Science, Scientific Literacy, and Science Education

This chapter begins by clarifying the traditional meanings given to scientific literacy and then offers a perspective on the science and their epistemic social practices that enable the production of reliable knowledge. In particular, the chapter considers how the contemporary contexts have changed and the implications for the knowledge and competency that school science now needs to address. The broad goal of scientific literacy for all is unquestionable, but the lack of clarity surrounding the term is suggestive of a chimera to cloak the real focus of science education – the foundational education for the future scientists – scientists who are needed to sustain the economic well-being of the country. Traditionally, the sciences have been valued for their utility, with an emphasis on experiment and observation that has ignored its cultural and intellectual achievement. Fundamentally, science is a set of ideas about the material and natural world and not some unique approach to inquiry.