need to be promoted to allow students to understand and participate in societal debate about applications of chemistry and technology. One prerequisite is that students should achieve substantial chemistry knowledge in the context of respective sustainability issues to understand the underlying developments, alternatives and dilemmas. But, subject matter knowledge will not be enough. The students as future citizens also need to learn how societal debate about questions related to chemistry, industry and the environment functions as well as develop skills to involve themselves together with others in the societal processes of democratic decision making. But this is only one side of the coin. Society can only decide about alternatives for raising sustainability in chemistry related developments and businesses if there are any. Future chemists and chemical engineers need to learn what a more resource efficient and environmentally friendly chemistry for the future might look alike. That means the ideas of a green chemistry should become part of their training from the very start. Students of chemistry programs at university should be guided to develop a deep consciousness of the importance of sustainability strategies in chemistry research and industry, and also to develop knowledge and skills to operate them. This themed issue on ‘‘sustainable development and green chemistry in chemistry education’’ therefore focuses on more sustainable chemistry in secondary as well as in tertiary education. It starts with two perspective papers summing up the state of the art in Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in secondary school chemistry as well as practices related to the ideas of green chemistry in higher education. Both perspectives will be illustrated by a kaleidoscope of examples from both areas in the other contributions to this issue. Three examples will provide ideas of how to include ESD in the secondary chemistry curriculum. Fields of study are using environmental issues as a context for chemistry education, using the debate about plastics as a socio-scientific issue for chemistry education, or making the analysis of the environmental impact of chemical synthesis a part of an organic chemistry course in upper secondary schools. Another set of papers will reflect the role of sustainability issues and green chemistry in higher education. These papers focus on both changing the curricula towards embedding explicit lessons on sustainable development in higher chemistry and chemical engineering education, but also on how to put the principles of green chemistry into practice in higher chemistry teaching. The latter step can be achieved, for example, by incorporating alternative reagents or making technical problems from the sustainability debate a context for higher chemistry learning. Since 2005 we have been living in the UN World Decade of an Education for Sustainable Development which will end in 2014. This current issue highlights that sustainability issues as part of this development already have increasingly become a prominent factor in contemporary chemistry education – both on secondary University of Bremen, Germany. E-mail: ingo.eilks@uni-bremen.de Alpe-Adria-University, Klagenfurt, Austria. E-mail: Franz.Rauch@uni-klu.ac.at Chemistry Education Research and Practice Dynamic Article Links

German chemistry teachers’ understanding of sustainability and education for sustainable development—An interview case study

Sustainability became a regulatory idea of national and international policies worldwide with the advent of the Agenda 21. One part of these policies includes promoting sustainability through educational reform. With the United Nations World Decade for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), spanning the years 2005 to 2014, all school subjects are requested to contribute to this reform, including secondary chemistry education. Furthermore, educational reform can only be successful if it takes teachers’ prior knowledge and attitudes into account. Unfortunately in the case of German secondary chemistry education, information about teachers’ knowledge and attitudes is very rare. In order to close this gap, a study using semi-structured interviews with a random sample of 16 experienced chemistry teachers was conducted and the results qualitatively analyzed. These results show that teachers hold positive attitudes when it comes to implementing issues of sustainability and ESD in their teaching. However, the findings also document that teachers are only vaguely informed about the theoretical concepts behind sustainability and ESD. For the most part, the teachers possess almost no theoretically-informed ideas about pedagogies which could be used to implement ESD in chemistry teaching. Reforms in teacher education (pre- and in-service) and the development of appropriate curriculum materials are highly recommended.

The Need for Innovative Methods of Teaching and Learning Chemistry in Higher Education--Reflections from a Project of the European Chemistry Thematic Network.

This paper summarizes the work and conclusions of a working group established by the European Chemistry Thematic Network (ECTN). The aim of the working group was to identify potential areas for innovative approaches to the teaching and learning of chemistry in Higher Education, and to survey good practice throughout the EU. The paper starts by identifying and justifying the need for innovation in the methods used to teach chemistry in higher education to deal with challenges arising from the rapidly changing nature of higher education. This leads on to a brief discussion of each of ten distinct areas identified by the working group, where innovation is considered to offer opportunities for enhancing the student learning experience in higher level chemistry education. The importance of improved training in pedagogy and pedagogical content knowledge for new lecturers is also stressed.

Evaluating roadmaps to portray and develop chemistry teachers’ PCK about curricular structures concerning sub-microscopic models

This paper describes a study on research-oriented chemistry teacher education, in which fifty-six advanced, secondary school chemistry student teachers working in teams of two interviewed twenty-eight experienced chemistry teachers. The interviews focussed on teachers’ personal viewpoints of how to best teach the different levels of sub-microscopic models in lower secondary chemistry classes. Over two thirds of the teachers said that they intend to structure their curriculum around a series of different models paralleling the history of science. However, subsequent analysis showed that this teaching procedure seemed to be inconsistent and insufficiently reflected upon by the teachers in many cases. Because the majority of teachers in these interviews admitted to personal understandings of scientific models which were neither well-considered nor comparative, it would seem that an actual implementation of their intended curricula lacks sufficient justification and structure in several cases. One tool for teacher education was developed from the analysis of the collected data, namely: roadmaps. Roadmaps are believed to offer us an empirically-based tool with which to display the experience-based views of teachers for use in teacher education. The idea is to create a picture showing specific aspects of chemistry teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge in order to stimulate reflection and discussion.

A case study of beginning science teachers’ subject matter (SMK) and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) of teaching chemical reaction in Turkey

This paper describes a case study focusing on the subject matter knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge, and beliefs about science teaching of student teachers in Turkey at the start of their university education. The topic of interest was that of teaching chemical reactions in secondary chemistry education. A written test was developed which used the research literature on potential student misconceptions with regard to different aspects of chemical reactions. Thirty beginning science student teachers were tested, with an additional eight interviews from the student teachers in the same sample. The interviews focused on student teachers’ views about how to best teach chemical reactions in lower secondary chemistry classes. The results revealed deficits in the subject matter knowledge of the student teachers. It also became obvious that the teachers in this sample held very traditional and teacher-centred beliefs when it came to chemistry teaching at the secondary level. Their teaching attitudes were geared mainly towards the acquisition of facts by pupils, and often ignored the development of process-oriented skills. Implications for science teacher education are discussed.

Reconsidering Different Visions of Scientific Literacy and Science Education Based on the Concept of Bildung

Over the last 50 years, policy makers and STEM educators have argued for Scientific Literacy (SL). SL is a typical boundary object that everyone can agree on, but that is filled with different meanings by different stakeholders. Roberts (as published in Abell SK, Lederman NG (eds), Handbook of research on science education. Lawrence Erlbaum, Mahwah, pp. 729–780, 2007) has identified two main orientations of SL: Vision I starts from and focuses on scientific content and scientific processes to learn about corresponding applications later, while Vision II focuses on contextualizing scientific knowledge for giving its use in life and society meaning. The tension between Vision I and II can also be related to the tension between “pipeline science – preparing future scientists” and “science for all”. Recently, a more advanced vision of SL was suggested. It is called Vision III and emphasizes philosophical values, politicization and critical global citizenship education. Such an orientation can be well justified by the Central/Northern European educational and cultural tradition called Bildung. In its most contemporary understanding, it is agency-oriented. Bildung-oriented science education aims at making the student capable of a self-determined life in his/her socio-cultural environment, participation in a democratic society, and of empathy and solidarity with others. This concept is also closely connected to more recent educational paradigms that were defined also beyond Europe, e.g. the ideas of Education for Sustainability (EfS) and transformative learning. Both concepts aim on skills development for critical-democratic participation and for shaping our society and culture in a sustainable way. The different visions of SL have consequences for the content and culture of teaching and learning of science and technology. Accepting Vision III requires awareness that our view of selecting and teaching certain content is dependent on our culture, for example our norms, values and worldviews, and on the society we are living in. Learning (cognition) must be complemented with not only meta-learning (metacognition), but also transformative learning, where things are considered from multifaceted (e.g., cultural) perspectives. The discussion in this chapter focuses on educational implications of Vision III of SL and its connection to critical-reflexive Bildung, EfS and transformative learning.