Broadening Secondary School Science

There is much that is good in England about school science. Compared to most countries, we have well qualified teachers and a tradition of practical work with employed laboratory technicians (at least in in secondary schools). As a society, we value science and many scientists are held in high esteem. However, we have one big problem. And that is that too many students by the time they are 16 are delighted to turn their back on the subject.

Many suggestions have been made as to how we can engage more young people with science. Our own work has shown that when teenagers recognise the ways that continuing with science can help them get good jobs, they are more likely to continue with the subject. But the fact remains that many teenagers find science too narrow for them. They feel that it doesn’t allow them to demonstrate creativity in the way that many other subjects, in particular the humanities, do. Science doesn’t feel part of their identity.

With this in mind, and with funding from the Templeton World Charity Foundation, as part of their ‘Big Questions in Classrooms’ initiative, we have begun a project to broaden secondary school science. Our thinking is that, for many teenagers, secondary school science education in England is too narrow; it presents a restricted vision for science. In particular, it ignores most of the ways in which science relates to other disciplines of knowledge.

We are therefore seeing whether the provision of Professional Development and classroom materials can help teachers of secondary science to develop their teaching so as to enable their students to develop a richer conception of science, one that gives them a better understanding of how science relates to other subjects, and is more engaging for them.

This is a three-year project and it’s early days – we only started in September 2018 – so, with a team of experts, we are in the process of developing these classroom materials. If you would like to know more about the project, simply enter your name and e-mail address here and we will keep you informed.

Dr Tamjid Mujtaba and Professor Michael J. Reiss, UCL Institute of Education