Background Investigations of evolution knowledge and acceptance and their relation are central to evolution education research. Ambiguous results in this field of study demonstrate a variety of measuring issues, for instance differently theorized constructs, or a lack of standardized methods, especially for cross-country comparisons. In particular, meaningful comparisons across European countries, with their varying cultural backgrounds and education systems, are rare, often include only few countries, and lack standardization. To address these deficits, we conducted a standardized European survey, on 9200 first-year university students in 26 European countries utilizing a validated, comprehensive questionnaire, the “Evolution Education Questionnaire”, to assess evolution acceptance and knowledge, as well as influencing factors on evolution acceptance. Results We found that, despite European countries’ different cultural backgrounds and education systems, European first-year university students generally accept evolution. At the same time, they lack substantial knowledge about it, even if they are enrolled in a biology-related study program. Additionally, we developed a multilevel-model that determines religious faith as the main influencing factor in accepting evolution. According to our model, knowledge about evolution and interest in biological topics also increase acceptance of evolution, but to a much lesser extent than religious faith. The effect of age and sex, as well as the country’s affiliation, students’ denomination, and whether or not a student is enrolled in a biology-related university program, is negligible. Conclusions Our findings indicate that, despite all their differences, most of the European education systems for upper secondary education lead to acceptance of evolution at least in university students. It appears that, at least in this sample, the differences in knowledge between countries reflect neither the extent to which school curricula cover evolutionary biology nor the percentage of biology-related students in the country samples. Future studies should investigate the role of different European school curricula, identify particularly problematic or underrepresented evolutionary concepts in biology education, and analyze the role of religious faith when teaching evolution.
Mechanisms are central in scientific explanations. However, developing mechanistic explanations is difficult for students especially in domains in which mechanisms involve abstract components and functions, such as genetics. One of the core components of genetic mechanisms are proteins and their functions. Students struggle to reason about the role of proteins while learning genetics and show limited ability to provide mechanistic explanations of genetic phenomena. In genetics education there are currently two competing theoretical frameworks regarding what domain‐specific knowledge about proteins is important for reasoning about genetic mechanisms. One framework assumes knowledge about specific protein functions in the body, a tool kit of functions; the other framework assumes more abstracted knowledge about protein interactions that are common to all protein functions. These frameworks implicate different instructional frameworks: One offers to provide concrete examples of protein functions while the other offers a more general description of protein activity. Our aim in this study was to ascertain the ways in which students' reasoning about proteins' role in genetic phenomena (both familiar and novel) relates to the two theoretical frameworks. Toward this end we engaged 7th grade students in learning about proteins functions in the mechanisms underlying genetic traits using an online simulation environment that embodied key aspects of both frameworks. We analyzed students' responses to the final test questions in which they were asked to generatively reason about the underlying mechanisms of two novel genetic traits. Our findings suggest that students use proteins in their explanations mainly when they can explain the protein function and that knowledge about a few specific functions is insufficient to support conceptualization of new functions. Moreover, knowledge of general protein activities common to most functions is also insufficient. We suggest a new combined approach to supporting students' understanding of proteins' role in genetic mechanisms.
Resumen: En este trabajo exponemos un análisis de los curricula de ciencias de Reino Unido, Francia, Suecia, Portugal, España y Estados Unidos, para comprobar la presencia de la teoría de la evolución, como marco o como contenido. Esta revisión internacional de la normativa para Educación Primaria o Básica nos ha permitido hacer una comparación, cualitativamente significativa, de este tema en contextos legislativos y sociopolíticos diversos. A partir del análisis de los contenidos, se ha comprobado la existencia, o no, de las ideas nucleares ("core ideas") necesarias para construir el razonamiento sobre evolución. Con los resultados, hemos clasificado los estados según el diferente grado de incorporación de constructos relacionados con el modelo de la evolución. Se ha observado que, en aquellos lugares donde se incluye en el curriculum, aparece una clara posibilidad de conseguir una progresión de aprendizaje sobre el modelo. Finalmente, concluimos que esos avances pueden servir de guía para aquellos estados con menor presencia de contenidos sobre el modelo de evolución biológica en sus curricula, que son España y Portugal. Se dotaría así a la ciudadanía de los conocimientos necesarios para tomar decisiones fundamentadas en numerosos temas relacionados con la evolución, relativos a su salud y responsabilidad cívica.Palabras clave: Educación Primaria, curriculum de ciencias, modelo de evolución, progresión de aprendizaje.The model of biological evolution in the curriculum of Primary Education: An international comparative analysis Abtsract: This paper analyses the Science curriculum of Primary Education from United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Portugal, Spain and United States of America. The main purpose is to identify whether biological evolution is included on it, either as framework or as content. This international review of the legislation of Primary / Elementary Education has enabled us to deeply compare how such different legal and socio-political contexts deal with this topic. The analysis of the content have shown the existence, or not, of the core ideas to build up the reasoning about the theory of evolution. The results have allowed us to classify the states according to the different degree of introduction of constructs related to the evolution model. Wherever evolution is included in the curriculum, an effective learning progression of the model is actually possible to achieve. Thus, the citizenship would be provided with the knowledge required to make informed decisions on a wide variety of issues related to evolution, both in terms of health and civic responsibility. IntroducciónLa teoría de la evolución arrastra la polémica desde su aparición hasta la actualidad. Científicos de la época se negaron sistemáticamente a la aceptación de la teoría darwiniana y el debate alcanzó pronto a la sociedad, que recibía datos sueltos que representaban la evolución con la imagen del ser humano como un mono. Tampoco la teoría sintética de la evolución ha evitado el problema: en la posguerra española se vivía bajo un...
While several researchers have suggested that evolution should be explored from the initial years of schooling, little information is available on effective resources to enhance elementary school students’ level of understanding of evolution by natural selection (LUENS). For the present study, we designed, implemented, and evaluated an educational activity planned for fourth graders (9 to 10 years old) to explore concepts and conceptual fields that were historically important for the discovery of natural selection. Observation field notes and students’ productions were used to analyze how the students explored the proposed activity. Additionally, an evaluation framework consisting of a test, the evaluation criteria, and the scoring process was applied in two fourth‐grade classes (N = 44) to estimate elementary school students’ LUENS before and after engaging in the activity. Our results show that our activity allowed students to link the key concepts, resulting in a significant increase of their understanding of natural selection. They also reveal that additional activities and minor fine‐tuning of the present activity are required to further support students’ learning about the concept of differential reproduction.
While several researchers have suggested that evolution should be explored from the initial years of schooling, little information is available on effective resources to enhance elementary school students’ level of understanding of evolution by natural selection (LUENS). For the present study, we designed, implemented and evaluated an educational activity planned for fourth graders to explore concepts and conceptual fields that were historically important for the discovery of natural selection. Observation field notes and students’ productions were used to analyse how the students explored the proposed activity. Additionally, an evaluation framework consisting of a test, the evaluation criteria and the scoring process was applied in two fourth-grade classes to estimate elementary school students’ LUENS before and after engaging in the activity. Our results suggest that our activity allowed students to effectively link all of the key concepts in the classroom and produced a significant increase in their LUENS. These results indicate that our activity had a positive impact on students’ understanding of natural selection. They also reveal that additional activities and minor fine-tuning of the present activity are required to further support students’ learning about the concept of differential reproduction. We also observed a low level of teleological predictions for both pre- and post-tests.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.