ABSTRACT

In 1993 I wrote an article in which I attempted to reconcile the demands of cultural pluralism and antiracism via a series of curriculum proposals grouped into three broad, but overlapping and interacting categories: ‘Science Education in a Multicultural Setting’, ‘Antiracist Science Education’ and ‘Taking a Global View’ (Figure 9.1) (Hodson, 1993a). Embedded within this framework are three different perceptions of science. First, science as perceived by the students: their understanding of scientific concepts, their explanations for phenomena and events, their knowledge of scientific procedures. Second, science as perceived by the community of scientists and expressed in the science curriculum as particular conceptual and procedural knowledge. Third, alternatives to the traditional view of the nature of science and scientific inquiry that reflect different philosophical and sociological perspectives on the purposes and procedures of scientific practice.