What can we do to help improve science education in the US?

If vocational training doesn't happen today, it isn't the schools that are to blame. When I was a left-wing student at Marygrove College and Wayne State University, my friends and I often discussed how society holds the working class in contempt. We talked about how in Europe, waiters and auto mechanics and tailors are valued in the community. Here, a waiter is someone earning a little money while he applies for other jobs, an auto mechanic is someone on the bottom of the totem pole whose ENglish is substandard and there is no work for tailors as people by fairly cheap ready to wear and throw out older garments rather than repair them.

When my parents and my in-laws were in school, there were distinct tracks: college prep, general, business, and, in a few schools, scientific. Most students were in general studies, but not everyone was expected to graduate. Busiess training had an air of some eclat during the 30s and 40s, which was lost in the 50s. Today, there is no business curriculum although people accept business as an acceptable major for college and graduate students, the revers of the 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s.

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JamesMorrison -- I have been reading this thread and decided to stop at page 10, the halfway point. I read half your post at the bottom of that page. As someone who wore uniforms through elementary and high school, I think there is nothing good to be gained by putting kids into uniforms, and I teach at a high school today where I am constantly exposed to midriffs and cleavage. Besides, the clothing industry won't allow it to happen, so we can forget uniforms!

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What can you do?

I dont know Rosborne. Seems to me the US is slipping back into the dark ages.

Perhaps you could pray?

For a return to the straight and narrow perhaps?

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We can begin by teaching our children English proper.

Have you seen how a student unfamiliar with English usage and grammar tackles a maths text?

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Tiped thussly fore affect, I hoep...

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Nearly every school in Massachusetts seems to be seeking a chemistry teacher.

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Here's an example of what *not* to do to improve science education in the US:

TOPEKA, Kansas (AP) -- The Kansas school board's hearings on evolution were not limited to how the theory should be taught in public schools. The board is considering redefining science itself.

Advocates of "intelligent design" are pushing the board to reject a definition limiting science to natural explanations for what's observed in the world.

Source

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Ga...Wha......But.....I'm speechless.

I'd rather have science removed from schools entirely than have the definition of science changed so that non-science fits.

Analogy just popped up:

Let's redefine cattle as: "any four-legged creature", it will be so much easier to use the label "100% BEEF"

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Eorl wrote:

Ga...Wha......But.....I'm speechless.

I know. Stuff like that is just too good to be fiction. Only real life can be that twisted.

I can just hear the recruiters from Princeton and Harvard now... "You came from where? Kansas? So, why do you need to go to Harvard, when they teach you how to turn lead into gold in alchemy class? Wink

"

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Does anyone remember a Frank Zappa song with the line, "Who'd ever thought they would freak out in Kansas?" Well, they've freaked out in Kansas but not in the way Zappa meant. This action by the Kansas school board is an embarrassment to the country. I could understand thinking like this in the 19th C but not today.

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Here's an article everyone should read:

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/05053fa_fact

One of the things I would do when teaching writing is to have kids analyze articles that are well written and present a logical and cogent argument. This article does that. Furthermore, it can be used in science, English and social studies classes.

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If you want a teaching job, major in chemistry (or Spanish, if you aren't scientifically inclined). It seems like every district in this state is looking for a chemistry teacher. So, how do we encourage good people to go into teaching chemistry? Pay them for starters. However, as the economy continues to slide, I'm certain chemists who would have found work elsewhere will be knocking on the doors of high schools.

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Perhaps, if we eliminated some of the neurotoxins in the environment, our children would be better behaved in the classroom.

This weekend, I learned of a study that concluded toddlers who watch more than 2 hours of television each day have lowered attention spans. So, let's limit tv.

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plainoldme wrote:

Perhaps, if we eliminated some of the neurotoxins in the environment, our children would be better behaved in the classroom.

This weekend, I learned of a study that concluded toddlers who watch more than 2 hours of television each day have lowered attention spans. So, let's limit tv.

TV as neurotoxin---I LOVE it, Plain! Laughing

That old idiot box stultifies, kills your imagination. But, you know what, I was just reading over at one of the other threads, and this one guy said that he wished TV had never been invented. You shoulda seen the Piranha attack that hit him for THAT! Watch out, those 2 sharks might come over here and rip you to shreds, too!

Anyway, before I encountered your excellent post, I just wanted to say that they oughtta teach science thru imagination. When I was a kid, I HATED Science like nobody's business, cuz it was so STERILE! If they would just present the universe as one giant art gallery, then it'd spark imaginations.

Another thing: they oughtta teach tessellating. It's a branch of geometry, and if kids could see what kinds of fun art they could create (without ever touching a number!) with geometry, then a lot of them might get jump-started to pursue math further.

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the article wrote:

Certainly none of us has all the answers to fixing our failing schools. But here are a few thoughts, just to add to what I hope becomes a national effort to assure the quality education of the next generation:

* It is time to restore absolute discipline to our public schools and classrooms to eliminate every extraneous program in kindergarten through eighth grade that does not focus on reading, literature, writing, American history and civics, mathematics and natural sciences.

* We should begin to redress the compensation of all public school teachers to ensure that we have the very best and brightest educating our next generation. For me, that means paying teachers far more and demanding far more of them.

* The role of the federal government should be to provide, no matter what the cost, a scholarship program that provides a family stipend to economically disadvantaged students who demonstrate exceptional intellect and talent.

* All graduating seniors in the top 10 percent of their class should be assured federally funded national scholarships to pursue university educations in mathematics, science and English. And stipend programs should be instituted, conditional on an educational commitment to teach in our public schools after their college graduation.

Source

Good ideas? Not enough?

Any other ideas?

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rosbourne -- What about the department chairman who has two applicants for a post: one with a master's degree in the subject to be taught; the other fresh from third string state university with a degree in teaching the subject. The chair hires the latter.

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Let's stir things up by repeating a proposal to eliminate teaching Earth Science at the high school level and launching kids directly into either biology or physics.

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plainoldme wrote:

Let's stir things up by repeating a proposal to eliminate teaching Earth Science at the high school level and launching kids directly into either biology or physics.

In my high school, physics was treated more as a math than a science, and I'm not sure we ever had Earth Science. We had Physical Science and Biology as seperate classes. We also had Chemistry. I think evolutionary theory was taught in Biology, but most of the class was spent on cellular biology.

I actually don't know what the "standard" science curriculum requirements are for Massachusetts any more.

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Science isn't learned at all and classrooms are specifically designed to inhibit its progress.

It's technology you are talking about and as shifting the trash off somewhere else is technology technologists don't like being called technologists so they think of themselves as scientists and technology as science.

Which doesn't make any difference to anybody I suppose, least of all me.
I don't care what they call themselves.

It is taught in schools the same way cookery is taught. If there's a budding scientist in a classroom he will have left the teacher behind yonks ago.

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rosbourne -- I would say that both earth science and physical science are the same thing but that in Arlington, the smarter kids take physical science in high school while the slower ones take earth science. There isn't a state wide expectation, other than students must take a year of lab science.

I want earth, physical or general science out of the high school curriculum and to begin a rung up the ladder.

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What can we do to help improve science education in the US?

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