Thread Rating:
  • 0 Vote(s) - 0 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Article  Why is India dropping evolution & periodic table from school science? + Flouride

#1
C C Offline
Why is India dropping evolution and the periodic table from school science?
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-01750-2

EXCERPT: A series of changes to school science teaching have resulted in the deletion of the periodic table, explanations of evolution and electromagnetism, and discussions about the sustainable use of natural resources from the textbooks used by children aged 14–16.

These and other topics were removed from the curriculum last year to help lighten students’ workloads during the COVID-19 pandemic. But they have now been removed from textbooks, too. The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), the government-funded but operationally autonomous body tasked with producing India’s textbooks, has not discussed the changes — which will affect more than 38 million children — with parents, teachers or researchers. Those who study science education have told Nature that they’re baffled, not least by the lack of any engagement.

NCERT also wants “a rootedness and pride in India, and its rich, diverse, ancient and modern culture and knowledge systems and traditions”. Some people interpret this as a motivation to remove the likes of Charles Darwin and Michael Faraday, and instead use the time to learn more about India’s precolonial history of science.

India is not the only postcolonial country grappling with the question of how to honour and recognize older or Indigenous forms of knowledge in its school curricula. New Zealand is trialling the teaching of Māori ‘ways of knowing’ — mātauranga Māori — in a selection of schools across the country. But it is not removing important scientific content to accommodate the new material, and for good reason... (MORE - missing details)

RELATED (scivillage): A dangerous trend to decolonize the scientific method


The Fluoride Controversy Never Dies
https://www.acsh.org/news/2023/05/30/flu...dies-17093

The fluoride issue has moved from conspiracy theories of the 1940s and 1950s, claiming it was a communist plot or a government mind-control trick, to today’s science-based debate. The outcome of a court case involving fluoridation could have serious ramifications for EPA rules in the years to come.
Reply


Possibly Related Threads…
Thread Author Replies Views Last Post
  Article EPA uses shoddy science + EBM versus SBM in medical school C C 0 60 May 23, 2023 02:19 PM
Last Post: C C
  Annual evolution meeting raises some questions: More emphasis on Woke than science? C C 0 59 May 13, 2022 04:36 PM
Last Post: C C
  "Woke" school invasion runs into math obstacle from both parents & educators C C 0 67 Mar 30, 2022 05:19 PM
Last Post: C C
  7 'Facts' You Learned at School That Are No Longer True C C 0 251 Oct 1, 2017 04:15 AM
Last Post: C C
  India Opens Homeopathy Lab + Ugly state of science literature C C 0 256 Sep 17, 2017 11:18 PM
Last Post: C C
  Inevitable evolution of bad science + The problem with science writing C C 1 456 Sep 23, 2016 07:01 PM
Last Post: Syne



Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)