Goal+1+Artifact

Part One Scientific literature is complex and diverse at any level. For science, literacy goes beyond the requirements found in an English classroom. Scientific literacy can be described as finding the purpose of the words rather than their meanings. A scientific author could write that they selected their experimental plots haphazardly. In an English classroom, haphazardly would mean that the scientists went about their experiment without care. However in a science classroom haphazardly means that the scientists picked specific areas to research rather than selecting randomly. Haphazard in this case leads a scientifically literate student to believe that the scientist is choosing data that would support the hypothesis rather than conducting an appropriate experiment. As we can see, the purpose of using the word haphazard rather than random is found in the way the scientist wants the reader to understand their methods. The approach to science education is more similar to teaching a foreign language than any other course. Students must be able to understand the structure before being able to work through the terminology. The language involved is so specialized that an introductory student to science would be confused by chapter 3 of any science textbook. Students have to learn vast amounts of new words as well as redefine words that were already in their vocabulary. This can be challenging for any student at any reading level. For the purpose of this research paper, I will be considering student comprehension of scientific language, the coherence of science textbooks and possible ways to prevent further miscommunication between students and scientific texts. Science classroom textbooks rarely allow for comprehension checks at the high school level. They tend to introduce a topic then throw the students into applying the concept immediately after. Only through supplementary materials can an idea be explored depth. One main problem that leads to a lack of comprehension in the science textbooks is the difference between calculation and the need to explore a specific idea. Any physics textbook shows how a concept can be used for calculation however reasoning behind that calculation is not thoroughly explained. For example, in an AP physics textbook the students are given information about the correct way to calculate capacitors in series and in parallel. The textbook, however, does not explain why those calculations are done in that way. The text is more than willing to dig into the who, what, and where of science but neglects to delve into the why behind it all. Concannon (2011) explained that students should be able to understand the overall concepts before moving on to more complex problems. The student should be able to see, feel and understand the ideas that support the information before variables and numbers are introduced. Without this form of introduction, the students focus on the mathematical processes and poke away at their calculators rather than exploring why the world around them works the way it does. According to Roseman, Stern and Koppal (2009), the standards-based approach to science education is to promote a foundation for continuous science learning. High school graduates should be able to fit important ideas together and be able to apply them to a variety of contexts rather than only knowing fragments of scientific information. The students should be able to not only put numbers in set formulas and calculate them but understand what those calculations mean. The overall goal of science education is to expand the students mind in a way that allows them to be able to take new information and connect it to past knowledge and hopefully connect between disciplines (Roseman, Stern and Koppal, 2009).

Works Cited Concannon. (2011). Gravity is easy to understand, right? the difference between calculating and comprehending. //Science Activities: Classroom Projects and Curriculum Ideas//, //49//(1), 14-22. Retrieved February 17, 2012, from http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00368121.2011.570381 Roseman., Stern., & Koppal. (2009). A method for analyzing the coherence of high school biology textbooks. //Journal of Research in Science Teaching//, //47//(1), 47-70. Retrieved February 15, 2012, from http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1002/tea.20305