Science Literacy for the Twenty-First Century edited by Stephanie Marshall, Judith Scheppler and Michael Palmisano, Prometheus, $29, ISBN 1591020204 Reviewed by Jon Turney
LEON Lederman, ace experimental physicist, former director of Fermilab in Chicago, Nobel laureate, author and all-round good guy, has done more than most scientists for science education. At his behest, a world-class particle physics lab has opened its doors to teachers and students, and inspired many.
So it probably seemed a good idea to make education the theme of this 70th-birthday tribute volume to the great man. But the result is a bit of a ragbag. There are some persuasive critiques of existing science education in the US: fact-filled and light on thinking skills, weighed down with teaching texts 鈥渁 mile wide and an inch deep鈥�.
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There are lots of rather similar statements about why everyone should end up knowing more science than they do now, and why children are naturally scientifically minded. And there are a few pretty mundane essays on physics thrown in, along with brief reminiscences of Lederman and a few words from the man himself.
In short, the whole thing is pretty unsatisfactory. You may agree with Lederman that US science education is largely uninspired and uninspiring, but you鈥檇 have to dig pretty deep for worked-out alternatives here. The best effort is in Stephanie Marshall鈥檚 account of the integrated, exploratory curriculum of the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy. It sounds wonderful, and well worth a close study, but the Lederman-inspired academy admits only the gifted and is clearly geared to the education of future scientists.
For the population at large, the way forward is less clear. Lederman himself has proposed that everyone鈥檚 science education should begin with physics, and then move on to chemistry and biology. This inverts present custom in the US, which leaves many with no acquaintance with physics at all.
Maybe this is a good idea, but it is hard to see it making much of an impression on the mass of science-averse students. Nor is there much real engagement here with wider debate about scientific literacy, or much attempt to explain why past efforts to deliver it all seem to have failed. Instead, the book offers well-intentioned voices preaching to the converted.