Science, Schooling, and Society: Toward an Integrated Curriculum

Authors

Peter B. Dow

Document Type

Article

Abstract

Those of us who have participated in the curriculum movement over the past decade have seen a profound change in the orientation of curriculum makers during this period. In the wave of science-based curriculum projects that followed the launching of Sputnik in 1957 there was little explicit attention given to the social purposes of instruction. The emphasis in those years was on the transmission of knowledge in the most economical form through the identification of central ideas, and on the invention of pedagogical techniques that supported and reinforced the child's natural curiosity and desire to learn. One of the most influential thinkers of the period, Jean Piaget, turned the attention of curriculum makers almost exclusively to the child's processes of cognitive growth, and to individual differences in learning style. Another, Jerome Bruner, wrote an immensely popular book, The Process of Education, that stressed the most effective ways of organizing the transmission of knowledge, while making only passing reference to the social purposes of instruction.

Publication Date

April 1975

Journal Title

Iowa Science Teachers Journal

Volume

12

Issue

2

First Page

19

Last Page

24

Copyright

© Copyright 1975 by the Iowa Academy of Science

Language

en

File Format

application/pdf

Recommended Citation

Dow, Peter B. (1975) "Science, Schooling, and Society: Toward an Integrated Curriculum," Iowa Science Teachers Journal: Vol. 12: No. 2, Article 11.
Available at: https://scholarworks.uni.edu/istj/vol12/iss2/11