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PISA National Symposium Concluding Remarks. Eamonn Murtagh Assistant Chief Inspector Department of Education and Science. Role of Science in Education. …enhances learners’ understanding of themselves and the world involves them in the active construction of their own understanding
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PISA National Symposium Concluding Remarks Eamonn Murtagh Assistant Chief Inspector Department of Education and Science
Role of Science in Education • …enhances learners’ understanding of themselves and the world • involves them in the active construction of their own understanding • enables learners to create new knowledge • Observation – the ability to notice significant details • Questioning • ‘What if’ … forming hypotheses
Ireland’s Performance in Reading Literacy, Science and Mathematics • Very good…Good…Fair • Consistently high reading literacy • Fewer low achieving students • BUT • Boys? 16% vs 8% at L1 or below? Upward trend in lower achievement?
Ireland’s Performance in Reading Literacy, Science and Mathematics • Science: high levels of participation – 86%; two-thirds study Higher Level • More students in Ireland than in the OECD as a whole (68% vs 62%) think that studying science is worthwhile • Achievement of students who had not taken science as a Junior Certificate subject …? • Students in schools with a high level of promotion of scientific learning scored better than students in schools with low levels of promotion
Ireland’s Performance in Reading Literacy, Science and Mathematics • Mathematics achievement levels consistently at the OECD average • Not as good as Czech Rep, Slovenia, Poland • Fewer high achievers – 1.6% L6 • We need: • Curriculum reform • Changes in how maths is taught • More students undertaking higher level maths • Project Maths
Thanks to… • Educational Research Centre • Authors of the report • National Advisory Committee • Colleagues in DES • Schools • Presenters at the symposium • Participants