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Papers by Berry van Berkel

Beginning 60 years ago, Thomas Kuhn has had a significant impact across the academy and on cultur... more Beginning 60 years ago, Thomas Kuhn has had a significant impact across the academy and on culture more widely. And he had a great impact on science education research, theorising, and pedagogy. For the majority of educators, the second edition (1970) of his Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Kuhn, 1970a) articulated the very nature of the science, the discipline they were teaching. More particularly, Kuhn's book directly influenced four burgeoning research fields in science education: Children's Conceptual Change, Constructivism, Science-Technology-Society studies, and Cultural Studies of Science Education. This paper looks back to the Kuhnian years in science education and to the long shadow they cast. The discipline of science education needs to learn from its past so that comparable mistakes might be averted in the future. Kuhn's influence was good and bad. Good, that he brought HPS to so many; bad, that, on key points, his account of science was flawed. This paper will document the book's two fundamental errors: namely, its Kantian-influenced ontological idealism and its claims of incommensurability between competing paradigms. Both had significant flow-on effects. Although the book had many positive features, this paper will document how most of these ideas and insights were well established in HPS literature at the time of its 1962 publication. Kuhn was not trained in philosophy, he was not part of the HPS tradition, and to the detriment of all, he did not engage with it. This matters, because before publication he could have abandoned, modified, or refined much of his 'revolutionary' text. Something that he subsequently did, but this amounted to closing the gate after the horse had bolted. In particular, the education horse had well and truly bolted. While educators were rushing to adopt Kuhn, many philosophers, historians, and sociologists were rejecting him. Kuhn did modify and 'walk back' many of the head-turning, but erroneous, claims of Structure. But his retreat went largely unnoticed in education, and so the original, deeply flawed Structure affected the four above-mentioned central research fields. The most important lesson to be learnt from science education's uncritical embrace of Kuhn and Kuhnianism is that the problems arose not from personal inadequacies; individuals are not to blame. There was a systematic, disciplinary deficiency. This needs to be addressed by raising the level of philosophical competence in the discipline, beginning with the inclusion of HPS in teacher education and graduate programmes.

Models in modeling in science education, 2009

Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Ber... more Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Berkel, Albert Pilot and Astrid MW Bulte Abstract Although the learning of micro–macro thinking is a key conceptual area in chemistry, it is perceived as difficult and abstract. ...

Journal of Chemical Education, Sep 1, 1994

Science & education, Dec 13, 2014

Philosophy of science education can play a vital role in the preparation and professional develop... more Philosophy of science education can play a vital role in the preparation and professional development of science teachers. In order to fulfill this role a philosophy of science education should be made practical for teachers. First, multiple and inherently incomplete philosophies on the teacher and teaching on what, how and why should be integrated. In this paper we describe our philosophy of science education (ASSET approach) which is composed of bounded rationalism as a guideline for understanding teachers' practical reasoning, liberal education underlying the why of teaching, scientific perspectivism as guideline for the what and educational social constructivism as guiding choices about the how of science education. Integration of multiple philosophies into a coherent philosophy of science education is necessary but not sufficient to make it practical for teachers. Philosophies are still formulated at a too abstract level to guide teachers' practical reasoning. For this purpose, a heuristic model must be developed on an intermediate level of abstraction that will provide teachers with a bridge between these abstract ideas and their specific teaching situation. We have developed and validated such a heuristic model, the CLASS model in order to complement our ASSET approach. We illustrate how science teachers use the ASSET approach and the CLASS model to make choices about the what, the how and the why of science teaching.

Science Education, 2015

Between 1970 and 1990, the Dutch working group Empirical Introduction to Chemistry developed a se... more Between 1970 and 1990, the Dutch working group Empirical Introduction to Chemistry developed a secondary school chemistry education curriculum based on the educational vision of the mathematicians van Hiele and van Hiele-Geldof. This approach viewed learning as a process in which students must go through discontinuous level transitions characterized by linguistic changes. Transposed to chemistry education, the first transition is from the ground level to the descriptive level, where students learn to describe regularities in chemical phenomena. This transition is followed by a transition to the theoretical level, where students learn the structure of these regularities. In this article, the researchers introduce the qualitative concept of chemical element, expand it to address quantitative formulas for gases, and explain it using the concept chemical atom as an indivisible unity. The researchers qualitatively analyze transcripts of discussions both between students and between students and their teacher to look for evidence of chemistry learning in accordance with the theoretical expectations. The results show the applicability of the Van Hiele theory of level transitions for chemistry learning. In retrospect, more attention should have been paid to necessary idealizations to arrive at the desired chemical concepts.

Summary In this review article, I wil1 first give a description of the content and structure of M... more Summary In this review article, I wil1 first give a description of the content and structure of M.J. Vollebregt's thesis, titled, "A problem posing approach to teaching an ,initia1 particle model". This is followed by my interpretation of the results of her study (explaining the known in terms of the unknown), and a discussion and evaluation of its underlying pedagogical and content-specific choices. 1. Introduction: description of content and structure of the thesis Vollebregt's thesis (1998) is a pleasure to read. Firstly, it is concisely written using good English, and the structure of the thesis is clearly laid out. Secondly, Vollebregt answers her research questions clearly and in a refreshingly honest and candid way, i.e., critically and scientifically. Vollebregt reports on a developmental research project concerning the design and cyclic trial of a problem posing approach to teaching science2. The case study períormed concerns a topic which forms a part of ...

Journal of Chemical Education, 1994

Science and Education, 2000

Multiple Representations in Chemical …, 2009

Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Ber... more Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Berkel, Albert Pilot and Astrid MW Bulte Abstract Although the learning of micro–macro thinking is a key conceptual area in chemistry, it is perceived as difficult and abstract. ...

Beginning 60 years ago, Thomas Kuhn has had a significant impact across the academy and on cultur... more Beginning 60 years ago, Thomas Kuhn has had a significant impact across the academy and on culture more widely. And he had a great impact on science education research, theorising, and pedagogy. For the majority of educators, the second edition (1970) of his Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Kuhn, 1970a) articulated the very nature of the science, the discipline they were teaching. More particularly, Kuhn's book directly influenced four burgeoning research fields in science education: Children's Conceptual Change, Constructivism, Science-Technology-Society studies, and Cultural Studies of Science Education. This paper looks back to the Kuhnian years in science education and to the long shadow they cast. The discipline of science education needs to learn from its past so that comparable mistakes might be averted in the future. Kuhn's influence was good and bad. Good, that he brought HPS to so many; bad, that, on key points, his account of science was flawed. This paper will document the book's two fundamental errors: namely, its Kantian-influenced ontological idealism and its claims of incommensurability between competing paradigms. Both had significant flow-on effects. Although the book had many positive features, this paper will document how most of these ideas and insights were well established in HPS literature at the time of its 1962 publication. Kuhn was not trained in philosophy, he was not part of the HPS tradition, and to the detriment of all, he did not engage with it. This matters, because before publication he could have abandoned, modified, or refined much of his 'revolutionary' text. Something that he subsequently did, but this amounted to closing the gate after the horse had bolted. In particular, the education horse had well and truly bolted. While educators were rushing to adopt Kuhn, many philosophers, historians, and sociologists were rejecting him. Kuhn did modify and 'walk back' many of the head-turning, but erroneous, claims of Structure. But his retreat went largely unnoticed in education, and so the original, deeply flawed Structure affected the four above-mentioned central research fields. The most important lesson to be learnt from science education's uncritical embrace of Kuhn and Kuhnianism is that the problems arose not from personal inadequacies; individuals are not to blame. There was a systematic, disciplinary deficiency. This needs to be addressed by raising the level of philosophical competence in the discipline, beginning with the inclusion of HPS in teacher education and graduate programmes.

Models in modeling in science education, 2009

Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Ber... more Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Berkel, Albert Pilot and Astrid MW Bulte Abstract Although the learning of micro–macro thinking is a key conceptual area in chemistry, it is perceived as difficult and abstract. ...

Journal of Chemical Education, Sep 1, 1994

Science & education, Dec 13, 2014

Philosophy of science education can play a vital role in the preparation and professional develop... more Philosophy of science education can play a vital role in the preparation and professional development of science teachers. In order to fulfill this role a philosophy of science education should be made practical for teachers. First, multiple and inherently incomplete philosophies on the teacher and teaching on what, how and why should be integrated. In this paper we describe our philosophy of science education (ASSET approach) which is composed of bounded rationalism as a guideline for understanding teachers' practical reasoning, liberal education underlying the why of teaching, scientific perspectivism as guideline for the what and educational social constructivism as guiding choices about the how of science education. Integration of multiple philosophies into a coherent philosophy of science education is necessary but not sufficient to make it practical for teachers. Philosophies are still formulated at a too abstract level to guide teachers' practical reasoning. For this purpose, a heuristic model must be developed on an intermediate level of abstraction that will provide teachers with a bridge between these abstract ideas and their specific teaching situation. We have developed and validated such a heuristic model, the CLASS model in order to complement our ASSET approach. We illustrate how science teachers use the ASSET approach and the CLASS model to make choices about the what, the how and the why of science teaching.

Science Education, 2015

Between 1970 and 1990, the Dutch working group Empirical Introduction to Chemistry developed a se... more Between 1970 and 1990, the Dutch working group Empirical Introduction to Chemistry developed a secondary school chemistry education curriculum based on the educational vision of the mathematicians van Hiele and van Hiele-Geldof. This approach viewed learning as a process in which students must go through discontinuous level transitions characterized by linguistic changes. Transposed to chemistry education, the first transition is from the ground level to the descriptive level, where students learn to describe regularities in chemical phenomena. This transition is followed by a transition to the theoretical level, where students learn the structure of these regularities. In this article, the researchers introduce the qualitative concept of chemical element, expand it to address quantitative formulas for gases, and explain it using the concept chemical atom as an indivisible unity. The researchers qualitatively analyze transcripts of discussions both between students and between students and their teacher to look for evidence of chemistry learning in accordance with the theoretical expectations. The results show the applicability of the Van Hiele theory of level transitions for chemistry learning. In retrospect, more attention should have been paid to necessary idealizations to arrive at the desired chemical concepts.

Summary In this review article, I wil1 first give a description of the content and structure of M... more Summary In this review article, I wil1 first give a description of the content and structure of M.J. Vollebregt's thesis, titled, "A problem posing approach to teaching an ,initia1 particle model". This is followed by my interpretation of the results of her study (explaining the known in terms of the unknown), and a discussion and evaluation of its underlying pedagogical and content-specific choices. 1. Introduction: description of content and structure of the thesis Vollebregt's thesis (1998) is a pleasure to read. Firstly, it is concisely written using good English, and the structure of the thesis is clearly laid out. Secondly, Vollebregt answers her research questions clearly and in a refreshingly honest and candid way, i.e., critically and scientifically. Vollebregt reports on a developmental research project concerning the design and cyclic trial of a problem posing approach to teaching science2. The case study períormed concerns a topic which forms a part of ...

Journal of Chemical Education, 1994

Science and Education, 2000

Multiple Representations in Chemical …, 2009

Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Ber... more Page 1. Chapter 2 Micro–Macro Thinking in Chemical Education: Why and How to Escape Berry van Berkel, Albert Pilot and Astrid MW Bulte Abstract Although the learning of micro–macro thinking is a key conceptual area in chemistry, it is perceived as difficult and abstract. ...