Teachers treading lightly with evolution lessons
Intelligent design advocates are pushing to have the teaching of evolution downplayed in public schools.
That may already be happening in Lawrence classrooms.
Some students here say teachers shy from teaching evolution. And some teachers say as they teach evolution, they broach it gingerly.
Timmia Hearn Feldman, a Central Junior High School student, said her father had to press school officials to teach evolution in her biology class. When it was covered, Hearn Feldman said much of the unit was passed over.
“I feel like it wasn’t covered sufficiently,” she said. “I think a lot of teachers are afraid to teach evolution.”
Conservative members of the state Board of Education and proponents of intelligent design, the idea that some features of the natural world are so complex and well-ordered that they are best explained by an intelligent cause, are battling to change the state’s science standards. Hearings on the matter will continue Thursday in Topeka.
In Lawrence, there are smaller skirmishes, like Hearn Feldman’s.
“I learned that you have to push even on things that you would assume that you don’t have to worry about,” said the student’s father, Hume Feldman, an evolution supporter.
Lynda Allen, the Lawrence district’s math and science director, said in a few cases in the last two years the district heard from parents concerned that evolution was not emphasized enough in the classroom.
Teachers tread lightly
David Reber, a Free State High School biology teacher, said he saw teachers who were intimidated into trying to bypass the topic.
“To shy away from it sort of perpetuates the misconception that it’s bad science or something,” he said.
Sandy Collins, a West Junior High School biology teacher, said she tried not to be too aggressive in her teaching. She wants students to feel comfortable, and she doesn’t want to cause conflict between students, she said.
“We’ve all become over the years a lot more sensitive to that than we have before,” Collins said.
Penny Kramer, a South Junior High School science teacher, says she tries to introduce the topic in such a way that students can form their own decisions.
“I present evolution as a theory, which it is … and say there are other theories out there,” Kramer said.
Deena Shipley, a biology teacher at Central, said she tried her best to cover a vast subject in a limited time span.
She said those who were passionate about the issue might like to see more time spent on it, but she said she incorporated evolution throughout the curriculum.
“There are going to be bird people who wish we spent more time on birds,” Shipley said. “We all feel there’s never enough time to do everything we want in biology.”
A K-12 topic
Students learn about evolution and related subjects in sixth-grade life science, seventh-grade earth science, ninth-grade biology and several high school courses, including advanced biology, and ecology and environmental science. But many topics, such as dinosaurs or the age of the Earth, can be introduced as early as kindergarten. And points related to evolution pervade the curriculum.
Textbooks contain whole units and chapters dedicated to evolution discussion. The Lawrence school district’s sixth-grade life sciences textbook contains a unit called “heredity, evolution, and classification.” It covers fossils, dinosaurs, the geologic time scale that outlines the history of life on Earth, human evolution and other topics.
But just because it’s in a book, doesn’t mean students learn it, or even read it.
“They don’t really get into the people side of evolution,” said Nastassia Weber, a Free State junior. “They touch on it.”
Allen said she was not concerned about science-certified teachers shying from the controversial subject, but she tends to worry more about elementary science teachers.
“You have teachers that may not be as comfortable because they don’t have as much background in the area,” she said.
Impact unknown
It’s difficult to gauge how the controversy may have already altered the way science is taught in public schools, said Susan Spath, spokeswoman for the National Center for Science Education, a pro-evolution not-for-profit group.
“All of these attempts to chip away (at evolution) can have a chilling effect,” Spath said. She said that in any given week, the center has 25 active cases related to the anti-evolution policy or actions in schools.