According to the document Current Challenges in Basic Sicence Education (2011), science is a powerful tool to improve the quality of life of people. Tracing its history, science paved way to advancing technologies which helped upgrade the quality of life from generations to the next. The basic essentials of life such as access to water, food and shelter, all have a strong science component. Good scientific understanding leads to good decision-making. One’s decision affects other individuals as well as the whole community. If children are taught effectively the basic principles of science, not only will they gain a powerful tool to help in decision-making, it will lift them from ignorance and help improve the quality of their lives. This promotes equity and equality because each one will share his or her useful contribution to the betterment of the community and the society. Taking a career in science opens to a wide range of options in the world of work as well, providing wider possibilities for future children and reducing inequalities.
However, even though UNESCO has recognized the right to universal access to quality science education, it remains to have a lot of challenges to achieve this right. One is that although science plays an important part in basic education, it still not included in the primary education in many parts of the world. In third-world countries, majority of the population unfortunately only get to access primary education so they are already deprived of a science education. Without access for all and the ability to make use of opportunities that school offers, then there can be no quality science education at all.
In this fast-paced world ruled by technology, globalization has influenced greatly the field of education, more so science education. Globalization had paved the way for science to have the most rapid, wide-ranging and widespread influence on human society. Knowledge is at everyone’s fingertips for the exchange of and access to information is now easily available to all. It is a great advantage to the growth and advancement of science. Nevertheless, it also offers a great challenge to educators to change the way science is taught in schools, from a mode of transmission to a more active process akin to how scientists do science. Because of globalization, development of new competencies are at necessary and schools have to innovate to accommodate such priorities.
If the rest of the world works towards making science curriculum more competitive and innovative, the Philippines still continues to address challenges that hinders quality science education such as shortage of qualified science teachers, lack of quality textbooks, inadequate equipment, large classes and lack of support from administration.
It is quite alarming when we reflect that these issues and challenges can be easily identified, the lack of qualified teachers for example and yet, they are not addressed properly, if not at all. In Mathematics for instance, aspiring teachers are trained to be able to teach all levels in high school. As such, a math teacher graduate is qualified to teach all year or even grade levels. However, in science, a student-teacher gets to be trained to teach only the branch of science he or she preferred to teach and the problem starts when most science graduates, for example, are trained to teach a certain discipline, let’s say, Biology but the required slot in school is for a Chemistry or Physics teacher. Sometimes because of lack of qualified teachers, schools opt to hire any science graduate even through they may not be competent when it comes to pedagogy of another discipline. The curriculum in college should have been changed years ago. Colleges who train science teachers, especially now that the K12 science curriculum is spiral, should not anymore train teachers to become specialists, but to be qualified and competent in teaching all major branches of science. Specialization could be passed on to masters degree programs or other continuing education programs.
It is the lack of qualified science teachers that bothers me the most and gets me questioning even my own education. Am I also qualified enough to teach the subject I am handling? I handle elementary teachers now who are all Biology majors and I could see how some of them really struggle teaching other branches of science such as chemistry and physics, let alone earth science. If the teacher programs in college could not produce qualified science teachers who could teach all grade levels of science, what more could you expect from the students?
I agree that the quality of science education and the students’ interest in science is greatly dependent on the science teacher, himself or herself. There other issues that the administration and education department should address, but as teachers, our contribution to the improvement of science education lies in our commitment. I completely agree with the qualities of a committed science teacher presented in the module. A teacher must be reflective and collaborative and be a lifelong learner. I couldn’t emphasize more the importance of being a lifelong learner. As a science teacher one should not rely on what he or she already knows because science is a complex as well as a diverse subject. As more discoveries are made through the advancement of technology and the increased speed upon which information gets disseminated, scientific theories continuously get modified and factual statements get changed. Teachers should see to it that despite obstacles, quality science education is delivered through a learner-centered classroom environment and that students become challenged, yet inspired through his or her teaching.
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