Chemical Education Journal (CEJ), Vol. 4, No. 1 /Registration
No. 4-3/Received February 10, 2000.
URL = http://www.juen.ac.jp/scien/cssj/cejrnlE.html
E-Mail: hosoya@is.ocha.ac.jp
Abstract: It is stressed that the role of science teachers, in secondary education this changing time, is becoming more and more important for proper guidance to the pupils to open their eyes toward the importance of science, especially chemistry, for the future of the mankind. Discussion is also given to the question, what is the proper way of scientific thinking, which should be taught not only to the pupils but also to non-science teachers.
According to the traditional curriculum in Japan pupils in the elementary school were supposed to learn the basic skills of hearing, speaking, reading, writing, watching, and calculating in the designated subjects of national language, arithmetic, science, etc. However, nowadays, due to the rapid increase in environmental problems, these pupils not only hear in their daily life but also are taught in their classroom odd and queer technical terms, such as chemical substances, pollution, environment, and so on. In the educational system in Japan all the schools and school teachers engaged in primary and secondary education, namely from elementary to senior high school are required to obey formally or informally the Course of Study, which is provided by the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture (hereafter called Ministry of Education, the historically oldest name) of the government of Japan [1].
The Course of Study, which has been revised regularly almost every ten years, not only governs the curriculum and materials in the textbooks but also decides the upper limit of the level of the related entrance examinations. In 1999 the Ministry of Education publicized the new version of the Course of Study, the slogan of which is "Train the Pupils to Acquire Power to Live out through Liberal Education." Now many publishers are beginning to edit and prepare new textbooks on each subject for primary and secondary education to be used from 2002, in accordance with the nationwide start of full school operation of five-day week.
As a matter of fact there arose hot discussions not only on the content of the Course of Study but also on the procedure for its preparation among the people who are involved in primary and secondary education in Japan [2]. However, no matter how controversial this problem is, the tidal movement cannot be changed at this stage. Then let us see what will happen.
One of the largest changes in the new Course of Study is the introduction of a new subject, "Hour of integrated study" throughout from elementary to senior high schools. This is a kind of cross-curriculum hour, in which, no designated textbook is prepared but the class is taught or guided by a group of teachers of different specialties. The scenario of the set of these hours can solely be decided by each school or district. For example, a group of teachers may alternately or jointly teach some environmental topics and problems surrounding their own town or school in the hours of integrated study.
Since no designated textbook is published for this credit hour,
pupils and teachers may prepare their original materials or worksheets.
They can study either in their own classroom or outside of the
school. Pupils can find the problems or targets to be solved by
themselves, learn what they choose, discuss and draw conclusions,
and finally report the results in their own way of thinking. Except
in a special case or demand teachers are not supposed to score
and to report each student's accomplishment. If this hour is properly
designed and organized by the pupils themselves or by the aid
of an experienced teacher or teachers, the Ministry of Education
says, those pupils will surely acquire or strengthen the power
to live in the coming twenty-first century, when excen
information, internationalization, and diversified things and
affairs will prevail in their daily-life.
Depending on the kind of theme the spectrum of the fields of teachers, who are engaged in the same project, will be diversified widely. Relative weight in and responsibility to the project for each member of the team may also vary. Even before the new version of the Course of Study becomes effective, a number of experimental projects of the integrated study have been tried in many schools, especially in junior high schools under the name of cross-curriculum, because this trend has already been discussed and propagandized on a world-wide scale. As I am not an expert in the field of primary and secondary education, the following opinion might be biased or prejudiced. However, as far as I know, almost all the published reports on cross-curriculum and integrated study in Japan are conducted or planned by the teachers of social studies, English, home economics, or Japanese language, but not science.
It goes without saying that teachers who have been trained in science should take their initiative in the hours of integrated study, especially on the environmental problems and some other topics which are derived from the development of science in a wide sense. According to the statistics, which I have obtained from a comparative study on the Course of Study decennially publicized by the Ministry of Education, we can find more sentences than before involving "environment", "resources", "energy", and "information" in the newest edition of the Course of Study. The increase is contributed largely by the subjects other than science, namely, social studies involving geography, history, civics, homemaking, and manual training. As a matter of fact the frequencies of these keywords appearing in the science section of the new and current Course of Study are almost kept constant. This means that in the science classroom in junior high schools almost nothing has been changed in the description of chapters dealing with these problems, although much more attention has been focussed onto these problems in the hours other than science.
Even without browsing the textbooks of these subjects (of course, they have not yet appeared) one can correctly guess that the human environment on our planet, the earth, is getting more polluted by chemical substances which were scattered around by chemical industries, cars, and daily home garbage with an accelerated speed. The results are, unfortunately, true, indeed. However, without proper knowledge of the history of the earth and universe, and the history of science, industry, and civilization, youngsters are threatened and horrified by the evil facets of what the mankind has invented and produced under the name of modern science, especially, chemistry. Here they need to be carefully taught the excitement of science in the past and present, the role of science in the future, and the problems to be solved by the new scientists-to-be.
Of course, in primary schools pupils are taught several problems related to our environment. However, it is rather difficult for them to judge logically and ethically the raw materials which are taught in their classroom. This decision is duly suspended to the next stage, namely, to their junior high school age. Thus, the role of the teachers, especially of science teachers, in secondary education in this changing time is becoming more and more important for proper guidance to the pupils to open their eyes toward the importance of science, especially chemistry, for the future the mankind.
Even without recourse to authorized statistics on the education systems in the world, we know that nowadays a majority of primary school teachers are female [3]. Especially in Japan, most of them are non-science major graduates from universities and colleges [4]. The percentage of the two-year-course college graduates is still rather high in primary schools. In junior high schools, of course, there are working a good amount of science teachers, but not enough. The problem is that our younger generation who has to understand science well enough to survive the severe twenty-first century is not and will not be properly taught and guided into the essence of science during the important stages of their primary and secondary education. As I am repeatedly commenting in this paper, it is the task of top priority for the science-oriented teachers to teach this issue to their, non-science-oriented comrades. Remember that by the introduction of the hours of integrated study the school teachers will have more chances to discuss with each other deeply and sincerely what and how to teach in their class rooms.
In July last year I had a good opportunity to be able to attend a workshop, the Chemical Societies in the Twenty-First Century, at Ascot, England, where the presidents of the chemical societies of four countries, United States, Great Britain, Germany, and Japan got together to share information about the challenges they face, their activities and to explore areas for collaboration. They decided to prepare a statement to be issued on occasion of the World Chemical Society Presidents Meeting in August, 1999, in Berlin. Besides several practical problems they chose the issue of teacher training, especially for secondary education. Let me quote it here [5].
"Teaching: Chemistry teachers have a critical role in ensuring the vitality of the chemical sciences and improving public understanding of chemistry. Chemical Societies have an obligation to support the continuing education and lifelong professional development of chemistry teachers. Chemical Societies need to collaborate to ensure that chemistry teachers are aware of developments in chemistry and can adapt good practice from around the world to address the needs of their students."
Not only in the new edition but also in the current and older versions of the Course of Study you will see the repeated usage of the sentence "Teach the proper way of scientific thinking". I think this is one of the most important but stereotyped phrases stressing the essence of science education all over the world. Now let us think -about what kinds of concepts should be taught to the younger generation and laymen in order to convince them of the essential way of scientific thinking, because we just want to ask the science-oriented teachers to teach this point to their comrades, namely,and to non-science teachers, of course, to their pupils.
I must confess that I do not think that I have the best answer to the question: what is the proper way of scientific thinking? So, each person is encouraged to try to formulate his or her own answer. Thus the following argument may be deemed as the starting point for all the scientists to discuss [6]. I think the law of causality is the first aspect to be raised. The result and the cause or causes must be connected by at least one objective now of logic without contradiction, irrespective of the fact that we have succeeded in tracing it or not. The logic used here should be independent of space or time. If possible the flow of logic should be expressed mathematically and quantitatively.
Reproducibility is another important issue to be raised. However, we cannot escape from a certain amount of error and fluctuation from any real observation actually performed. Further, in a series of similar experiments or observations, not only in the primary or secondary education stage but also in the sophisticated and advanced projects conducted by the authorized experts, it may sometimes happen that one or more results are deviating seriously from the majority of other data. Similar deviation may occur from the observation of a continuous and smooth change of a certain property against the elapsed time. Although most physical properties, such as the temperature and specific heat of a substance, under certain environmental change may trace a smooth and, of course, continuous curve against time, one can detect a sudden spike of the curve at a certain phase change.
In the history of modern science we can find a number of anecdotes
of great discoveries to which detection of a subtle change by
careful and precise observation has led. This example may be too
sophisticated or advanced for education at the primary and secondary
stages. Especially in the stage of primary education it is very
difficult to convince this facet of experiment and observation
to
pupils. However, I think, by a proper combination of these doctrines
for the logical positivism of scientific thinking or reasoning,
well-trained teachers can teach elementary school pupils the very
big difference between the occult and science.
It is also important for us to grasp the idea of order of magnitudes and to apply it to the problems arising in our daily life. I would like to teach this concept properly to politicians and journalists especially when the problem of dioxine is discussed. We would like to ask for the cooperation of the teachers of mathematics in this propaganda.
"I do not believe in science." More than once have I witnessed some TV talents and politicians, both of whom seem to be influencial to the public, boldly declare the above challenging words. I do not understand why those people are accustomed to submit their body to a reclining seat of a huge jumbo jet liner during their frequent travels without any doubt if some occult power may evilly overwhelm the control of the airplane, a treasure of modern scientific technology, which was carefully designed according to the laws of aeronautic mechanics and manufactured with highly reliable materials and sophisticated technologies. I also do not understand why those sciencephobic youngsters can drive their cars so crazily by utilizing the full power of the machine which was designed and manufactured by a team of honest engineers with the highest knowledge and newest progress of science and technology.
However, if once some fatal accident may occur due to some imperfectness or even their malusage of the machine, those sciencephobic people suddenly turn the sharp blade of their dangerous knife toward us, the scientists. This is also the case with the mechanism of the hysteric reaction of radical people against the awkward development of science and technology without reflecting such strong users demand that might be one of the multiplicatively combined causes of the accident.
Except for a very few cases all the discussions in this presentation are based on the global field of science and not limited to chemistry. Nowadays no branch of modern science is capable of standing and growing alone. In the beginning of this talk I h
ave introduced some controversial discussion on the new version of the Course of Study among so many persons concerned. All the communities in Japan involved in science education including mathematics and physics were violently shaken by this big earthquake. Now many science education communities in Japan have actually begun to tie-up with each other and to take effective action to the Ministry of Education, the public, and pupils all over the country [7, 8].
This trend should not be confined to a small group of people or societies. Every school teacher of chemistry, physics, biology, earth science, or mathematics should tie-up with those teachers working in other fields of science and mathematics in order to take the initiative in their primary and secondary education in the coming twenty-first century.
[1] Course of Study (in Japanese), Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture (Japan), Tokyo, 1999.
[2] See for example: H. Hosoya, Chemistry and Education (in Japanese), 46, 562 (1998).
[3] Chemical Education in Japan (Second Version), Chemical Society of Japan, Tokyo, 1994.
[4] Big Problems in the System of Fostering Teachers the toward Twenty-First Century (in Japanese), H. Hosoya, Nichigaku Sensho No. 9, Nihon Gakujutsu Kyouryoku Zaidan, Tokyo (1997), pp. 447.
[5] Summary of Workshop, Chemical Societies in the 21st Century, Ascot, England (1999).
[6] H. Hosoya, Chemistry and Education (in Japanese), 47, in press (1999).
[7] Butsuri Kyouiku (Physics Education, in Japanese), 47, No. 2 (1999).
[8] Suugaku Tsuushin (Bulletin of the Mathematical Society of Japan, in Japanese), 4, No. 1 (1999).
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