Scientific Concepts and Reflection

Abstract

An interpretation of the idea of "scientific concepts" as the products of science that should supersede prior everyday knowledge of pupils is untenable and obscures the relation between learning, reflection, and morality. Instead, in this article I propose to think of scientific (or "scholarly") concepts as the products of reflection in a practice that includes choices about the future development of that praxis and are, in that sense, of a moral nature. Teaching scholarly concepts should be "genetically adequate," meaning that it should encourage pupils to reflect and interpret concepts as elements to be used in co-reconstruction of practices. In teaching, subject matter, identity formation, and the development of practices are interconnected.