Geoscience education: an overview

Geoscience educational publications are reviewed in seven areas to identify future directions for curriculum development, professional development and research. The review shows that: effective teaching methods encompassing broad geoscience study still need extensive research; whilst some valuable materials have been developed for the teaching of systems approaches to geoscience, these need to be evaluated in different curriculum contexts; different methodologies for teaching spatial awareness in geoscience need to be more widely applied and researched; approaches for the effective teaching of geological time should be further developed and tested; there is much scope for the development and evaluation of approaches to geoscience fieldwork; geoscience misconceptions are widespread and need further identification and review; and studies of the effectiveness of professional development in geoscience education should be implemented more widely, including their impact in the classroom. The review indicates that geoscience education will progress most effectively through: extending geoscience learning to all children; educating teachers in effective implementation of new curriculum initiatives; evaluating the progress of the initiatives and using the results to refine them; and researching the whole process to demonstrate its effectiveness and to ensure wide dissemination on the basis of well‐founded research findings.