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Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 8, Issue 1, Article 11 (June, 2007) Beverley JANE, Marilyn FLEER & John GIPPS Changing children's views of science and scientists through school-based teaching |
Most children's drawings showed the stereotypical 'scientist'; white lab coat, with beakers and test tubes, working in a laboratory and carrying out experiments. Some children said that scientists have useful skills and make lots of money. The majority thought scientists were mostly males, but some recognised that there are female scientists too. Most drawings showed stereotypical images of scientists as looking weird, bad and mad. A representative example is Chloe's drawing (Figure 1) and comments (Figure 2).
Figure 1. Chloe's drawing of a mad scientist (Fleer, Jane & Hardy, 2007:7)
When asked to talk about her drawing:
Chloe "scientists make stuff like potions."
When asked what these potions are used:
Chloe "They turned a man into a lama and then he needed another potion to turn him back into a person."
When asked why she thought that:
Chloe "I saw it on The Emperors New Groove!"Figure 2. Chloe's comments about her drawing of a scientist
Children in Years 5 and 6 had more developed ideas (Figure 3).
Can scientists be fashion designers?
Scientists invent things. They explode things too.
Scientists blow things up! KABANG! BOOM! SHEBANG!
My sister Emile is a scientist. She has a ring in her nose and through her lip!
Scientists learn about things like cells and chemicals.
Investigating things, inventing things, exploding things. That's what scientists do.
Figure 3. Stereotyping scientists by Years 5 and 6 children (Fleer, Jane & Hardy, 2007:9)
In Figure 2 above, Chloe's last comment "I saw it on The Emporer's Groove!" provides evidence of the media as an influencing factor. The following children's comments indicate the influence of television.
"On Survivor they use their T-Shirts to make water cleaner, it was on TV the other night".
"They bent water like this on Wicked Science once, but that was ages ago".One pre-service teacher reflected:
Towards the end of our time with the group, a new show started on TV called Braniac, a show that focuses mostly on explosions, silly and dangerous experiments. They would talk about it during our sessions and it definitely influenced their view of science. This show made science seem more cool because they did crazy and funny experiments.
Children as rudimentary scientists
By the end of the science program some children realised that they themselves were scientists (Figure 4).
WE ARE SCIENTISTS!
We worked as a group!
Figure 4. Children working in a scientific way
Consistent with these views, one pre-service teacher reflected:
Children benefit a great deal more when the lesson and the topic is interesting, motivating and where they can actually get involved themselves. This enables them to discover and construct their own meanings and in a sense become mini-scientists themselves. I would like to continue using a hands-on/discovery approach when teaching science as it gives the power to the children and sees them as the pivotal part of science teaching. (our emphasis)
Another pre-service teacher planned to challenge the children's stereotypical views of scientists and science as the following reflection shows:
The students had a fantastic time conducting the food experiments. They were excited because the experiments belonged to them: it was their ideas that formed this lesson. I wanted to show students that science wasn't "hard work done by those geeky guys in white coats and glasses". I wanted to show them science is a part of our daily lives and a subject that everyone can be actively involved in. I know I succeeded at this task when a student approached me and declared: "I thought that Science was just Chemistry stuff. This is so fun! I want to be a scientist when I finish school". (our emphasis)
Evidence of changes in the children's views
Table 1 contains data that show children's views before and after the small group teaching experiences. There is evidence of changes in their views.
Table 1. Children's views of science and scientists
Children's 'initial' thoughts about science and scientists
Children's thoughts about science and scientists 'after' the group teaching
Gp 1. Science is: Science is: experiments, fun, making things, putting things together, science works, learning, blowing things up, fun finding out how air works, trying different lots of things, digging up fossils, creating your own experiments
Gp 2. Science is: Science is: about making things explode (J) about exploring the things around us (J) doing interesting stuff (Je) about bugs and things (Je) making volcanoes (S) doing experiments (S) boring stuff (L) trying my hardest and experimenting with different things (L) boring (Ja) learning electricity (Ja) making medicines (D) fun and doing lots of different experiments (D) blowing things up and inventing things (Jo) learning about different stuff (Jo)
Gp 3. Science is: Science is: static electricity, heat, food (J) chemical reactions. I don't like some scientists. We did lots of stuff (J) chemicals, light (L) great, lots of things, I am a scientist (L) food (N) can be fun. Is not just about food (N) chemicals, solar system, electricity, experiments, magnets, energy (Je) physical reactions. It is really fun. It's about experimenting. Scientists rock! (Je)
Gp 4. Scientists are: Science is: nerds, freaks, dissect things, destroy the best, cool
Gp 5. Science is: mixing chemicals and blowing things up (R) Science is fun! Now I know about chemical reactions (R) growing plants (Sa) I like Science. I can do it (Sa) chemicals, liquids and labs (E) Everything we do is science (E) doing experiments, discovering new things (S) Science is everything (S) testing all different things (chemical reactions) (T) Lighting a light bulb with a battery is science (T) making volcanoes (K) There is science when we make sherbert (K) One pre-service teacher reflected on the effect of the students' hands-on exploration with materials.
We are able to see how the students' thoughts before and after changed because of the results. Usually one or two students expected the outcome to occur but often there was some debating prior to the experiment that actually led to the students being more interested in the results.
I believe the students learned from our experiments and they were always interested in what we would be doing each week. Their beliefs about science and science stereotypes were challenged, but in a way that they found fun and you can tell from their responses that are occasionally joking yet contain some serious thought shifts. I found that they were able to solidly back up their own theories.
Figure 4 above shows that by the end of the semester of hands-on activities with the pre-service teachers, some children thought they were working in a scientific way. These children value working in groups, researching, exploring, discovering and theorising, which incorporate cognitive and affective dimensions and reveal positive attitudes towards science. The pre-service teachers were doing science with the children and in the process changing their own ideas and that of the children. Fleer, Jane and Hardy (2007) call this 'reciprocal teaching'.
