• Journal of The Korean Association For Science Education
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.409-427
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• 1999

The aim of this study was to illustrate how STS-related ideas in science education have been developed historically in the context of British education, particularly focused on the period of the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century. It has been hardly considered that the basic ideas of the STS education, one of the two paradigms of current science education together with constructivism, can be traced back to the beginning of the school science education itself. far beyond some of the programs which are largely regarded as the first-developed STS programs in Britain, such as Science in Society and SISCON. The movement of Mechanics' Institute during the first half of the 19th century would be the first systematic attempt to bridge the gap between the knowledge of pure science and its practical applications, although the main target was working-class adults rather than school pupils. At the end of the first half of the 19th century, this application-focused approach of science teaching was echoed in the elementary schools by Richard Dawes, one of the early experimenters of school science. The second half of the century was in large the period of the establishment of science as one of the core elements of school curriculum, mainly by emphasizing the aspect of pure science as a means for mental training. During this period, the elements of STS education-related appeared in the subject called 'Object Lesson' in elementary schools which was practically a separate subject from those of science. After the turn of the century, triggered by the experience of World War I, the growing appreciation of the impacts of science upon society and of the necessity of the teaching of science for wider audience gave a great impact towards two new main movements, i.e. for General Science and Citizen Science. The later illustrates a typical example of the STS movement in school science during the first half of the 20th century, particularly driven by the socialistic ideas towards the relation between science and society.