McComas W.F. (ed.). The Language of Science Education

Rotterdam / Boston / Taipei: Sense Publishers, 2014. — xii +110 p.As science education has matured as a discipline, it has developed experts in the field, specialized journals, professional meetings, advanced degree programs along with a unique language and the desire on the part of scholars and practitioners from across the globe to participate in work designed to enhance science teaching and learning. Recently, these last two elements came together when I was approached by colleagues from the Excellence Research Center of Science and Mathematics Education (ECSME) of the King Saud University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Their request was to write a glossary defining a number of key terms within science education so that they could more fully understand the literature and make contributions to it. This immediately seemed to be a worthy and interesting project with potentially far reaching implications to promote shared understanding. The original list of more than seventy terms featured an important cross section of many aspects of science education, all of which were worthy of formal definition. The list revealed that science education has truly developed its own language with unique entries and general education terms contextualized with respect to science teaching and learning. It was immediately clear that knowledge of this core set of terms would be fundamental to having shared and productive conversations within the discipline. As we completed our task for ECSME, they graciously encouraged us to expand the work and produce a product directed at a wider audience.