Education leaders and political leaders worldwide are increasingly placing greater emphasis on developing scientific literacy in response to OECD’s PISA testing. This is also the case in Wales where the results of the 2009 and 2012 scientific literacy tests were significantly lower than the rest of the United Kingdom. This thesis considers interpretations of the term scientific literacy in Wales, including confusion over what the term actually means and an exploration of the potential of renaming it ‘scientific competency’ in order to minimise issues regarding current definition. An alternative definition is considered, in addition to an exploration of the current methods of measuring and improving it within the country. A post-positivist approach was adopted in the research. Data were collected through questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and a case study. The analysis of data revealed that Welsh science teachers often had inadequate skills and understanding regarding scientific literacy and this impacted directly upon their ability to measure and improve it within their lessons. This was due to teachers’ perception of a lack of guidance and training. Although there was substantial consensus about the importance of science and scientific literacy to pupils, this was not adequately translated into scientific literacy practices within schools. Large scale educational reform has led to an emphasis on literacy and numeracy skills, but there has been limited focus on science education. In addition, the Welsh education system and its lack of standardised testing may have produced a lack of rigor within science, leading to a decrease in attainment. The study has implications for the professional development of Welsh science teachers and the general teaching of Science within the country and beyond.

It is expected that by 2022, an additional 2.5 million workers with science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) skills will be required globally, although there is a shortfall of around 40,000 STEM graduates per year. Several strategies have been suggested to address this deficit, one of which includes providing STEM outreach activities for school pupils, including interactive STEM workshops, STEM ambassador presentations, master classes, competitions and talks about STEM careers. However, very little research has been conducted that has examined different perspectives and investigated approaches to enhance the delivery, impact and evaluation of STEM outreach. The purpose and significance of this research is to identify and develop an effective STEM outreach model that describes strategies to maximise the efficiency of outreach activities through combining the views of the receiver, facilitator and provider involved in STEM outreach. This research utilised a mixed methods approach. Qualitative data were collected through semi-structured interviews with outreach facilitators (practitioners) and teachers specialising in a range of STEM subjects. Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected through surveys with students of different age groups. The research questions focused on STEM outreach practitioners’ and teachers’ perspectives on a range of areas including how students are selected, target year groups, evaluation methodology and factors influencing the impact of STEM outreach. The research also explores students’ perceptions, understanding and aspirations of STEM subjects, careers and examines the evidence for differences based on gender, ethnicity and whether or not a student had participated in a STEM outreach activity. The key messages that emerge from this study include the importance of dialogue between outreach practitioners, teachers and students. A second important finding is that messages about STEM are most effective by integrating STEM outreach into a school’s ethos and providing all students with an equal opportunity to access the activities provided. Another important finding concerns students’ views on preferred types of activities, which include fun and interactive activities. Gender, ethnicity and participation in STEM outreach activities were found to have significant effect on GCSE and A level students’ aspirations of a STEM career. Conclusions from the research include the proposal that every student should be offered STEM outreach throughout their compulsory education, creating more opportunities to positively influence and inspire them towards STEM education and careers. It is suggested that a generic evaluation tool is developed in order to capture more rigorous and meaningful data. It is also identified that the STEM community should develop a STEM outreach Quality Framework and STEM outreach practitioners training qualification in order to ensure maximum interaction and impact on young people. Finally, to support planning and delivery for future outreach activities, a prototype model has been recommended as part of this research. If implemented, the enhanced provision of activities should help to effectively address the shortage of high quality STEM graduates and professionals.

This qualitative study examines science curriculum policy making in Ontario, Canada over four different governments between 1985 and 2008. Each government released new curricula for school science. The purpose of this study was to explore influences that shaped the origins, processes and content of these government-mandated curricula. Since 1985, Ontario’s education reforms encompassed neoliberal trends for standards and accountability measures thereby transforming its education system into an auditable commodity. A policy cycle approach, adapted from Bowe, Ball and Gold (1992), and Vidovich’s (2003, 2001) modifications for macro, meso and micro levels of analysis, provided an analytical framework for this study. A trajectory approach was used to analyse science curriculum policy-making both within a government and to identify patterns, trends and actors across all governments. Document analysis, interviews and focus groups were chosen methods to understand the meaning of events, situations and actions of key actors and texts and to understand the contexts within which science curriculum policy was initiated and developed. Findings indicate that an interplay of global trends and local political arenas have influenced Ontario’s science curricula. Governments responded to the decrease of public confidence in education and the increasing demand for standards and accountability measures by reforming education and its curricula. The science curriculum policy documents reflected these reforms as over time they became more specific and were written as standards; however, the content is reflective of Cuban’s (1992, p.223) notion of the ‘historical curriculum’ in that each curriculum continued to exert influence on successive curricula thereby highlighting a tendency to continue with the traditional.

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Starting from 1998, a new language policy on the medium of instruction for secondary schools is implemented in Hong Kong. The policy stipulates that only 25% of secondary schools, which take in students with better academic and language abilities, are allowed to use English, the students' second language, as the medium of instruction, and the others have to use Chinese, the native language, for instruction. The present research project is a longitudinal study that aims to explore the effects of this language policy on the science learning of the English-medium and Chinese-medium students in the first three years of secondary schooling. The learning outcomes of the two streams of students were assessed by science achievement tests and a questionnaire on students' self-concept in science. The results obtained show that the English-medium students were disadvantaged in science learning, as they had relatively lower achievement scores and lower self-concept in science than those who learned through Chinese. Based on the analysis of students' performance on the test items, their perception of classroom climate in science lessons and classroom observations, the negative effects of learning science through English can be related to the limited English proficiency of the immersion students and inadequate repertoire of instructional strategies used by the science teachers. These negative effects, however, tended to become reduced with increase in time of immersion, probably because the English-medium students had become more proficient in English language skills and more confident in learning through English. Recommendation on the implementation of the language policy and teacher education programmes are proposed to resolve the problems faced by the English-medium students.

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Traditionally, education in Saudi Arabia has tended to lay considerable emphasis on the correct recall of memorised information. In the early years of the 21st century, education policy in Saudi Arabia began to consider the introduction of the concept of critical thinking into the curriculum. At the same time, the role and place of the sciences in the curriculum have increasingly been emphasized, the aim being to equip future generations with the skills thought important in taking the country forward. This study is, therefore, set in Saudi Arabia and focuses on the nature and development of critical thinking in the context of the current curriculum in the sciences. After describing the educational scene in Saudi Arabia, the thesis focuses on what is known about thinking in general and critical thinking in particular. The aim here is to move towards the development of a model of critical thinking and some kind of operational description against which test material can be developed. At that stage, it was recognised that, while critical thinking might be conceptualized as a set of cognitive skills, there is a strong attitudinal element. In simple terms, the learner needs to know how to think critically but also be willing to use these skills. There is a very brief review of some key research in the area of attitudes, including the principles of measurement which underpin the way the perceptions and attitudes of the learners are considered in this study. The cognitive nature of critical thinking is then related to two key research contributions of the 20th century: the work of Jean Piaget and David Ausubel. Critical thinking takes place in the working memory and the insights from information processing are discussed, looking at the ways information moves around the brain and the implications for the development of critical thinking are discussed. This study aims to explore how to measure critical thinking and to determine whether critical thinking skills can be developed in science subjects in school pupils. To achieve this aim, a model of critical thinking was first developed representing that thinking critically basically involves asking the questions how, what and why of new sources of information, the information itself and the linking processes involved in understanding. A test of critical thinking was developed based on this model. The data from this test were related to several other educational measures: student perceptions, working memory capacity, understanding science, school marks in science. Interviews with teachers and school inspectors were also conducted to explore their perceptions. The researcher is confident that the model and test make a contribution to the literature, as well as being of benefit to Saudi Arabia and to other countries. Critical thinking was measured with a total of 240 pupils, 120 girls and 120 boys, aged between 13 and 15, in classes 1, 2 and 3, in six Intermediate Schools in Saudi Arabia in the academic year 2009-2010. The questions in the test were designed so that success in the test relied on one or more of the aspects of critical thinking. The outcomes were related to working memory capacity and school science performance while student perceptions were measured. Principal Components analysis using Varimax rotation showed that the test designed to measure critical thinking was not measuring either science knowledge or understanding nor was it a measure of working memory capacity, but the school marks were highly correlated with working memory capacity. It was found that the measured critical thinking grew from year 1 to year 3; possible reasons are suggested. While the validity of the critical thinking test is not certain, it is not simply a measure of knowledge and understanding or of working memory capacity although any critical thinking would take place in the working memory. The survey offered many insights but, in particular, it revealed that most pupils had a negative attitude to science and showed broadly negative perceptions of science. The following experiment aimed to determine whether critical thinking skills could be developed in science subjects in school pupils. A fresh sample for the second experiment consisted of 1,600 pupils, from 12 schools, 800 girls and 800 boys, 400 of each in grade 1 (aged 13) and 400 in grade 3 (aged 15). Of these 400, 200 were in control groups and 200 in experimental groups. The pupils in the experimental groups were taught critical thinking skills using teaching material specifically developed for this research (which took 9 weeks to complete) and with a method proposed for it, while those in the control groups were taught in the normal way. The following were measured: student perceptions, working memory capacity, critical thinking, and understanding. The first two tests were identical to those used in experiment 1 and the critical thinking test was only slightly modified. In addition, their school marks were taken to make a fifth data set. Analysis of the data showed that critical thinking skills grew significantly after use of the new materials, with year 3 showing greater growth. Despite attempts to make the material gender neutral, boys were found to be better at critical thinking skills, although this may simply reflect gender-separated education. Principal components analysis again showed that critical thinking test data is unrelated to measured working memory capacity, measures of recall, and measures of understanding. The student survey was carried out with the purpose of examining pupils’ attitudes towards various aspects of thinking and critical thinking in the context of science teaching and some unexpected gender differences were observed. In the test of critical thinking skills, girls and boys in the experimental groups both performed better than did the control groups but the girls did not appear to be convinced that this is the case.A total of 98 science teachers and science inspectors were interviewed in order to explore their perceptions of critical thinking in science education. A range of themes was explored and there were some differences in their views which, in turn, did not seem to match the views of the students. Implications are discussed. The overall conclusions are that critical thinking can be measured and that it can be enhanced with school learners aged in the range 13 to 15. However, it is vital that educational policies, resources, national assessment and teacher training be adjusted if the development of critical thinking is to make much progress in Saudi Arabia. The limitations and implications of the study are outlined.

Cyrus S. Bamji. / Originally presented as author's thesis (M.S.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology), 1985. / Bibliography: leaves 108-111. / Supported in part by the U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research contract F49620-84-C-0004

The initial aim of this study was to explore the changes in the students’ perceptions of learning over their study years in the education colleges in the Sultanate of Oman. A number of years ago Perry developed a scheme to describe students’ perceptions of learning. Johnstone adapted this scheme. In both the original scheme and the adaptation, the development of students’ perceptions of learning was considered in four areas: the lecturers’ role, the student’s role, the nature of scientific knowledge, and assessment. The Johnstone’s adaptation was used in this study. The first stage was to carry out a survey with a sample of 889 students and 1165 pupils from education colleges (age 18-22) and secondary schools (age 15-18). The schools data provided a background against which the student data could be considered. A questionnaire was devised and distributed to three study years in secondary schools and four study years in the education colleges. The results show that although there is a growth in students’ perceptions of learning over their study years, this growth varied from area to area. In the areas of the lecturer’s role the growth was generally good. In the area of the nature of scientific knowledge the growth was very poor while in the assessment area the growth was good in some questions and poor in others. The results also revealed that students’ perceptions of learning correlated positively with their academic performance. It was also evident that females in general had better perceptions of learning than males. In secondary schools, it appeared that science stream students had better perceptions of learning science than arts stream students but this may merely reflect the contextual nature of Perry development.