Junior High School Science Curriculum Implementation Status, Influencing Factors And Environmental Studies

Setup of science curriculum in middle school is an important part of curriculum integration reform. However, two obvious contradictions exist in practice: in the macro aspect, on one hand, the time calls for the setup of science curriculum in middle school; on the other hand, the implementation is faced with great difficulties; in the micro aspect, science teachers'are barely competent in science teaching while the students love the subject. A study of science curriculum implementation not only helps clarify the source of these contradictions to promote science curriculum reform, but also enriches the theories in curriculum implementation.With the combination of qualitative and quantitative research, this research applies three methods, namely, questionnaire, on-the-spot observation and interview to study middle school teachers in the city, suburb, and countryside area respectively in a city of Zhejiang province. In this research, four aspects of the new science curriculum are defined, namely, handling of teaching contents, employing of teaching strategies, highlighting of teaching goals and reflecting of teaching process. And simultaneously 18 factors at the layer of society, school and teacher are constructed for reflection of the influential factors in the new science curriculum implementation in middle school.Conclusions of the investigation on implementation situation are as follows:As for the teaching contents, most teachers can handle flexibly in preparation and the added material is mainly exercises and knowledge, secondly the life-related material intended for arousing students'interest. However science inquiry is largely neglected and in the teaching, the prepared material is merely adjusted slightly or even remains unchanged. Variation in this aspect for teachers of different areas and ages lies in the amount of added information, in the degree to which the prepared content are adjusted and in the scientific experiment.In terms of employing teaching strategies, teachers show deep-rooted influence of traditional teaching concept in that the traditional methods such as lectures, routine questions and question-answer exercises are usually adopted but methods advocated in the new curriculum are scarcely used. As for different areas, teachers in the city employ a wider range of methods while countryside teachers show a better use of new curriculum methods. And in terms of age, teachers of group 3 are most influenced by traditional ideas with no palpable distinction for the rest.As far as teaching goal is concerned, science knowledge remains the focus. Although experimental skills are receiving attention from many teachers, the practice is not carried out in the true sense. And other goals are even ignored such affection, attitude, and value. A great gap still exists between the designed goals and the realized ones. In terms of area, goals highlighted in teaching by suburban teachers are most monotonous and in age, teachers of group 1.In the aspect of reflection, nearly all the teachers undertake reflection of different degrees, but reflection has not become a real part of teaching with the focus chiefly on contents, strategy and students response. Generally the reflection level still has great room for improvement. No distinctive area difference is demonstrated in this aspect except that reflection of countryside teachers is slightly lower. As for age difference, teachers of group 1 are more inclusive in their reflection while group 3 are more unitary.In view of the implementation situation of new science curriculum, the author undertakes the following research:On the levels of implementation, a analytical quantum table is constructed and 8 levels are identified, namely, not implemented, just knowing, having the tendency, occasionally, just a show, routine, elaborate, innovational. The analysis show that the implementation level is generally low and great gap exists between real implementation and the prescribed and suggested contents in the new curriculum.In terms of influential factors of curriculum implementation, 15 factors of 3 categories are identified. Among them the strong ones are teacher's knowledge, faith, psychology, school culture, science education assessment and science textbook; the moderate ones include school curriculum resource, headmaster, teacher's interpersonal relationship, student, and parents; the weak ones are science curriculum criteria, science supplement material, social science activity and social curriculum resource. These factors exert either positive or negative influence upon the implementation of science new curriculum.Concerning the environment of curriculum implementation, the author brings up system cultural environment, Copenhagen environment and science teacher professionalization environment, which are an organic whole in nature. And they interact with each other to construct the environment for the science curriculum implementation in middle school.Based on a literature review and his investigation and reflections, the author also explores into the four theoretic problems in curriculum implementation, which are the connotation, orientation, influential factors and level measurement of curriculum implementation. Finally a conclusion is made and suggestions are provided for further study in this area.