Jim Ryder

School Science Education for Citizenship: Strategies for Teaching about the Epistemology of Science.

One consequence of the advancing globalization and technological dependence of society is that people outside professional science are finding that issues of concern to them have a science dimension. I consider how school science education can support engagement with scientific information. I contend that teaching about the epistemology of science is central to achieving this educational goal. I identify epistemic learning aims appropriate to school science education. These are derived from a survey of case studies of how individuals interact with science outside formal education. I consider different ways in which these learning aims might be achieved in schools. Teaching approaches based on modifications of existing practice are identified. Addressing the full range of epistemic learning aims is likely to require teaching approaches rarely used in current science teaching.

Multiple Aims in the Development of a Major Reform of the National Curriculum for Science in England

In the context of a major reform of the school science curriculum for 14–16‐year‐olds in England, we examine the aims ascribed to the reform, the stakeholders involved, and the roles of differing values and authority in its development. This reform includes an emphasis on socioscientific issues and the nature of science; curriculum trends of international relevance. Our analysis identifies largely ‘instrumental’ aims, with little emphasis on ‘intrinsic’ aims and associated values. We identify five broad categories of stakeholders focusing on different aims with, for example, a social, individual, political, or economic emphasis. We suggest that curriculum development projects reflecting largely social and individual aims were appropriated by other stakeholders to serve political and economic aims. We argue that a curriculum reform body representing all stakeholder interests is needed to ensure that multiple aims are considered throughout the curriculum reform process. Within such a body, the differentiated character of the science teaching community would need to be represented.

School Teachers’ Experiences of Science Curriculum Reform

We examine teachers’ experiences of a major reform of the school science curriculum for 14–16-year olds in England. This statutory reform enhances the range of available science courses and emphasises the teaching of socio-scientific issues and the nature of science, alongside the teaching of canonical science knowledge. This paper examines teachers’ experiences of the reform and the factors that condition these experiences. A designed sample of 22 teachers discussed their experiences of the reform within a semi-structured interview. Our analysis considers how the external and internal structures within which teachers work interact with the personal characteristics of teachers to condition their experiences of the curriculum reform. In many cases, personal/internal/external contexts of teachers’ work align, resulting in an overall working context that is supportive of teacher change. However, in other cases, tensions within these contexts result in barriers to change. We also explore cases in which external curriculum reform has stimulated the development of new contexts for teachers’ work. We argue that curriculum reformers need to recognise the inevitability of multiple teaching goals within a highly differentiated department and school workplace. We also show how experiences of curriculum reform can extend beyond the learning of new knowledge and associated pedagogies to involve challenges to teachers’ professional identities. We argue for the extended use of teacher role models within local communities of practice to support such ‘identity work’.

Sources of differential participation rates in school science: the impact of curriculum reform

School science courses have widely varying participation rates across a range of student characteristics. One of the stated aims of the 2006 Key Stage 4 science curriculum reforms in England was to improve social mobility and inclusion. To encourage students to study more science, this reform was followed by the introduction in 2008 of an entitlement to study the three separate sciences at Key Stage 4 for the more highly attaining students. This paper uses longitudinal national data over a five year period to investigate the extent and change of participation across science courses at KS4, focussing on student gender and socio-economic status. It finds that whilst there is some evidence of a move towards a more equitable gender balance for some courses, there is as yet little evidence of substantial change in differential participation rates by socio-economic status.

Policy networks and boundary objects: Enacting curriculum reform in the absence of consensus

This article uses the concept of ‘boundary object’, first developed within science studies by Star and Griesemer, to analyse curriculum policy implementation. It employs as a vehicle a significant but contested reform of the science curriculum in schools in England from 2006 onwards, drawing empirically on an extended study of the reform, using public documentation and fieldwork in schools. The focus of the article is on the processes of mediation which are invoked during the implementation process. Star and Griesemer characterized boundary objects as entities which are shared across institutional and other social boundaries, but are sufficiently flexible and indeterminate to satisfy diverse agendas. In this study a curricular element called How Science Works is constituted as a boundary object. Its implementation is set within a network of institutions with different imperatives. The overall effect is to distribute the implementation process, and localize the meaning of the reform. This in turn enables what Star called ‘co-operative action in the absence of consensus’. Complementing and sometimes working against this are mechanisms of accountability dependent on public information. These create pressures for standardization of practices, and thus of meanings, which can both undermine the working of the network and lead to reification of professional practices. The article concludes with some reflections on the implications of this analysis for curriculum developers.

Being professional: accountability and authority in teachers’ responses to science curriculum reform

The science curriculum is a focus of repeated reform in many countries. However, the enactment of such reforms within schools rarely reflects the intended outcomes of curriculum designers. This review considers what we know about the experiences and reflections of teachers in the enactment of externally driven school science curriculum reform. ‘Externally driven’ signals a focus on studies of teachers who did not make a proactive choice to adopt a particular curriculum reform initiative. This is a very common experience for teachers in many school systems, and one likely to highlight issues of professionalism and authority that are central to the work of teachers. The review analyses 34 relevant studies. These include studies of teachers’ experiences of national curriculum reform, and also studies focusing on more regional or local curriculum reform activities. The studies examine individual teachers’ beliefs, practices and reflections associated with curriculum reform, the response of teacher communities to reform (e.g. within school departments), and teachers’ (and other stakeholders’) experiences across school systems. A wide range of factors influencing teachers’ responses are identified. These are characterised in terms of personal, internal and external contexts of teachers’ work. The review also highlights issues of authority, professionalism and the process of meaning-making in response to external curriculum reform. The discussion section identifies important areas for future research and gives recommendations for the design of curriculum policies that recognise and support the professionalism of science teachers.

The pursuit of humanity: curriculum change in English school science

This paper is concerned with the recent history of science curriculum reform in England, though it traces these developments back to the mid‐nineteenth century. It first reviews approaches to science in the curriculum until the mid‐1960s, identifying the curricular settlement of the postwar years and the beginning of the so‐called ‘swing from science’. It then examines structural shifts which undermined this settlement, including the introduction of comprehensive schooling, and the declining relative recruitment to physical science in post‐compulsory education. It goes on to explore subsequent attempts at reform, setting them in the context of increasingly centralised control of the curriculum and changing patterns of professional representation. Three reform themes are identified: a reconstruction of the notion of discovery learning around student investigation; increasing attention to social and ethical issues; and a growing emphasis on vocationalism. It argues that these themes have been merged into a new flexible curricular settlement, which imitates important characteristics of the humanities.

The use of national data sets to baseline science education reform: exploring value-added approaches

This paper uses data from the National Pupil Database to investigate the differences in ‘performance’ across the range of science courses available following the 2006 Key Stage 4 (KS4) science reforms in England. This is a value-added exploration (from Key Stage 3 [KS3] to KS4) aimed not at the student or the school level, but rather at that of the course. Different methodological approaches to carrying out such an analysis, ranging from simple non-contextualized techniques, to more complex fully contextualized multilevel models, are investigated and their limitations and benefits are evaluated. Important differences between courses are found in terms of the typical ‘value’ they add to the students studying them with particular applied science courses producing higher mean KS4 outcomes for the same KS3 level compared with other courses. The implications of the emergence of such differences, in a context where schools are judged to a great extent on their value-added performance, are discussed. The relative importance of a variety of student characteristics in determining KS4 outcomes are also investigated. Substantive findings are that across all types of course, science prior attainment at KS3, rather than that of mathematics or English, is the most important predictor of KS4 performance in science, and that students of lower socio-economic status consistently make less progress over KS4 than might be expected, despite prior attainment being accounted for in the modelling.

The Impact of a Science Qualification Emphasising Scientific Literacy on Post-compulsory Science Participation: An analysis using national data

In 2006 in England an innovative suite of science qualifications for 14–16-year-olds called Twenty-First Century Science (21CS) was introduced. These qualifications have a strong focus on developing scientific literacy in all students whilst simultaneously providing preparation for the study of post-compulsory science for a smaller proportion of students. Claims have been made that such an innovative qualification would impact significantly on post-compulsory science participation—either positively or negatively. Using national data in England to track one cohort of students over 2007–2011, this study compares progression rates to post-compulsory science qualifications in England between 21CS qualifications and more traditional non-21CS qualifications. Methods employed include simple comparisons of proportions progressing from each qualification, and more complex multi-level modelling approaches that take account of both students clustered in schools, and potentially differing demographic and achievement profiles of students in the 2 groups of qualifications. A simple descriptive analysis shows that there is very little difference in overall progression rates between the 2 types of 14–16 science qualification. More fine-grained descriptive analyses show that there are some important differences, based in particular on the interaction between the amount of science studied at ages 14–16, and on the post-16 science qualification chosen (biology, chemistry or physics). Furthermore, sophisticated modelling analyses indicate a consistently negative small to moderate impact on progression from the 21CS qualification. Overall, our findings suggest that the emphasis on scientific literacy within the 21CS qualification suite has not had a major impact on the uptake of post-compulsory science qualifications.

Understanding Student Participation and Choice in Science and Technology Education: The Contribution of IRIS

Many of the chapters in this volume provide reviews of the existing research literature. In this chapter we focus on what the research studies presented in this book have contributed to our understanding of students’ educational choices. The nature of these contributions is varied. Many findings corroborate existing research insights, or explore existing perspectives in new educational contexts or across distinct geographical and cultural settings. In some cases our work challenges prevalent accounts of students’ educational choices. This chapter has five themes: theoretical perspectives; choice as a continuous process; the role of identity and social structure; gender; and methodological insights. We end with suggestions for the future development of research into student participation and choice