California 6th grade science books: Climate change a matter of opinion not scientific fact

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://blog.smu.edu/research/2015/11/09/california-6th-grade-science-books-climate-change-a-matter-of-opinion-not-scientific-fact/

[font face=Serif][font size=5]California 6th grade science books: Climate change a matter of opinion not scientific fact[/font]

Posted on November 9, 2015

[font size=4]Textbooks from different major publishers give climate deniers equal weight as vast majority of climate scientists who cite scientific evidence of human-caused global warming[/font]


[font size=1]A new study measured how four sixth-grade science textbooks adopted for use in California frame the subject of global warming. (Diego Román, SMU)[/font]

[font size=3]If American teens are unsure about climate change or its cause, some school textbooks aren’t helping, says teaching expert Diego Román, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, co-author of a new study on the subject.

…

The researchers examined different textbooks, each published in either 2007 or 2008 by a different major publisher. They found and analyzed 279 clauses containing 2,770 words discussing climate change.

“We found that climate change is presented as a controversial debate stemming from differing opinions,” said Román, an assistant professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning in the SMU Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development. “Climate skeptics and climate deniers are given equal time and treated with equal weight as scientists and scientific facts — even though scientists who refute global warming total a miniscule number.”

…[/font][/font]

[LiberalArkie]

1. I kind of remember back when racism was caused by blacks who did not want to act like whites.

Geez.

[rocktivity]

2. I'm willing to split the difference

Climate change is a scientific opinion BASED on scientific fact.

What is climate change denial based on?


rocktivity

[happyslug]

3. My old History books, they had the stories of corrupt inner city politicians...

But then did not mention that all of them were Republicans. Now, they did mention the party if the Politician was a Democrat but even when the book mentioned the time a Politician yelled past some Police Officers asking someone how many times had he voted that day. since that Politician was a Republican, his party affiliation was NOT mentioned (but did imply he was a Democrat).

Tilting what is in school books have been going on for decades, this is nothing new. What is needed is input when BUYING these books and when publishing these books. Texas is and has been the center of this fight, for Texas has a Centralized book buying system (Designed during the Progressive era of the early 1900s to cut out corruption in buying books). Thus the State of Texas is the single buyer of School Books in the Country and publishers cater to the Texas board of Education for that Board decides what the State of Texas will buy (and NOT buy) and other public schools will just accept what Texas decides to buy (Thus the power of the Texas Board of Education when it comes to Text books).

Sorry, this should have been fought in 2006 or 2007 when these books were first offered, not now almost 9 years later. These books are about done, i.e. they are being replaced for they are worn out.

Now, making this observation is the first step in any fight over the books being purchased today, but it is ONLY the first step. We have to address this issue when the books are approved, and most importantly by the Texas Board of Education.

[Mnemosyne]

4. I will never understand being willfully ignorant and wanting your kids to be too. Sickening really.

[Binkie The Clown]

5. By the time those kids grow up they will realize their text books were full of shit

because they will be living climate change, not just talking about it.

But by then it won't matter, because they will all be doomed to die of catastrophic ecosystem failure, no matter what they believe or don't believe.

[Nihil]

6. I doubt it

They'll just do the same that their ignorant parents & grandparents did: blame the scientists ...

[OKIsItJustMe]

7. “Why didn’t they warn us!?”

When I first heard that the Space Shuttle, “Challenger” had exploded, I said, “they must have had a burn-through.” I had read newspaper stories of previous incidents which included dire phrases like (potential) “catastrophic failure.”

I was shocked, in the aftermath, to see astronauts who were upset because they had not been warned of problems with the “O-rings.” What!? I thought? How could I know about them, and astronauts not? I was just some guy, reading the newspaper!


During the early days of the “AIDS crisis,” but after the discovery of HIV, and the coining of the phrase “safe sex.” I felt bombarded by information on how to slow the spread of HIV, and, yet, I heard it said time after time that people didn’t know. They weren’t being warned. How was that possible!?


“The greenhouse effect” has been a part of the popular culture since the early 1970’s. While many people remember the line “Soylent Green is people” how many recall that part of the reason for the extreme conditions faced by society was climate change, i.e. warming due to “the greenhouse effect?”

How can anyone claim ignorance, and, yet… they will.