Odd title, don’t you think. According to a growing number of science educators, the science curriculum, burdened by the overwhelming influence of the Standard’s movement, and high stakes testing, is in need of reform. I know this sounds like a broken record in that since Russia launched Sputnik in 1957, the American government has supported a “state of reform.” Even with the millions of dollars that was invested in the re-design, and implementation of “new” curricula, most students did not, and are not benefiting from these NSF curriculum efforts. Although curriculum change was on the minds of educators involved in these efforts, the way in which students are taught has not changed significantly, and indeed, the gap in achievement and interest in science between student groups has remained.

Based on results from the most recent NAEP, the gap between White and Black students in science narrowed slightly at grade 4, while the gap remained unchanged at grade 8, and 12. The gap between White and Hispanic students narrowed between 2000 and 2005, but has remained unchanged at grade 8, and grade 12. Of significance here, however, is the gap has persisted between groups of students based on race and social class.

Most of the reform work was what we call “scientist centered” and tended to create science curriculum as if context and the lived experiences of students didn’t matter.

Yet alongside this powerful effort to change the teaching of science was another “movement” that Glen Aikenhead calls “humanistic science.” It is within this humanistic movement that we are rediscovering “old” traditions that many science educators see as a conduit to reaching the students that the “traditional science curriculum” reform efforts did not reach.

Humanistic science has been at the core of The Art of Teaching Science, and has its origins personally is books I wrote in the 1970s and the 1990s. This view has been strengthened by the work of a number of educators.

In re-writing the book The Art of Teaching Science, my views of humanistic science were enhanced and influenced by Glen Aikenhead’s writings (in particular his book, Science Education for Everyday Life, the work of Fritjof Capra, especially his most recent book, The Science of Leonardo, as well as the thinking of multicultural science educators. The net effect was to enlarge the view of science as presented in The Art of Teaching Science, and to connect this larger view to the notion of humanistic science.

For instance, Aikenhead points out that although “western science” had its origins in the science of the Greeks, and the works that were carried forward from Archimedes, Erathosthenes, and Pythagoras, “indigenous science” has been part of human history far surpassing the time that Western science has flourished. Aikenhead points out that indigenous science is worldwide, and can be found in the experiences of Native Americans, First Nations of Canada, Indian nations of South America, and the first people of Hawaii among others. Humanistic science would include the traditions of “indigenous science” resulting in a more comprehensive and inclusive conception of what is science.

Capra, in his book The Science of Leonardo, argues that the true founder of Western science was Leonardo (1452-1519), not Galileo (1564-1642). However, it was the science of Galileo that influenced subsequent scientists (Newton, 1643-1727) who stood on Galileo’s shoulders. Capra wonders what would have happened if these 16th – 18th century scientists had discovered Leonardo’s manuscripts, which were “gathering dust in ancient European libraries. You see, Capra shows that Leonardo’s view was a synthesis of art and science, and indeed science as a whole was alive, and indeed science was “whole.” Leonardo was ahead of his time in understanding life: he conceived life in terms of metabolic processes and their patterns or organization. Capra suggests that Leonardo, instead of being simply an analytic thinker, was actually a systemic thinker preceding the lineage established by scientists and philosophers including Wolfgang von Goethe, Georges Cuvier, Charles Darwin, Alexander Bogdanov, Vladimir Vernadsky, Gregory Bateson, Ilya Priogogine, and Humberto Maturana.

These are only two examples of traditions that reach further into the past than “Western science” and their “rediscovery” provides further support for humanistic science.

What do you think about this?