Attempts to amend state science curricula to mandate equal time for “creation science”, to delete the word evolution, or to prohibit any discussion of evolution and natural selection have occurred recently in Kansas and Georgia, to name two examples. There will surely be other efforts to define science differently from what is arrived at by consensus among its practitioners, and it will require vigilance and effort to maintain appropriate scientific content in curricula. However, pedagogy as well as content has become an issue. On March 10, the California State Board of Education approved Criteria for Evaluating Science Instructional Materials for Kindergarten through Grade Eight that will apply to adoptions of materials and textbooks that will be submitted in the fall of 2006 (2). One section of these approved criteria states that, to be considered for adoption, an instructional materials submission must provide,

A table of evidence in the teacher edition, demonstrating that the California Science Standards can be comprehensively taught from the submitted materials with hands-on activities composing at least 20 to 25 percent of the science instructional program (as specified in the California Science Framework). Hands-on activities must be cohesive, connected and build on each other to lead students to a comprehensive understanding of the California Science Content Standards.

This statement is in accord with evidence from science education research and with scientists’ intuition that students learn science more effectively when they base their conclusions on hands-on, experimental evidence. The pathway to this statement was somewhat rocky, however. A January 16 draft of the same paragraph was quite different. It said

A table of evidence in the teacher edition, demonstrating that the California Science Standards can be comprehensively taught from the submitted materials with hands-on activities composing no more than 20 to 25 percent of science instructional time (as specified in the California Science Framework). Additional hands-on activities may be included, but must not be essential for complete coverage of the California Science Standards for the intended grade level(s), must be clearly marked as optional, and must meet all other evaluation criteria.

This almost complete turnaround in favor of hands-on, inquiry-oriented science did not happen of its own accord. Many organizations, such as the California Science Teachers Association and the National Academy of Sciences, lent strong support to changing the criteria to favor hands-on science, and, happily, their advice was heeded.

The California criteria are crucial, because publishers of instructional materials who cannot meet them cannot sell their materials in the nation’s most populous state, which constitutes their largest market. Thus publishers would have moved quickly to change textbooks so that no more than 25% of instruction would have involved hands-on materials. Given that hands-on activities in excess of the 25% limit would have had to “be clearly marked as optional”, few if any publishers would have put more than 25% hands-on activities in their materials. As a consequence, teachers and students in other states would probably have been deprived of the option of a fully hands-on curriculum, since very few publishers would have provided support materials. That criteria approved in one or two states might limit choices in the rest of the country is disturbing. It implies that those of us in the other states must keep a watchful eye on states like California and Texas that have large populations and statewide adoption criteria.

The power of standards is disturbing in another way. Unless standards are regularly examined and updated, they may become a major impediment to change. Another section of the criteria approved in California requires publishers to provide that, “Extraneous lessons or topics that are not directly focused on the standards are minimal, certainly composing no more than 10 percent of the science instructional time.” Chemistry and other sciences are changing rapidly, with new, exciting developments every week and new fields coalescing every year. With tests and instructional materials tightly tied to standards and curricula written a few years ago, how will students find out about the new, exciting science? Will teachers whose evaluations depend on their students’ doing well on tests take time to introduce new ideas? Major efforts will need to be made to insure that national standards are re-examined and, if necessary, updated every couple of years, and criteria for instructional materials in every state are also suitably altered. Otherwise the inertia inherent in standards may ultimately become a target of yet another phase of educational reform.

Literature Cited

1. National Research Council, National Science Education Standards; National Academy Press: Washington, DC, 1996 (accessed Apr 2004).
2. California State Board of Education, Criteria for Evaluating Science Instructional Materials for Kindergarten through Grade Eight, 2004 (PDF; accessed May 2004).