Keith, from the center of the Kansas chaos, posted in response to my
comments:
"Welcome to the real world! If those qualifying statements were not
included in the standards, it would not have been approved. Saying this,
I also agree with the intent of those words. Teaching science is not
about compelling belief, it is always about introducing students to a way
of learning about the world around us, and demonstrating the observation
basis for our current theoretical understanding."
Your first sentence sounds a little bit like a put down, Keith, but I'll
take it with a < G >. As for your second sentence, I'll assume you know
whereof you speak.
I'm in substantial disagreement with the rest of your post. If I do not
try to "compel belief" in gravitation's power to kill someone who flouts
it, or on any number of other interesting physical phenomena such as
electricity, heat, radiation, etc., and stuck only to the "high road" of
" introducing students to a way of learning" then I'd be doing only 1/2
the job. If anyone in the school lab was injured or killed because I did
not "compel belief" in some of those things, I am sure I'd wind up in
court.
Obviously, as George (I think) pointed out, belief cannot be imposed on
anyone who resists. But one can try.
On issues such as the equal number of ribs by gender, or the ancient age
of the earth, or the non coexistence of dinosaurs and humans, or the non
superiority of one race over another, perhaps a good case can be made for
not teaching these "dogmatically," or trying to "compel belief" in any
one of them. Perhaps.
A caveat - I'm thinking more of high school people than graduate
students.
Burgy (John Burgeson)
web page
www.burgy.50megs.com
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Feb 18 2001 - 17:31:26 EST