Getting to Grips with Science

The following sections are included:

• Dedication
• Acknowledgements
• About the Author
• Contents
• Preface

The following sections are included:

• Natural Curiosity Meets the School Curriculum
• Trying a Different Way
• Summary
• This Book
• Endnote

What is it that fascinates us about science? What issues draw us in ever greater numbers to radio and TV programmes and books about evolution, stars or brain science? There are many answers to these questions, and none alone gives the whole story. In this chapter we analyse the experience of people who have been deliberately offered the opportunity to follow their natural curiosity, to ask whatever questions they like about science and to follow them through in discussion with a science teacher. The records of these discussions are drawn upon to provide insight into just what it is that gets us going when it comes to science.

“Don't ask me, I was no good at science at school.” How often we hear rejoinders of this kind in everyday conversation! Indeed it is so common that many people feel little compunction in admitting it. In this chapter we consider the difficulties expressed by people in discussion groups about their previous experiences of science education. Many factors are involved, including teaching style, syllabus content, examination pressure and gender stereotyping, yet the accounts given over many years by people of differing ages and backgrounds tell a remarkably consistent story. What follows is based on these personal recollections and on some of the more systematic evidence gathered through academic studies of science education…

We have now considered what makes people want to re-engage with science in adult life and looked at some of the difficulties they may have experienced with the subject in the past. In this chapter we look more positively at how perceptions of the subject can be revised, as a preliminary to re-engaging with it in a fresh way. We begin by thinking about how science can seem for people who have not been much involved with it, then move on to how these perceptions might be revised. We take the point of view of a person who is curious about the natural world and wishes to learn, in an unpressurised sort of way, about the fundamental ideas that science has to offer.

The following sections are included:

• Introduction
• Curiosity
• Sources of Curiosity
• Dampening Curiosity
• Fostering Curiosity
• Endnotes

The following sections are included:

• Introduction
• Themes
• Structural Components
• Systems of Classification
• Challenging Ideas
• Extremes
• Summary
• Endnotes

In earlier chapters we considered the kinds of things that arouse our curiosity about the natural world: questions we have always wanted to ask triggered by things we notice in the world around us. Curiosity may lead you to pose a question in your head, perhaps express it to a friend, but all too often it just remains hanging in the air, effectively a rhetorical question. On a good day, however, you may be stirred to pursue a query a little further, perhaps by getting hold of a popular science book or maybe visiting a museum. In this chapter we look at some of the challenges that arise when you decide to follow through by taking your questions more seriously, and suggest some ways of meeting these challenges.

Having addressed some of the challenges in taking your curiosity about the natural world seriously, we now consider the next step: how to extend understanding beyond your initial questions. We look at the kinds of resource available to help dig deeper and to develop a broad understanding of a topic area. First we tackle the practical issues, then some of the intellectual ones.

The following sections are included:

• Introduction
• History
• Uncertainty
• The Experimental Approach
• Theory Building
• Using Evidence
• Ethics
• Summary
• Endnotes

In the preceding chapters we have considered what makes people want to find out more about science and what possibilities there are for doing so after their school days are over. It has drawn directly on the experience of science discussion groups, whose way of working was described in Chapter 1. In this final chapter, the discussion group experiment is reviewed and some of its broader implications explored.

The following section is included:

• Index