Children get turned off to science early, says Scientific American, saying, “Studies have found that children in kindergarten are already forming negative views about science that could cast a shadow across their entire educational careers. . . . Furthermore, even before first grade, fewer girls than boys say they like science.”

One solution, from educational psychology researchers at Purdue University, is to teach science in kindergarten by integrating it with language teaching. Bravo—that’s the kind of integrated instruction I’ve written about before. President Bush’s No Child Left Behind Act focused on reading and math to the detriment of other subjects, but there’s no reason one can’t learn to read and write by reading and writing about science, or history, or social studies. It really took a major university study to figure this out?

The article does, however, make the excellent point that: “The goal of science education at the earliest levels should be to encourage and refine children’s innate love of exploring the world around them and to help that enthusiastic behavior grow into true scientific literacy.”

I should add that I’m not one to value scientific education over that of history, literature, or the arts.  I’m a big believer in the full range of the liberal arts as the basis of an education. Since scientific literacy is a part of that, however, I’m all for it.

The article is worth a read if you’re an educator or have young children.