“Kids these days!”
It’s one of the oldest, most constant complaints: kids today are ruder, lazier, dumber, etc., than they were at some indeterminate point in the past—usually coinciding with when the complainer was a child. But what if it’s not the kids’ fault? What if they simply aren’t getting the opportunity to learn the basic concepts and skills that previous generations took for granted? For science skills, this might be the case.
A spring 2007 study by UC Berkeley’s Lawrence Hall of Science and WestEd looked at science education in Bay Area elementary schools. Researchers found that science has been squeezed out of elementary school curriculums to the point that 80% of surveyed teachers reported teaching less than an hour of science each week—and a fifth of those say they don’t spend any time teaching science.
Teachers reported that, in addition to not having much classroom time for science, they don’t feel as prepared to teach science as other subjects, and what’s more they don’t have opportunities for professional development if they do want to improve their science skills.
Here are kids presenting the study’s findings:
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/GqZUjR-Ex34" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
Those statistics make me, who grew up with science fairs and frog dissections, exclaim, “Schools these days!”
But what if it’s not entirely the schools’ fault, either? School district representatives who were interviewed said that since the No Child Left Behind act took effect, less and less time goes toward science education. This is because all the schools’ energy is focused on meeting NCLB’s testing requirements, which concentrate on basic reading and math.
Where does that leave me in my litany of complaints?
“Education policy these days!!”
Source: “Science courses nearly extinct in elementary grades, study finds,” by Nanette Asimov.
The full LHS report is here.
Photo credit: Notebook photo by Flickr user Bas.K
