Some time ago, while I was with the Educational Technology Division (ETD) of Singapore’s Ministry of Education (MOE), a colleague of mine and I was asked to accompany a visiting master teacher from the United States as she went round a few places in Singapore. We visited the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Nature Reserve.

During the course of our conversation there, the topic of acid rain came up. She regaled us of how an American senator, in his attempt to show off his green credentials while talking about acid rain, said that he would like to bring the pH level to zero! We had a good laugh then. But a few moments later while still taking about how students could study the water quality in the area to check for acid rain and its effects, I received a first-hand experience of scientific ignorance (now that’s contradiction of terms). While she was explaining how it could be done, she asked what the water quality would be like if the rain clouds had passed over industrial areas before pouring into the reserve. My colleague, who was a Science teacher, promptly answered, “It would be acidic!” He did it with a big knowing smile like a child who had provided the teacher with the correct answer in school.

On my part, I think I looked stumped by the answer. The master teacher also looked a little surprised. I am not sure if she was annoyed but we both knew that the water from the rain may not be acidic. It may be alkaline. It all depends on the kinds of pollutants in the air! The master teacher then proceeded to explain with a  straight face why the rain water might not be acidic as my colleague had blurted out.

Even then, I felt that my colleague’s “answer” was a reflection of the kind of science teaching that goes on in Singapore schools. All too often what goes on is the teaching to the examinations. This implies again rote-learning and mechanical operations.  Little time time is spent to teach the scientific approach which is about asking questions and testing hypothesis. Little effort is spent at making observations and inferences or deductions and classifying data and trying to understand processes. Laboratory work in schools usually only have students follow written set of instructions about what to do and is left for them to carry out the experiment and draw their conclusions from “their” experiments. Students don’t create their own experiments to answer their own questions. We in fact don’t teach them to ask questions. We don’t encourage them to be curious. This was a point raised by the American master teacher too. At Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve, she noticed that at the exhibits were all in the “telling” mode. Information was given about the plants and animals found there. But what about the questions? I remember her saying that it is not important to provide the answers to the questions as what we want the visitors to do is to think. This is what science education is about.

On the other hand, in Singapore, concepts are over-simplified (see what happens to the idea of acid rain) and memorized rather than understood and applied outside of the examination papers. Little knowledge transfer is attempted by teachers to make the learning meaningful. It is because of this approach to the teaching of science in Singapore schools that many false or wrong ideas are carried to adulthood. I have often come across many “educated” people who believe all fishes lay eggs. Or that all mammals give birth to their young. Simplistic ideas are taught and these tend to stick in the students’ heads till adulthood due to what is known as contiguity. Perhaps this is the reason why we are importing scientists from overseas to pad our R & D pool in Singapore. We simply don’t teach our students science. What we teach them is bordering on science fiction sometimes. I will end this post with a quote from Richard Feynman, a Nobel Prize winner in Physics and also tough critic of Science education. He said:

“…I couldn’t see how anyone could be educated by this self-propagating system in which people pass exams, and teach others to pass exams, but nobody knows anything.”

(PS My thanks to Kelvin for the quote and for inspiring me to write this piece.)

Addendum: Just for a comparison with the way Science is taught in Singapore’s , read this article.