Science Education for Diversity

This book explores the issue of science education for diversity from a range of perspectives. All the chapters take a broadly socio-cultural theoretical approach to investigate the contexts of science education. The scope is international drawing on experiences from all the major continents.§Diversity is our main theme and some chapters will discuss how we can conceptualize diversity. As well as the more traditional approach to diversity focusing on externally evident differences of gender and ethnicity we explore the more subtle impact of the diversity of constructions of personal identities and the ways in which these identities interact with existing science education. The chapters of this book all explore how different cultural constructs influence both the teaching of science and the learning of science in a variety of contexts.§By exploring the cultural factors that influence engagement and non-engagement in science education around the world the chapters collected in this book shed light on the topical question why increasing numbers of students are failing to engage with science education in schools. What emerges is that cultural diversity may be central to the reason why science education often fails to connect and to ways in which science education could respond more effectively to the current challenge.