Scientific Method of Higher Education

Some Orange County elementary school students had better get ready for a whole lot more science in their future. Knowing what E=mc2 means, or at least, what makes the sky blue, could soon become the equivalent of learning “See Dick run.”

Twenty-eight teachers from elementary schools throughout the county recently completed three years of weekend work toward master’s degrees in teaching science at Cal State Fullerton. All that’s left is for some of them to complete their theses before getting their degrees.

These are not beginners in the classroom--they have taught from five to 27 years. But they are the first group of teachers from Orange County to participate in Project ExSEL, a state-subsidized program to improve science teaching.

Fullerton has been a leader in improving science and math instruction, with its Center for Excellence in Science and Mathematics Education and the Beckman@science program to improve science literacy in kindergarten through sixth grade.

Patricia Romero, who teaches fourth grade at Arovista Elementary in Brea, said the understanding of science she received from Project ExSEL changed the way she looks at the world.

“My family vacations have entirely changed,” she said. “This summer, we’re going to look at the geothermal vents at Mammoth. Before this program, the desert was something I passed through on the way to Vegas. Now, every creosote bush, every piece of burro brush is interesting.”

The primary purpose of the program, however, was not to turn teachers into nature lovers, but to boost the woeful science ability of American schoolchildren.

A comprehensive international study of academic achievement found U.S. 12th-graders ranked in the lower third of the 21 nations tested in math and science.

“There are only so many things you can learn, but science is now viewed as an important subject for everyone in order to keep up with technology,” Romero said.

Not only are these Fullerton graduates supposed to help their students learn science, they are expected to act as resources and mentors for teachers at their schools.

Thirty teachers went through the program. When ExSEL began, all were teaching in Orange County, but two transferred to Riverside County in the middle of the program.

This was the second group to go through the program at Fullerton. The first group, which finished four years ago, consisted of 29 teachers from the Montebello Unified School District. A study found the schools where they taught doubled the amount of weekly science instruction, said John Meyers, Montebello Unified’s science consultant.

Fullerton also offers a more traditional master’s program in science teaching. But in this one, the teachers’ tuition, books, field trips and other expenses are paid for with a grant from the California Postsecondary Education Commission. The selection process was stricter too. Of the 80 applicants, 30 were chosen.

The teachers attended school every other Saturday, except for one year when class was held each week.

The program was the brainchild of Marvin Rosenberg, a biology professor and former associate dean of the College of Natural Science and Mathematics, who started as a secondary school teacher.

“You don’t have to go to too many meetings to hear about the terrible, terrible situation in elementary science education,” he said.

San Francisco State and San Diego State offer similar programs in math.

The Fullerton program was supposed to remedy the lack of science courses elementary school teachers take in college.

“Elementary school teachers are not science prone,” Rosenberg said.

Romero, for her thesis, found that in the school district she studied, few elementary teachers had a strong science background and that only 32% of them had taken physics in high school or college.

“Teachers that generally like science teach it in the classroom, but those that don’t like it, don’t give it much time,” she said. Romero is considering studying for her doctorate in science education.

How much do you have to know about science, though, to teach it in elementary school?

“I feel a lot more secure in knowing what I need to know,” said Margaret Benzie, who teaches second grade at McPherson Magnet School in Orange. “Of course the teacher should know a lot more than the child. But a lot of times because the teacher hasn’t had a lot of science in high school and college, they are just a little bit above the child’s level in science.”