Science/Technology/Society (S/T/S) is a reform effort to broaden science as a discipline in schools and colleges; to relate science to other facets of the curriculum; and to relate science specifically to technology and to the society that supports and produces new conceptualizations of both. S/T/S is also defined as the teaching and learning of science/technology in the context of human experience. It focuses on a method of teaching that recognizes the importance that experience in the real world has on the learning process. And it recognizes that real learning can occur only when the learner is engaged and able to construct her or his own meaning. Science/Technology/Society as Reform in Science Education, is rich with examples of such teaching and learning. It includes impressive research evidence that illustrates that progress has been made and goals have been met. For teachers and administrators alike, this book provides and validates new visions for science education.

Science/Technology/Society (S/T/S) is a reform effort to broaden science as a discipline in schools and colleges; to relate science to other facets of the curriculum; and to relate science specifically to technology and to the society that supports and produces new conceptualizations of both. S/T/S is also defined as the teaching and learning of science/technology in the context of human experience. It focuses on a method of teaching that recognizes the importance that experience in the real world has on the learning process. And it recognizes that real learning can occur only when the learner is engaged and able to construct her own meaning. Science/Technology/Society As Reform in Science Education is rich with examples of such teaching and learning. It includes impressive research evidence that illustrates that progress has been made and goals have been met. For teachers and administrators alike, this book provides and validates new visions for science education.

Science/Technology/Society (S/T/S) is a reform effort to broaden science as a discipline in schools and colleges; to relate science to other facets of the curriculum; and to relate science specifically to technology and to the society that supports and produces new conceptualizations of both. S/T/S is also defined as the teaching and learning of science/technology in the context of human experience. It focuses on a method of teaching that recognizes the importance that experience in the real world has on the learning process. And it recognizes that real learning can occur only when the learner is engaged and able to construct her or his own meaning. Science/Technology/Society As Reform in Science Education is rich with examples of such teaching and learning. It includes impressive research evidence that illustrates that progress has been made and goals have been met. For teachers and administrators alike, this book provides and validates new visions for science education.

David D. Kumar and Daryl E. Chubin We live in an information age. Technology abounds: information tech nology, communication technology, learning technology. As a once popular song went, "Something's happening here, but it's just not exactly clear." The world appears to be a smaller, less remote place. We live in it, but we are not necessarily closely tied to it. We lack a satisfactory understanding of it. So we are left with a paradox: In an information age, information alone will neither inform nor improve us as citizens nor our democracy, society, or in stitutions. No, improvement will take some effort. It is a heavy burden to be reflective, indeed analytical, and disciplined but only constructively constrained by different perspectives. The science-based technology that makes for the complexity, contro versy, and uncertainty of life sows the seeds of understanding in Science, Technology, and Society. STS, as it is known, encompasses a hybrid area of scholarship now nearly three decades old. As D. R. Sarewitz,a former geologist now congressional staffer and an author, put it After all, the important and often controversial policy dilemmas posed by issues such as nuclear energy, toxic waste disposal, global climate change, or biotech nology cannot be resolved by authoritative scientific knowledge; instead, they must involve a balancing of technical considerations with other criteria that are explicitly nonscientific: ethics, esthetics, equity, ideology. Trade-offs must be made in light of inevitable uncertainties (Sarewitz, 1996, p. 182).

This text examines: the roots of STS education; the pragmatic heart of STS, projects and programmes as they actually exist in classrooms; the cultural aspects of science education; the reasons women often feel alienated from existing valid and neutral science; and research into STS education.

This text celebrates the fact that science-technology-society (STS) has come of age in schools. STS science reform has been nurtured worldwide by the political economics of science and technology today and by heightened public concern for an environment at risk. Reform means changing the orthodox teaching of science from a monolithic, socially sterile rhetoric of conclusions to a culturally relevant study of scientific facts and principles connected to the political, economic, technological and ethical realities of the communities where students live. This volume offers an internationally diverse collection by educational leaders, including Peter Fensham, David Layton, Hilary Rose, Herb Thier, Bill Williams and John Ziman.

This is the first book to address moral reasoning and socioscientific discourse. It provides a theoretical framework to reconsider what a "functional view" of scientific literacy entails, by examining how nature of science issues, classroom discourse issues, cultural issues, and science-technology-society-environment case-based issues contribute to habits of mind about socioscientific content. The text covers philosophical, psychological and pedagogical considerations underpinning moral reasoning, as well as the status of socioscientific issues in science education.