A typology of approaches to science teaching in schools

Bentley and Watts (1986) have recently argued that fundamental changes in science are necessary if girls’ needs and expectations in school science are to be met. They explore the implications of a radical shift, from a masculine to a feminist view of science, in terms of the context and conduct of school science, and warrant their attempt to reconstruct a feminist science largely by reference to ‘new paradigm’ research in the social sciences. By exploring the reasons underlying the adoption of ‘new paradigm’ methods in the social sciences, I argue that their explication of a feminist science lacks an important feature that would hinder its consideration as an alternative vision of scientific inquiry and as a basis for changing the content of science curriculum in schools. I further question their need to look to the social sciences as a model, when many social scientists have turned to the physical sciences for inspiration in attempting to reconstruct their own disciplines. By exploring the tenets most commonly held in present‐day science and examining the nature of scientific understanding, I argue that their view of ‘normal’ science is a highly simplified and incomplete stereotype of scientific inquiry. It is suggested that the nature of science is not the root problem, as Bentley and Watts would have us believe.