When I was in high school, I had a very enthusiastic chemistry teacher. You could tell he knew chemistry inside and out, upside and down, ’round and ’round. He was a good guy to talk to outside of class …
But man, did he suck at teaching.
No one liked his class because every time he tried to explain chemical reactions, it just sounded like that unintelligible, mumbling teacher on Charlie Brown.
People like my old chemistry teacher are why the University’s new Science Literacy Program is a win-win for students and faculty. Non-science majors will have the opportunity to take interesting science classes, and faculty (along with grad students) will have the opportunity to practice teaching students who don’t have the periodic table memorized.
“Some faculty come into the job without learning how to teach,” said physics professor Michael Raymer, one of the co-directors of the program. “They watched their professors stand in the front of the class and just lecture. (In this program,) faculty can teach each other how to teach.”
Raymer came up with the idea for the program when his graduate students successfully co-taught one of his classes, The Physics behind the Internet. Together with biology professor Judith Eisen and a small group of faculty, Raymer’s idea took off and slowly became a reality.
The Howard Hughes Medical Institute awarded a $1.5 million grant to the Science Literacy Program. The institute periodically awards grants and funding to undergraduate-level education institutions for the exact purpose of increasing students’ exposure to science and research opportunities. This grant is the only one that focuses on non-science majors.
The purpose of the Science Literacy Program is to make “quality general science courses” available for non-science majors. All four physical science departments — chemistry, biology, geology and physics — have come together to design a whole new program that is relevant, interesting and beneficial for non-science majors and graduate students who want to learn how to teach.
“It’s easy to get a student to take a course,” Raymer said. “Once you get them in there, you have to keep them there.”
Emphasis will be on keeping the classes active and interesting. This will include things like in-class activities and using the iClicker system that many students already know. The courses will also focus more on the big picture.
I know from experience that focusing too hard on the nitty-gritty details makes it 10 times more difficult and less appealing to the students who don’t want to be scientists but are interested in a subject.
“Rather than a teacher standing up there blathering on and on, (they’ll use) various kinds of active learning to get students thinking,” Eisen said.
One of the biggest problems in science is the communication of science. How does one explain something so incredibly complex so that people with different levels of background can all understand? Usually science stories on the news are sound bites: decades-long research condensed into two or three sentences. Misconceptions about science run rampant, especially around highly controversial issues like evolution and global warming.
“You cannot look at the media without seeing how science impacts our lives,” Eisen said. “(People who) don’t have sufficient background read a lot of disinformation.”
An example of that disinformation is the definition of the phrase “scientific theory.” To a person who has little background in science, a theory is about as a good as a well-thought-out guess. But to a scientist, a theory is compilation of facts, tests, experiments and results.
Yes, evolution and global warming are theories — but then again, so is gravity.
Part of the science literacy program will be to design courses that will teach students about things like the scientific method (which is one of the most misconceived concepts) so they can learn to critique what they watch or read in the news.
The first class will be taught in the Robert D. Clark Honors College this spring. It’s called Scientific Revolutions, and it will be taught by physics professor Raghuveer Parthasarathy and geology professor Samantha Hopkins. All the courses in the Science Literacy Program will span multiple departments.
Eventually, Raymer wants to see the development of a “science literacy teaching” degree for students who’d like to teach or be journalists.
Thinking back to my high school chemistry teacher, I wish there had been a program like that where he went to school. It’s just not enough to be brilliant in your field anymore. You also have to know how to teach, and sometimes, that’s a tough brick wall to jump.
I’m excited to see how the Science Literacy Program works out.
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