Hey, high school biology teachers, students are paying attention to you. What you teach and how you teach it really can influence how kids view evolution and creationism, according to a recently published study. The study questioned introductory biology students at the college level concerning their views on evolution and also asked them how much the subject was covered in high school courses. They were also asked if creationism was taught in high school.
Students whose high school biology class included creationism (with or without evolution) were more likely to accept creationist views as entering college students. Similarly, students exposed to evolutionism but not creationism were more likely to accept evolution in college. For example, 72 to 78 percent of students exposed to evolution only agreed that it is scientifically valid while 57 to 59 percent of students who were exposed to creationism agreed that it can be validated.
“I’ve long known that many biology teachers teach creationism, but was surprised to learn they have such a strong impact,” said Randy Moore, professor of biology and lead author. “It’s unfortunate that so many teachers think their religious beliefs are science. Teachers who don’t teach evolution deny students the understanding of one of the greatest principles in history.”
That story is a bit confusing to me, though. This paragraph:
About two thirds of students from both groups said their high school biology class included evolution and not creationism. Only 1 to 2 percent of classes covered creationism and not evolution. And 6 to 13 percent of classes did not cover either evolution or creationism. But 29 percent of majors and 21 percent of non-majors said their high school biology class covered both evolution and creationism.
Doesn’t match up with this sentence:
However, it still remains overall that only 28-37% of high school biology teachers keep a strict science basis for human evolution …
Two thirds had evolution without creationism and yet only 28-37% of the teachers kept a strict science basis for human evolution? I don’t get it. Unfortunately, I can’t access the study itself. Can someone help me understand this?
The study that appeared in the May 2009 issue of BioScience was a survey of the students themselves, and that’s the survey that indicates that 64% reported that their high-school biology class included evolution but not creationism.
But the 28-37% figure comes from a different survey, one done of high-school biology teachers themselves, regarding their personal beliefs regarding *human* evolution (specifically). (I assume that the 37% figure is derived from adding the 28% to the 9% “no answer/no opinion” group. I can’t get the numbers to work any other way.)
According to that study that looked into the beliefs of high-school biology teachers, there are 47% of high-school biology teachers who believe that human evolution took place but that it was “guided” by God. That still isn’t “creationism” as it is normally defined (instead, it’s theistic evolution), and in any event, what a high-school biology teacher personally believes does not automatically translate into what they present in their classrooms.
The “keep a strict science basis for human evolution” refers to their personal beliefs, not to what they present in the classroom.
Pardon my French, but what the bleep is “evolutionism”?
I think that a good percent of the science teachers at my college (PHCC) are creationists. Just last week I had a short debate with Guy McCann, a geology teacher at my school. He ended the debate saying that god created the universe, therefore we couldn’t discover what began the universe because that would prove god exists, and it is scientifically impossible to prove god exists. For one, it is internally inconsistent logic, for two, he is making a scientific prediction based on his religious belief. It was very odd.
There is another teacher, Greg Woodard, who told his Phys Sci class (for non-majors) that he doesn’t believe what he is teaching–the universe is billions of years old–because he religion is against that belief. At least in the case of Guy McCann he was arguing in a hallway with a couple of students that aren’t in any of his classes. Greg Woodard said it in the middle of a lesson on science.
I was only taught about evolution, and I accept it without qualms. I was also given good examples of evolution in action within the human species; the fact that our molars don’t fit in our heads.