Science literacy through the lens of critical feminist interpretive frameworks
✍ Scribed by Mary M. Atwater
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 1998
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 13 KB
- Volume
- 35
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 0022-4308
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
asserted that science literacy includes understanding science and the general culture and their mutual impact on each other. Therefore, his article explores the pedagogical value of students' studying the nature of science and its interface with the general culture. Even Shamos (1995) and other positivists emphasize the importance of the nature of science, which is the essence of scientific inquiry. Students come to comprehend that the distinguishing attribute of science as a discipline is the formation of questions about natural phenomena and experimental designs to obtain the most convincing arguments to explain natural phenomena. Since science is restricted to investigating natural phenomena, it has its own limitations. Scientists have been and continue to be influenced by their political and sociocultural histories. Unfortunately, science is characterized as being objective; therefore, many people believe scientists who advocated that the results from their studies verified the inferiority of people of color, females, gays, lesbians, and poor people and condoned oppressive policies and practices. Even today, few scientists renounce the prevarication that people with more melanin in their skin are both mentally and emotionally inferior. Consequently, students need to develop the knowledge and skills to be able to ascertain whether scientific evidence justifies a claim or conclusion. Because Normal (1998) believed that science literacy is the responsibility of the entire school curriculum, he advocated that history teachers be involved in this effort. How can history teachers help accomplish this goal when many K-12 science teachers do not understand scientific inquiry?
Critical feminist interpretive frameworks have common assumptions: Virtual reality is shaped by social, political, cultural, economic, ethnic, and gender values; findings are value-mediated; and methods for research studies are dialogic and dialectical in nature (Guba & Lincoln, 1994). Utilization of these frameworks enlightens learners, teachers, and scientists about the