US High School Laboratories Suck.

[NNadir]

Here's a not too surprising fact from a country run by dumb fundementalist MBAs:

"WASHINGTON - While sleek crime-scene TV shows have turned students on to forensic science, an investigation of today's high school laboratories shows that reality isn't so flattering.


The typical high school lab is an isolated add-on that lacks clear goals, does not engage students in discussion and fails to illustrate how scientific methods lead to knowledge, says a report by the National Research Council.

Most of the labs are of such poor quality that they don't follow basic principles of effective science teaching, says the council, a private adviser to government leaders on matters of science and engineering.

Contributing to the problem: teachers who aren't prepared to run labs, state exams that don't measure lab skills, wide disparities in the quality of equipment, and a simple lack of consensus over what "laboratory" means in the school environment..."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050808/ap_on_sc/science_labs

[NorCalDem]

1. We don't need science labs....

all we need is the Good Book! :sarcasm:

[RobertSeattle]

2. Who needs a lab when the Bible has all the science answers?

:evilgrin:

[Dudley_DUright]

3. My experience working with HS science teachers is that

of all the reasons cited this one is the biggest:

state exams that don't measure lab skills

I have seen HS labs that were wonderfully equipped but hardly used since the lab skills learned were not reflected on the state (FL in my case) standardized exams so the teachers spent more time teaching material that was on the exams instead of spending time in lab.

[Desertrose]

5. This "teaching to the tests" starts in first grade...I am not surprised

that if its not on the state/nat'l exams then its the first thing cut in the school budget.

I had hoped that after so many years out of school that the quality of education would have gone up. Too bad for all of us that it went the other way.

What happened to the idea that you taught so the could would actually have knowledge...now its just "learn the answers" to some disconnected questions. How sad and what a waste.

[Kraklen]

4. They sure do.

So do sleek crime-scene TV shows.

[bemildred]

6. US High Schools Suck. nt

[Massacure]

7. This doesn't surprise me.

Chemistry and physics are taken during junior and senior year at my high school. Our counselors usually recommend taking chemistry first because an extra year of math is usually very helpful in physics. So as a high school senior this fall, I will be taking advanced placement physics, and I finished advanced placement chemistry last year. A friend of mine took regular chemistry.

The biggest difference I noticed is that my friend received tons of homework, while I ended up with very little. A lot of the information covered in my class was done through lectures and labs. About half of my class time was lectures with the other half being labs. My friend says that they did labs about once a week much like that article NNadir referred to says. A lot of my friends information also came out of a textbook. Both of our classes use the same textbook, but my class probably used it only two or three times throughout the entire year. The book was very useful for studying though, especially the review questions in it.

Besides having more lab time, my class was also required to write reports about them as opposed to my friend's class who just discussed the results in a class discussion. Because of this any test questions that my friend had related to his labs were rather easy and didn't require much in the way of notes. However decent notes were a necessity for the advanced placement class. Anyone who didn't take notes pretty much got fried on either the reports or the tests. Hell, it was easy enough to fry on them even with decent notes.

How we were graded and what on was also significantly different. My friend got graded pretty much on homework and tests. When talking to my friend about tests, he seemed to mention multiple choice, true false, and fill in the blanks a lot, with a few short answers. I never got multiple choice or true or false on more than a couple questions. There was always lots of short answer, plus a couple essay questions though. Plenty of math was involved too. I never talked to my friend about math, but I don't have any reason to believe that his class skipped Boyle's or Charle's laws or Stoichiometry.

I live in a upper middle-class area and goes to a school that outperforms just about every other one in the region (based on ACT and SAT scores I believe). I feel I am more prepared for further education than my friend is. If a school doesn't have the money to provide advanced placement courses and uses curriculum that the regular one at my school does, I can see how the United States is in trouble when it comes to science. Hell, writing this I notice my spelling is awful. I'd be in trouble if it weren't for spell checkers.