Biology Education

2009

The study was carried out within the European research project "Biology, Health and Environmental Education for Better Citizenship" that joined 18 European and North-African countries. We report here the methodology and some of the conclusions drawn from an analysis of science textbooks that considered the topics ecology and environmental education (EEE). Grids were conceived with the aim of revealing value systems conveyed by the exposition of the content and by images. We concentrate on the explicit/implicit presence of two of the four conceptions that have been investigated: complex vs. linear and relation of humans respect to nature in relation to the sub-topics ecosystems and ecological cycles and pollution. Dogmatism, scientism, and non-historical approach were also checked. The findings from the analysis of the sample of seven Italian textbooks for lower and higher secondary school are illustrated and compared with those obtained in Morocco. The outcomes of the analyses show that ecology is not oversimplified, and structural descriptions appear more articulate than the relational and the dynamical ones. The view of ecology communicated by most of the textbooks is rather superficial and incomplete under many respects that we specify. The topic pollution is treated in a fragmentary way, as a "call of attention" added to the description of the environmental components or in Cards included in the chapters concerning the human body. The higher secondary school manuals do not contain more and more articulate information nor they more deeply account concrete cases, familiar to students' experience. Regardless of cultural differences and the diversity in the environmental contexts, the examined topics  Eighteen countries from Europe and Africa have participated in the Project BIOHEAD-CITIZEN CIT2-CT2004-506015 that took into account school manuals, in service teachers and teachers-to-be of biology and of humanities. Values and beliefs underlying knowledge content in topics that are critical for citizenship have been the targets of the investigation. We thank all the other partners for their contribution that made possible this report.

Journal of Phenomenological Psychology, 2000

2021

This work presents an analysis proposal based on theorizations regarding comparative systems of reason, cosmopolitanism and the history of school disciplines, seeking to understand how certain objects become subject to reflection and action in the school curriculum from an international perspective. Comparing historical aspects of the teaching of biology in Brazil and Germany, the article presents a discussion of how the environment has increasingly been constituted as a cosmopolitan value in the biology school curriculum. In theoretical and methodological terms, curricular documents and textbooks are treated as historical sources and an analysis of them is articulated with results of a literature review, evidencing how different cultural organizations are combined to make this object intelligible in the present. The analyses indicate a transnational process of hegemonizing the value of the environment as a pragmatic macro-trend related to the concept of education for sustainable de...

Sustainability, 2022

One of the most important goals in biology education is shaping positive attitudes toward nature, social and global problems, as well as health. Environmental education is an essential element because without pro-environmental attitudes, every environment-protecting action is less successful, and the results have much less impact on society. In the following article, we tried to combine this idea with the school curriculum, which is one of the most important documents used in education. The research question addressed in this paper is to what extent does biology/nature primary school’s education curriculum highlight shaping attitudes (at sensory, functional, and rational levels), and how did it change during the educational reform in Poland? The sample is the Polish core curricula for nature and biology for primary school. National curricula have been revised by the analysis of the content methods before and after the 2017 reform of the education system. The results showed that while sensory and functional levels are represented quite equally in the curricula, the rational level is neglected and has decreasing tendency (when comparing curricula before and after educational reform in 2017). It is presented an interdisciplinary method of analyzing the core curriculum, particularly what relates to attitudes. The presented analysis method is, by definition, interdisciplinary, combining the approach of cognitive sciences, psychology, and science education. On the basis of the research, new elements that should or might be taken into consideration in school practice are proposed. The proposed approach assumes that the combination of teaching ideas and values (that are deeply rooted in our nature) will be successful in shaping pro-environmental attitudes toward nature and health.

SOCIETY. INTEGRATION. EDUCATION. Proceedings of the International Scientific Conference, 2016

In the article, the aims of teaching bioscience in primary and middle school have been introduced. Core curriculum has been mentioned as well, and the tools that may be used by a teacher to convey theory and practical knowledge in the most efficient way have been discussed. Furthermore, it has been noticed that various ecological ventures have a positive impact on children's ecological awareness. In the second part of the article, results of surveys conducted among primary and middle school students have been introduced. It embraces also questions and answers, in which children describe their knowledge level about the condition of environment and talk about their attitude towards taking care of nature, and what are the stimuli of such demeanours. In addition, the task of surveys was to find out which issues teachers pay particular attention to. The last two questions were to check the knowledge.

Biology education in secondary schools can be a good platform to implement elements of the environment among school children. The subjects include environmental elements that can be detailed and refined its contents as specified in MOE publications. In terms of mode of delivery, environmental element in the classroom, teachers need to effectively implement the teaching and learning activities (PDP). Activities adoption of these elements cannot be treated it as a new burden to the existing curriculum. Studies conducted previously showed that students in the primary, secondary or higher have the knowledge and low environmental awareness (Department of Environment, 1996). Some related literature states that the knowledge and low awareness stems from the failure of students to appreciate the environmental values. The problem arises from the difficulty of students to master the concepts of the abstract environment of teaching. Students who do not understand the basic concept of the abstract environment is often looking for short cuts to memorize a concept but do not understand what is being said. Memorizing the concepts of environmental causes meaningful learning does not occur. When meaningful learning does not occur, knowledge and environmental awareness will be at a low level. This opinion is based on the model of Responsible Environmental Behavior (Hungerford & Volk, 1990), which states that individuals with high environmental knowledge and awareness exhibit positive behavior towards the environment. In this context, the role and commitment of teachers is very important to realize applied intention element. Therefore, teachers who have been trained in Educational Institutions must have features and a tendency to think positively about the idea of environmental education through the application of Biology.

This study was done in a period when there are attempts to develop a framework for the sustainable development and sustainable education in order to emphasize the universal significance of biodiversity, sustainable development, and sustainable education. The research reported here is a case study carried out in the spring semester of 2012-2013 academic year. The participants of the study were student teachers enrolled in a general biology course in a preservice science teacher education program at a major research university in central Turkey. The study was designed as a qualitative study and the data of the study were collected through semi- structured interviews and observation forms. The aim of the study was to develop teaching materials about the sustainable education and the sustainability of biodiversity. In parallel to this aim, an experiment of frog breeding was designed and the experiment was carried out by the participants under the supervision of the author. More specifically, the participants were involved in feeding the frogs and cleaning the aquarium. They recorded their observations together with the author. The whole process was shared in the biology co urse. In short, the participants observed how larvas come out from frog spawn that were put in the aquarium and how larvas became adult frogs. Adult frogs were transferred to the nearest creek after the completion of the observations. At the end of the process the attitudes of the participants towards living beings changed positively as their reports indicated. Key words: Sustainability, Sustainable education, Biodiversity, Loss of biodiversity, Agenda 21

The Open Education Journal, 2010

This paper provides a review and critique on the curricular implementations of a variety of issues-based approaches to education including the use of Science Technology and Society (STS) and Science Technology Society and Environment (STSE) perspectives that are influencing curriculum efforts in the US, Canada and worldwide. By characterising aspects of these implementations as a form of technocentric curriculum reform, the paper goes on to describe the problematic nature of this development for science and environmental education. The paper then provides a description of an ecological (context driven) framework for science education, which references the emerging discourse around socio-scientific issues, place-based education and is further grounded in an ecological conceptions of science education that emphasize the 'embeddedness' of human societies and cultures (and their technologies) within place-bound communities. The model describes a range of ecological, socio-cultural and technical influences that provide a framework for educators' diverse interpretations of curriculum.

Research in Science Education, 2011

Research in Science Education (RISE) focuses on the role of the use of socio-scientific issues in science education within the context of the United Nations Decade for Education for Sustainable Development that runs from 2005 to 2014 (Unesco 2003). Papers in this issue describe and assess critically some ways in which the pedagogical approach of basing curriculum around investigations of naturally-occurring socio-scientific issues may attend to both the interests of science education and the newer and highly visible educational discourse of Education for Sustainability (EfS). Speaking at the international launch of DESD in New York in March 2005, UNESCO Director General Koichiro Matsuura set out a clear challenge for ESD: The ultimate goal of the Decade is that education for sustainable development is more than just a slogan. It must be a concrete reality for all of usindividuals, organizations, governmentsin all our daily decisions and actions, so as to promise a sustainable planet and a safer world to our children, our grandchildren and their descendants… Education will have to change so that it addresses the social, economic, cultural and environmental problems that we face in the 21st century (Unesco, 2005, p. 2). This Special Issue of RISE explores ways in which science education itself may 'change so that it addresses the social, economic, cultural and environmental problems we face in the 21st century'. In this sense, this Special Issue addresses a contemporary challenge for the field of science education and therefore research in science education. In exploring the role of socio-scientific issues (SSIs) in responding to this challenge, the authors in this Special Issue do not follow nor prescribe any specific approach; on the contrary a feature of this set of articles as a whole is their diversity around the common SSI theme. While agreeing that SSIs are crucial in education because scientific expertise continues to be highly regarded in society, the articles place differing emphases on their conceptualisation of ways in which education may successfully engage with biotechnology,

2012