Teaching Science: Content, Method and More?

Science is more than facts, concepts, theories, mathematics and experiments. In the long debate on what science really is, many scientists and philosophers tend to describe science not in terms of its content, but in terms of its approach and method. Thus, definitions of science are often expressed in terms of ‘a body of knowledge’, ‘systematic approach to knowledge’, ‘critical enquiry into the nature of the world’ and so on. Unfortunately, the problems and exercises are rarely taught as method. Instead, they have become tools to discipline the intellect of the students; more a strategy to evaluate the intelligence and competence of students. If, instead of packaging science as is done in our school textbooks now, the same content were presented through a larger framework of human and social interaction through the disciplines of social science and humanities, we might have students with a deeper understanding of science.