Scientific and Religious Perspectives on Evolution: an Approach Based on Pedagogy of Difference

Presentation given at The 13th Conference of the European Science Education Research Association. There is a long history of some students finding that the science instruction they receive in schools fails to address their deeply held concerns about the theory of evolution. New instructional strategies are emerging, aimed at reducing the tensions that may exist between evolution and religion by making space for students to examine their own views and recognize the spectrum of views that exists between atheistic evolution and special creation, as well as the bounded nature of science and different ways of knowing. In this study, we test the potential for an approach based on ‘pedagogy of difference’ to enhance students’ development of epistemic insight through recognition of the multiple perspectives that exist concerning the relationship between religion and science in the context of evolution. In doing so, we identified several alternative conceptions of science that arose in students’ shared perceptions of two accounts of the origin of species–one religious and one scientific. We discuss the findings implications for implementation of the epistemic insight exercise in classroom settings, which should aid students’ situating of science as a resource for making decisions about issues with scientific and societal aspects where the acknowledgement of multiple perspectives is valuable