EDUCATION

FIRST THINGS FIRST
High school science education is getting turned on its head, with uncertain consequences

SOPHIE L. WILKINSON, C&EN WASHINGTON

The sequence for high school science education used to be straightforward: biology in the first year, followed by chemistry, and then--if the student was willing to tough it out--physics. "Now there are as many orders as there are schools," says Elizabeth A. Sorrell, director of science education for Belmont Public Schools in Belmont, Mass. Anecdotal information indicates that modifying the science curriculum can improve both science literacy and science interest among high school students, but educators haven't yet quantified the impact with widespread testing.

	FIELDWORK Seniors in Sorrell's AP environmental science class collect and identify animal specimens at the Indian River in Florida.

Physics Nobel Laureate and former Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory director Leon M. Lederman is a vocal supporter of science curriculum reform. "The existing situation is pedagogically dumb," he writes in Forum on Education, a newsletter published by the American Physical Society. He believes that "too many high schools are mired in disconnected, fact-loaded, assembly-line-modeled curricula and pedagogy that bear no resemblance to the excitement of true scientific inquiry and discovery."

In addition, Lederman says, no connection is made between subjects from year to year. And "ninth-grade biology is a turn-off with a huge number of words to memorize." That may be part of the reason that only about half of the high school students who take biology go on to take chemistry, and half of the chemistry students ultimately take physics.

As a result of the deficiencies of the traditional system, he says, schools turn out students who aren't scientifically literate.

As an alternative, Lederman and his supporters for several years have been advocating teaching physics in ninth grade, "using only the algebra that is being learned in eighth and ninth grade. Physics, largely mechanics, electricity, and magnetism, is concrete, practical, dealing with issues and examples that may be drawn from real life just outside the classroom."

The concepts of "atoms, their qualitative electrical structure, the relevant forces, and some introduction to the quantum nature of atomic structure," as well as molecules as combinations of atoms should be taught in the last month of the course, he adds. That foretaste provides a smooth transition into 10th-grade chemistry education.

Samuel E. Dyson, a physics teacher at Chicago's Walter Payton College Prep High School, agrees that some chemistry has a place in freshman physics. He teaches his ninth graders some atomic theory "so that when they reach chemistry they can have a much better sense than they would otherwise of what is meant by a bond between atoms or molecules." Conversely, their introduction to chemistry helps when Dyson teaches the students about electricity and its flowing electrons.

In turn, 10th-grade chemistry provides the groundwork for 11th-grade biology, Lederman says. Seniors can take courses that bring together the three disciplines in subjects such as earth and space science, environmental science, and technology and society. Alternatively, they can take advanced versions of their prior subjects.

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Only about half of the high school students who take biology go on to take chemistry, and half of the chemistry students ultimately take physics.

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TEACHING CHEMISTRY before biology makes sense, agrees Sylvia A. Ware, director of the American Chemical Society's Education/International Activities Division. After all, she says, biology courses these days "are looking more and more like molecular biology." If students aren't primed with a formal chemistry course beforehand, they have to study complex molecules such as DNA and proteins and "do things like memorize relatively advanced biochemical reactions when their understanding of any kind of chemical bond is minimal."

	BODY AT REST Dyson composes himself before a roller coaster ride with his freshman physics students.

On the other hand, Lederman writes in a Fermilab report, the "reversed sequence" of physics-chemistry-biology gives students a chance to "transfer earlier learning into later applications," resulting in improved comprehension from repeated exposure to science concepts.

That sounds good on paper, but are freshmen ready for physics? Equally important, are physics teachers willing to take them on?

"The thought of teaching physics to freshmen, who are often real 'squirrelly' and have trouble paying attention, and who don't have the math background that the older students do, that's a hard sell sometimes," Dyson admits.

But he has found them to be ideal material. "Freshmen are quite a bit more wide-eyed and open to awe than older students can be," Dyson says. "They are so ready for physics because there are so many discoveries to be made, so many things to touch and play with. I think they end the year feeling like physics has the best toys of them all." To learn about concepts such as motion, energy, and acceleration, for instance, Dyson's kids ride a roller coaster at Six Flags Great America.

Freshmen at Dyson's school who want to take physics must have at least a semester of algebra under their belts. But math isn't the only determinant for taking physics or biology first. "I think the fear of physics plays some role," he speculates, "because when we decided to offer freshman physics, many of the parents said, 'It's a little ambitious, don't you think?' "

But once the students dig into the material, they may well flourish. "Parents who were terrified by their physics class" have told Dyson that "their son or daughter, who they thought was an 'English head,' came out of the freshman physics class really loving it."

Belmont has been offering a physics-first option since 1989. Those who take it "have been our most successful students in science," Sorrell says. "Until we did this, we never had a child attempt the Siemens Westinghouse Science & Technology Competition or the Intel Science Talent Search." But since the program was introduced, Belmont students have ranked as finalists or semifinalists every year. "And all of those students began with physics first."

But the school also offers a biology-first program and a sequence that blends different sciences. In part, that's because "Belmont is the home of professors from MIT and Tufts and Harvard, and they all have their opinion about what their children should take first," Sorrell says with a laugh.

Dyson acknowledges that the transition to a physics-first curriculum can be difficult for teachers as well as parents and students. Teachers need to be supported with suitable materials and training. In California, the San Diego school district, which will require all freshmen to take physics beginning this fall, may turn out to be a model for this backing. The system is "training teachers so that they are equipped with activities that are appropriate for freshmen," Dyson says. "They are even training teachers who have never taught physics in order to meet the demand that will be created by the change."

Lederman VISUAL MEDIA SERVICES/FERMI LABORATORY

SOME DISTRICTS are implementing an even greater modification by introducing what's termed an integrated science curriculum, which does away with the traditional "layer cake" method, Ware says. With the conventional approach, "you take one science one year--which is like the bottom layer of the cake," she says. "Then you take another science the next year, which is the next layer. And no integration takes place between the sciences."

Much of the rest of the world uses a more integrated approach, covering more than one science in any given year, Ware says. Topics are revisited from one year to the next to freshen and strengthen students' comprehension.

U.S. educators are experimenting with this style. For instance, a decade ago the National Science Teachers Association developed a program that taught chemistry, physics, life sciences, and earth and space science every year. One of the most challenging aspects of such a curriculum was that it "required a teaching cadre that was often being asked to teach a variety of disciplines," Ware says. "So it never quite got off the ground."

The Millard Public Schools system in Omaha, Neb., introduced integrated science in the 1995–96 school year, but its program never gelled either. "Eventually, it just turned into another earth science class," says David M. Noodell, science department head and chemistry teacher at Millard North High School.

He attributes the lack of success to several factors: teachers who lacked experience and creativity and didn't want to give up favorite lessons and programs, the poor fit of a single curriculum developed for the entire school district, and the absence of strong curriculum materials in the mid-1990s. Noodell's school will soldier on with the program for at least a few more years and will try to improve it.

School systems may find it easier to scale back the approach and teach, say, earth science and chemistry one year, followed by biology and earth science the next. Anecdotal reports indicate that this method is successful and can even energize a school, but Ware says, "Many of the new courses have not been out long enough to give a real sense of what impact they're having."

ACS has chosen not to endorse a particular high school course order. As Ware puts it, "The view was that there was more than one path to righteousness. The Society Committee on Education didn't want to say, 'Physics first is the only way to bring about reform.' "

But in a "Statement on 21st-Century Schooling," ACS urges the development of science curricula that "present science in a logical and coherent sequence that reflects the connections among the disciplines; stress the relationships between mathematics and science; strive for a balance between content and process; and emphasize inquiry and laboratory experience."

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