Student engagement is an important predictor of choosing science-related careers and establishing a scientifically literate society: and, worryingly, it is on the decline internationally. Conceptions of science are strongly affected by school experience, so one strategy is to bring successful science communication strategies to the classroom. Through a project creating short science films on mobile devices, students' engagement greatly increased through collaborative learning and the storytelling process. Teachers were also able to achieve cross-curricular goals between science, technology, and literacy. We argue that empowering adolescents as storytellers, rather than storylisteners, is an effective method to increase engagement with science.
International and national studies have revealed a sharp decline in student science engagement during the middle years of schooling. In Aotearoa New Zealand, over 20 years of cross-sectional evidence has repeatedly shown high levels of student engagement with science in primary school and lower levels in high school, but very little evidence in-between. In this study, we conducted an engagement survey (n = 429) across Years 7-10 (11-15 yo) to better understand this gap. We found that decreasing engagement with science was only apparent when considering school science, but not in other contexts like choosing science careers or science outside of school. Contrary to common rhetoric of a 'decline' in student engagement with science, we suggest that the middle years are marked with uncertainty about the role of science in students' lives, which would benefit from a shift toward contextualised curricula.
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