NCCRESt

part of the Education Reform Networks

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Science Curriculum

• Epistemic Universalism and the Shortcomings of Curricular Multicultural Science Education
  Identifies both epistemic and political shortcomings in the portrayal of science found in curricular multicultural science education. This approach denies the unique characteristics of Western science as it ignores the particular strengths of other systems of thought and has the unexpected political effect of reaffirming scientism.
• Equity for Black Americans in Precollege Science
  Explores many of the experiences that Black Americans have in science education in the United States and proposes changes so that Black Americans have an equitable opportunity to engage in and learn quality science. Suggestions include preparing multicultural science teachers, eliminating tracking in schools, equipping classes with science curriculum materials and technology, and supplying financial resources.
• Going Beyond Cultural Pluralism: Science Education for Sociopolitical Action
  Combines some guiding principles of antiracist education with Vygotskian notions of education as enculturation to produce a set of proposals for a radical form of multicultural science education for sociopolitical action. Outlines a radical form of curriculum development involving the politicization of teachers as the only effective way of implementing such a curriculum.
• Native American Perspectives
  On the Fajada Butte in New Mexico, 11th-century Anasazi constructed a site that marks the high and low points of the orbits of the sun and the moon. This unit on astronomy challenges students to think differently about the moon and about the ability of native people to understand the natural world.
• Phytochemistry and Culture
  Describes a trend in science teaching marked by shifts in philosophies and practices and by a search for science content that draws from the experiences of a culturally diverse student population. (DDR).
• Science Activities To Develop Transcultural Understandings
  Details an instructional approach to understanding another culture through the use of kits that enables children to learn at their own pace. This approach focuses on similarities among and between cultures and allows students to explore a variety of science concepts and understandings.
• Science Education in a Multiscience Perspective
  Argues that a multiscience perspective on science education affords richer implications for reflection and practice than does multiculturalism. Recognizes the existence of various types of science at play in all science classrooms, especially personal science, indigenous science, and Western modern science.
• Seeing a World in a Grain of Sand: Science Teaching in Multicultural Context
  Describes the Imagining Nature Project at Deakin University in Australia, and the Native Eyes Project at the Institute of American Indian Art in New Mexico. Both projects entail the teaching of science and technology to non-science majors of highly diverse cultural origin.
• Towards A Pragmatic Science in Schools
  Contrasts naive beliefs about the nature of science with science as it appears from sociological and philosophical study, feminist critique, and insights from multicultural education. Pragmatic school science is situated within a framework that questions how we know and the recognition that even high-status knowledge can be challenged.