5 Analysis of Metals: A chemical unit of the Salters’ Science curriculum In Chapter 4, I described, analyzed, and compared the visionary, designed, written, and formal curriculum levels of the Salters’ Chemistry course. My research there focused on the course taken as a whole, either on the Foundational course or on the GCSE exam course. In this complementary chapter, I will perform a similar analysis but now focused on a course unit, namely on the chemical unit Metals of the Salters’ Science course (1989), while extending the curriculum analysis to the interpreted, taught, and experienced curriculum levels of the unit. The process of developing the chemical unit Metals, and now also the process of teaching the unit in the classroom, will again be analyzed in terms of my curriculum theoretical framework, that is, in terms of the substructures pertaining to each curriculum level of school chemistry, the concept of curriculum emphasis and the concept of normal science education. In section 5.1, I will give the rationale for performing a case study on the unit Metals, the method of analysis of the lessons of this unit, followed by a description of the design criteria and the pedagogical, philosophical, and substantive structures of Metals (1989). Secondly, I will perform a consistency analysis on the unit Metals, taken as a Chemistry through Technology (CTS) curriculum unit, on the written curriculum as operationalized in the lessons of the unit Metals (5.2). This kind of analysis, performed at the level of specific lessons of a particular unit, makes it possible to see more precisely the extent to which the developers were able to fulfill in a consistent way the adopted design criteria. Thirdly, I will describe and analyze how a teacher congenial to the Salters’ approach interpreted the written curriculum as embodied in the lessons of Metals (1989), and taught the lessons of Metals thus interpreted in the classroom (5.3). Fourthly, I will describe and analyze how the curriculum, as embodied in the lessons of the unit Metals (1992) and as taught by the teacher, is experienced by students (5.4). Fifthly, I will compare the curriculum realized for Metals – at the written, interpreted, taught, and experienced levels – with, on the one hand the formal curriculum of Metals, and, on the other hand, with Normal Chemistry Education (NCE) as represented by O- level chemistry as it existed in the 1980s in England (Figure 5.1). Subsequently, I look back, both at the different articulations and operationalizations of the visionary curriculum of the Salters’ Chemistry course, as discussed in Chapter 4, and at the analysis of the lessons of the written unit Metals (1989) and its different operationalization, as discussed in Chapter 5 (section 5.5). 5.1 Introduction I will begin by giving my reasons for performing a case study on a unit of the Salters’ Science course, Metals (1989), that is, for doing empirical classroom-based research on 164 Chapter 5 the teaching and learning processes, and for performing an in-depth consistency analysis of the intended and realized lessons of the unit Metals (5.1.1). Following that, I will describe and analyze the Salters’ design criteria as formulated by the developers of Metals and the authors of the Teachers Guide (5.1.2). Subsequently, I discuss the problem of interpretation of the Salters’ design criteria, and will give the interpretation I have chosen as a starting point for my consistency analysis of Metals (5.1.3). Next, I will describe the specific method I used for the consistency analysis of the content of the lessons of the unit Metals (5.1.4). Finally, I will give the content of Metals (1989) represented in terms of Schwab’s categories (5.1.5). 5.1.1 Rationale of the case study of the Salters’ Science unit Metals As noted in section 4.1.2, I initially wanted to do curriculum research on two units of the Salters’ Chemistry course (1987). This central chemistry-technology-society (CTS) course seemed at the time to be the best theoretical choice as well as to offer an excellent practical opportunity to test the effectiveness of a bold attempt to escape from Normal Chemistry Education in England. However, I was led to perform classroom-based research on two units of the Salters’ Science course, modeled and developed after the Salters’ Chemistry course (1987). For reasons explained below, one of these units, namely the unit Metals (1989), was subjected thereafter by me to the in-depth curriculum analysis reported on in sections 5.2, 5.3, and 5.4. New developments in the educational system of England and Wales (Figure 5.1) interfered with my initial research plan. From 1990 on, it became mandatory for schools to follow the National Curriculum (DES, 1989) and, from 1992, the revised version thereof (DES, 1991). The National Curriculum required the provision of a so-called balanced science course, that is, a science course containing a balanced mix of biology, chemistry, and physics units. Many users (schools, departments, teachers) of the Salters’ GCSE Chemistry course from 1990 on therefore transferred in increasing numbers to the Salters’ GCSE Science course (Campbell, 1994). Many Salters’ schools in the vicinity of the University of York also took up Salters’ Science instead of Salters’ Chemistry. I wanted to use York as a base to do classroom based research, to interview the developers and study the Salters’ teaching materials. With the help of Peter Nicolson, Project Officer of the Salters’ Science Project, I started looking around for a school with a chemistry teacher willing and interested to permit me into her/his classroom while s/he taught chemistry using chemical units of the Salters’ Science course. The structure and content of units of the Salters’ Chemistry course (1987), Nicolson felt, were largely retained in the chemical units of the Salters’ Science course, such as the Third Year unit Metals (1989). (For the differences between Metals, 1987, and Metals, 1989, see the analysis given in section 5.1.4, and also Figure 5.5.) Furthermore, schools and science teachers had to comply with the requirements of the National Curriculum (DES1991) as to whether they would teach units of the Salters’ Chemistry course (1987) or chemical units of the Salters’ Science course (1989). Although the external constraints for the development, trialling, and teaching of the Salters’ Chemistry course differed (noted in Chapter 4) in some important aspects from Analysis of Metals: A chemical unit of the Salters’ Science curriculum 165 Figure 5.1 Educational System England and Wales within the National Curriculum a Before the introduction of the National Curriculum (DES, 1989), Year Nine was referred to as Year Three. those present for the development, trialling, and teaching of the Salters’ Science courses, there was also some common ground. First, developers of both courses had to take into account nationally set criteria, the National Criteria for Chemistry in the former case, and the more constricting criteria laid down by the National Curriculum in the latter. Nonetheless, as the developers have stated: 166 Chapter 5 ... the original design criteria provided a viable means of making the major decisions about curriculum content throughout the development program (Campbell et al., 1994, p. 420). Both courses, Salters’ Science and Salters’ Chemistry, set out to solve a similar problem, that is, to devise a science or chemistry course which would gain and retain the engagement and interest of children so as to provide the basis for scientific or chemical literacy for those who would finish their formal study at age16. Also, the respective courses aimed to increase the number of students choosing to carry on studying science beyond 16 (Campbell et al., 1994, pp. 418, 424). Further, year Three, or as it was later called year Nine, remained in a way a transitional year in which some kind of “foundation” had to be laid down for the last two years of science in the form of an examination course; in the first two years of their secondary schooling students received introductory or general science teaching. There were also some differences. Before 1989 students could, as in the case of the Salters’ Chemistry course, either choose chemistry for their GCSE examination or opt out at age 14. By the time the Salters’ Science course had arrived, science had become a compulsory subject for all students till age 16. Finally, a balanced science course, such as the Salters’ Science course, often meant a course, which combined – but which did not necessarily integrate – physical, chemical, and biological units. As a rule teachers of a single science taught such a course within their own specialization (Hezeken, 1996). The National Curriculum also came to mean, in general, a greater emphasis on scientific content and processes, and a lesser emphasis on relevant contexts. So, a study of the development and teaching of Salters’ Science units under constraints as set by the National Curriculum would also give me the opportunity to analyze the effects of these increasingly more constricting criteria on the content and structure of the course units and on their execution by the teacher. Such a study could shed some light on mechanisms of change under nationally imposed external criteria or constraints. Although from a strictly theoretical point of view, I would have preferred to do research on two units of the Salters’ Chemistry course, perhaps one from Year 3 and one from Year 4, practical reasons led me to a compromise, namely, to perform classroom-based research on two chemical units of Salters’ Science. The analysis of the data collected by the classroom-based research (observation, interviews, questionnaires, and audio taping) turned out to be rather time consuming, as was the ensuing in-depth curriculum analysis.