A recently published study decrying the poor quality of science textbooks comes as no surprise, despite the current climate of science education reform in this country. This evaluation of widely used textbooks for the crucial middle grades considered how effectively the books help students learn key ideas in earth, life and physical science.

The study charged that even the newest textbooks offer too little information on too many topics and fail to accommodate students’ existing notions or provide them with vivid experiences in exploration of a variety of phenomena. The research further revealed that textbooks give students little opportunity to develop critical reasoning skills or abilities in application of scientific concepts. The conclusion of the evaluation: “Our students are lugging home heavy texts full of disconnected facts that neither educate nor motivate them.”

Conducted by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, whose Project 2061 has been influential in national efforts to improve science education, the study was particularly disappointing to those expecting new texts to reflect new approaches to scientific subject matter and the ways that students learn. The hope was that textbooks published and adopted as part of the current reform movement would be better tools for teaching and learning than those that collected dust in lockers a generation ago. There appears to be little substantive difference, however.

Surprised? We shouldn’t be. Although national, state and local standards claim to be promoting development of skills in analysis and inquiry, these documents still emphasize enormous bodies of knowledge that students are expected to acquire. Some of the standards documents are, in fact, at odds with each other as to which concepts should be introduced at what ages. Textbook publishers simply shape their products to accommodate these multiple laundry lists of science fundamentals on which students will be tested. For them, it makes marketing sense.

Textbooks may be the “backbone of classroom instruction,” but fortunately are not the only option open to science educators. If teachers, administrators and the scientific community do indeed wish to engage America’s students equitably in successful, authentic science experiences in school, if we hope to foster development of genuine understanding of basic science principles and an enduring capacity to consider questions of science in life, then we should realize that textbook-based instruction alone is not the proper path.

Certainly, well-formulated textbooks can serve as an important resource, particularly when science teachers have adequate literacy training and are able to help students become careful and critical readers. Texts can be most effective when used as part of a program that also involves students directly in scientific investigations to develop skills and conceptual understanding. Textbooks can supplement lab and field activities, undergird readings in scientific magazines or provide a useful background to contact with scientists living and working in the local community. In such situations, the written word supports and enhances students’ real life science experiences.

This type of integration requires thoughtful, well-trained science teachers who have the ability, imagination, facilities and resources to evaluate text material and place it in proper balance with direct experience for their students. It also requires the philosophical and financial commitment of school administrators who realize that essential science understandings can’t be bought in a box of textbooks.

Finally, it requires that the scientific community, educators, lawmakers and the general public arrive at a genuine agreement on what is to be valued in science, and a shared understanding of how that value is to be justly determined.

Until these requirements are met, the universally applied, easilyscored laundry lists of test items will remain the measure of success in science education. And the quickest, cheapest, easiest route to answers will seem to be textbooks.

Mary Dickinson Bird is instructor of science education at the University of Maine.