What does it mean to know (about) science? This question is at the core of the concept of "Scientific Literacy", and this concept is under considerable discussion amongst both professional communities (scientists, science educators, politicians) and the general public. Although there is a general consensus that scientific literacy is important, both for ones' own life as well as for effective participation in the democratic process, there is much less consensus as to exactly what science literacy is. Over the past two decades the concept of "science literacy" has undergone some considerable changes as we have come both to better understand student learning and to gain new insights into the actual laboratory and field practices of scientists. To adapt to these changes in what we perceive "science literacy" to be, modified classroom approaches need to be considered. This paper first provides an overview of the concept of literacy about "science" and how perspectives on it are changing, and then introduces a web-based tool for use by high school science students that is designed to help them develop these new literacies.

"Science" as a discipline and a field of information can be characterized in three ways (following Hodson, 1998). Firstly, one can view science as a body of knowledge claims...the "facts" about a subject such as those found in textbooks and curriculum documents. These knowledge claims are supported by data collected by the scientists which are summarized and constructed into patterns from which arguments are constructed about what the patterns are, what they represent, and why they are significant (see Latour, 1987). Scientists present these findings at conferences where they are submitted to critique by their peers, often revise their interpretations based on that feedback, submit the findings to journals where they are further critiqued, revised and, if published, form the foundation for the claims found in textbooks. The ways in which these knowledge claims emerge and how they are influenced by the investigatory practices of the different disciplines, the social and professional interactions, the personalities of the individuals involved, the traditions in the discipline together represent both the local and broad contexts in which the studies and claims came to be and can generally be called the A"Nature of Science", the second possible characterization. Finally, the third way in which science can be characterized is as a field of practice and that knowing "science" means to be able to engage oneself in practices which are reasonable analogues of the types of investigatory and data generation practices which scientists themselves engage in.

Understanding about the last two characterizations has grown considerably in the last three decades, most particularly through the efforts of sociologists of science who study scientists conducting their day-to-day work in their laboratories, field settings, at conferences, and so on. These sociologists of science report that how scientists actually engage in their work often little resemble the practices of 'how science is done' that is reflected in their scientific publications and presentations (Bowen & Roth, 2002; Latour, 1997; Latour & Woolgar, 1986; Pickering, 1995) not a particularly surprising finding given that text usually underdetermines action (although there's a bit more to it than that in the sociology of science findings). Nor, for that matter, does their work much resemble what students learn about in school settings. What has been learned in the last 20 years through ethnographic studies of science research settings is that science is full of much more creativity, personality conflict, argumentation and disagreement, and "by the seat of the pants" approaches than was previously documented (see Bagioli, 1999 for a collection of articles supporting this). Not only that, but that floundering with initial approaches, trying multiple methods with ongoing failure (reporting only the successes in journals), personal dislikes and enmities, post-hoc creation of hypotheses and so on are not uncommon practice in the conduct of research (Collins & Pinch, 1998a, 1998b; Bowen & Roth, 2002; Roth & Bowen, 1991, 2001; Latour & Woolgar, 1986; Pickering, 1995; Rabinow, 1996, Knorr-Cetina, 1999). This is a very different science than the clean and ordered "objective" science we teach in textbooks, sounding very "messy" at times and much less ordered and organized in actual practice. Effectively, journal articles sanitize science research and usually present science research as "clean" and often non-problematic in practice and outcome; not the rough and tumble "science-in-the-making" from which the claims actually emerged (although the intended recipient audience, other scientists in the discipline, probably understand the ambiguities, intricacies and subjectivities present in the practices so for them this sanitization is less problematic; it is the non-target audience using those articles that often do not bring an interpretive framework that allows a contextualized interpretation). Apart from that, as a field matures practices become more standardized as issues of method are resolved, but such is not the case at the beginning as new areas of research and methods are refined and developed.

For a considerable period of time, school science was based on developing students' literacy in only one facet of science, that of the science "content" (Chinn & Malhotra, 2002; Claxton, 1991; Desautels et al, 2002). Often, classes were (and, often still are; Lemke, 1990; Tobin, 1990) based on memorizing and lectures reinforced by prescriptive science activities where students are provided step by step instructions and, often, told what outcomes to expect. One can see that a problem emerges from this. School science curriculum is based on a foundation of the existent science claims, but does little to engage the students in the practices from which those claims emerged. At best, students are engaged in mere confirmatory activities alone (also known as "cookbook" labs). In essence, we often expect students to more or less quickly absorb information and practices that represent the mature aspects of the field, but not themselves experience any of the processes through which those understandings of phenomena developed. The reason this is a problem is because what we are finding in science education research is that effective learning of the concepts requires having the students engage in the practices themselves as experienced by the scientists. Or at least reasonable analogues of them (Bowen, 2005; Crawford et al, 1999; Crawford, Kelly, Brown, 1999; Roth & Lee, 2002; Lee & Roth, 2002).

This perspective represents a considerable revolution in science curriculum and definitions of science literacy, because a more current definition of science literacy is one which involves educating students in all three characteristics of science (as defined above) (Bencze et al, 2003; Bencze & Elshof, 2004; Hodson, 1999, 2003). Since the 1990's an approach to science teaching called authentic science inquiry (see Roth, 1995) has been promoted in both research literature and in faculties of education. This was in response to research that suggested that students understanding of science concepts and practices was inextricably intertwined with their understanding of, and experience with, scientific practicesCmost especially those with considerable similarity to those reported by sociologists studying the work of scientists. As originally defined, "authentic" science problems in classrooms are ill-defined, contain uncertainties and ambiguities with respect to methodology and potential outcomes, are driven by the learner's current knowledge, involve participation in a community which negotiates both practices and meaning of the data, and involves students working on (related but) different problems where they can draw on each others' experiences and insights (Roth, 1995).

In actual classroom practice over the years, these "authentic" science investigations have involved fusions of science and technology (such as designing and building robot arms and bridges) (Bencze, 2001; Bencze & Lemelin, 2004; Lemelin & Bencze, 2001), investigating forest and stream ecosystems (Roth & Bowen, 1993), creating and testing different soaps by manipulating the oils used, engaging students in archaeological activities (Barbara Crawford, pers. comm.), and conducting watershed systems analysis to advise local municipalities on housing development impacts (Lee & Roth, 2002). Some high school science programs have shifted over to being entirely based on "authentic" investigations through series of problem-based learning activities. However, these are "ideal" authentic inquiry environments and do not represent the norm. Much of the enactment of inquiry in science classrooms involved having students develop their own methods to prove a science concept or address a question provided by the teacher and, often, students were still addressing the same question across the entirety of the classroom.

Research conducted in these different settings as students engaged in varying types of independent inquiry investigations provided insights into what led to improved student understanding of both scientific concepts/facts as well as practices and the nature of science. From that research came insights into what aspects of actual science practices needed to be incorporated into the design of classroom activities to further improve student understanding of concepts and science itself and thus meet the new standard of science literacy as defined above.

Extended Immersion: In conducting science activities scientists immerse themselves in a collection of related problems for a considerable period of time. Most classrooms start and finish student science activities in just a single period. Research into student learning in different science inquiry settings supports students being engaged in long-term activities where they have the opportunity to both engage in extended reflection on their activity as well as have the opportunity to revise their methodological approaches as they go along. A considerable advantage of such an approach is that, just like in real science, students have the opportunity to ask more, and more complex, questions as they gain increased familiarity with the concepts and use of tools in the topic area. It is from such an immersion that truly authentic inquiry investigations emerge driven by student interest.

"Do-Ability" in science: Students are frequently instructed that they "must repeat your treatments five times", or some other such absolutist statement. However, the practice of science seems to have two boundaries on what are considered acceptable practices and replication. Firstly, accepted methodological practices are usually those which are do-able in the context the scientist is working in. Standards often shift as the context of investigation shifts. The idea that there is a single agreed upon method for investigation seems to have emerged from tightly controlled physics laboratory investigations, but poorly reflect much of the initial (science-in-the-making) investigatory work done in most of the sciences. The degree of acceptable replication is also a shifting standard, although it is related to the degree of confidence in the outcome. In many field sciences even infrequent activities by a few individual organisms are reported in the literature. In those contexts, scientists "hedge" their claims more, but are still able to publish their findings. In laboratory contexts, however, higher standards for control and replication are held to be necessary to draw claims. However, the standard of evidence varies widely across disciplines and is generally that which is considered acceptable to others working in the area as opposed to being some arbitrarily set standard. Thus, it is members of the community which negotiate acceptability, and engaging students in such a setting is found to improve their understanding both of the nature of science and the interpretation of scientific claims.

Appropriating and Adapting Tools: In the classroom, much of science investigation is dependent on standardized approaches. Air tracks, frictionless cars, reagent kits, dissecting fetal pigs all represent an attempt to standardize student learning within prescribed activities intended to confirm concepts presented in textbooks. Yet, these teaching practices contradict the current understandings of how to develop science literacy in students. In science, it is common, particularly when investigating new areas, to appropriate new materials as one develops methodologies to answer emergent questions. Students participating in science learning environments where they are expected to develop their own methodologies, often by adapting available equipment to address their questions, gain both an increased understanding of science practices as well as increased competency at addressing problems outside of the classroom. Engaging students in inquiry activities empowers them as it implicitly teaches students that they can both identify problems and develop strategies to address them using resources available to them (not provided to them by someone else).

Extended Community: Science communities are characterized by a membership that is heterogeneous with respect to distribution, experience and age. Classroom activities are usually confined to only those students in a particular room at a particular time. Research suggests that enhanced student learning and improved scientific literacy occur when students have the chance to interact with others, other than just their immediate classroom, around and about the projects that they are working on. This is particularly true when it is peers that act as arbiters of acceptable practices and tool use, much as is the case in science itself.

In/formal Communications: Scientists frequently gather and communicate with each other in both formal and informal sessions, and some research suggests that it is in the informal interactions that considerable insight into acceptable practices (such as the negotiations around acceptable analysis techniques, data collection methodologies, and replication occur). If students in a classroom all participate in doing the same investigation they have much less to talk about than if they are working on a variety of different (but related) activities. By structuring classes so that students have both formal and informal times to discuss their project work with each other, they are implicitly having modeled to them the social environment that scientists engage in to conduct their work. Again, this develops students' understanding of the actual practices of science itself.

Some research also suggests that enacting Aauthentic science@, including the practices above, is insufficient to maximally develop students understanding of the Nature of Science (Lederman et al., 2001). This research suggests that their classes must include explicit instruction about NOS as part of the curriculum. By developing classrooms in which students can both enact authentic practices followed by reading case studies of scientists work with an emphasis on the perspectives on NOS that they themselves engaged in, students will develop a nuanced understanding of science practices and science claimsCand, hence, an enhanced science literacy.

As the reader may gather, there are some issues with attempting to create science classrooms that involve opportunities for extended communication within heterogeneous student groups where their science inquiry work is presented to and critiqued by a broad community of both students and adultsCa central one of which is the difficulty of achieving these in a school setting. This is where current web-based technologies offer advantages for achieving more complex scientific literacy, especially in those areas of the characteristics not normally addressed in classrooms discussed earlier. Although software tools exist for collaborative group project work, such tools are usually only locally available, expensive, and intended for use by adults in professional projects. Internet tools that have existed are, again, commercial (i.e., cost money) and oriented towards adult-level projects.

However, a current initiative to provide high-school students (Grade 7 to 12) with web-based tools to conduct and publish collaborative science projects is available in Atlantic Canada (and the rest of Canada). "The Canadian Electronic Journal of High School Science & Technology Projects" (http://www.thejournal.ca) was designed to allow students to (i) submit their school science projects for on-line publication (either reviewed or un-reviewed) for use by other students, and (ii) collaborate with other students on inquiry science projects through a collection of on-line collaborative tools designed for science projects.

The provided tools and site design of "The Journal" was modeled on the different types of activities that sociology of science studies reported that scientists do as part of conducting their research. Overall, the tools are intended to provide students the opportunity to develop, conduct, analyze and present entire projectsCand from that should emerge students who engage in long term, extended immersion projects. Through discussion in their extended and distributed community of learners (Lave & Wenger, 1991) students have the opportunity to creatively develop new tools and approaches to inquiry activities.

The publishing/reviewing environment, where reviewing (using formative feedback) will be done by student teachers as part of their science teacher education program, helps science students present and defend their ideas in a public sphere in a fashion paralleling the experiences of scientists with their publications. Unlike in most of schooling where the knowledge generation efforts of students reach a limited audience (often only the teacher), in this web environment student reports can be subject to continued critique and discussion by their peers (much like the knowledge generated by scientists) and can contribute to new science inquiry work done by other students at later dates.

To help students conduct the science inquiry projects, a collection of on-line collaboration tools are provided. These on-line tools (available through a web browser) include:

• a collaborative writing tool so that notes, project reports, etc. can be produced (with embedded tables and images)
• a collaborative spreadsheet tool so that data from research projects can be organized and (simply) analyzed by members of a research group
• a graphing tool so that research results can be graphed and discussed
• a drawing tool for preparing illustrations of equipment
• a task lists manager
• a personal calendar/scheduler so that project work can be coordinated
• discussion forums tools so that structured commentary can be obtained
• chat tools that allow synchronous communication as data entry & writing are occurring.
• simple data generating tools (reaction timers, stop watches, unit converters)
• a blogging tool with commenting feature
• a simple polling/questioning tool
• an internal "e-mail" tool
• and many others.

References

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