Between Education and Opinion-Making
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ARTICLE
Between Education and Opinion-Making Dialogue between Didactic/Didaktik Models from Science Education and Science Communication in the Times of a Pandemic Erik C. Fooladi 1 Published online: 9 September 2020 # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract
The fields of science education and science communication are said to have developed as disparate fields of research and practice, operating based on somewhat different logics and premises about their audiences. As the two fields share many of the same goals, arguments have been made for a rapprochement between the two. Drawing inspiration from a historical debate between the scholars John Dewey and Walter Lippmann, the present article is a case-oriented theoretical contribution applying models from science education and science communication in relation to a current socio-scientific issue (SSI), the COVID-19 pandemic. The main question of interest is how selected didactic (didaktik) models from science education and science communication can contribute to shed light on the present situation of an ongoing pandemic specifically and socioscientific issues in general. Three models are synthesised to give a new composite model that may help communicators and educators understand, discuss, and analyse complex socio-scientific issues. The model is subsequently applied on the apparently contradictory issue of Norwegian and Swedish governments’ very different responses to the pandemic, despite grounding their decisions on largely the same scientific evidence and advice. Contrast is made by comparison with another SSI, anthropogenic global warming (AGW). It is argued that the exchange and combination of didactic models from the two fields may open new spaces for cross-pollination and cross-fertilisation to the mutual benefit of both science education and science communication.
1 Introduction Although the fields of science education and science communication share many common goals, they have traditionally operated based on somewhat different logics and premises about
* Erik C. Fooladi [email protected]
1
Department of Science and Mathematics, Volda University College, Volda, Norway
1118
E. Fooladi
their audiences (Feinstein 2015). While science education research and practice by and large engage with formalised teaching and learning, science communication cannot permit itself the luxury of an audience obliged by the regulations of organised classes, mandatory participation and so forth. While the educator is at liberty to test learning outcomes, the communicator is often left in the dark in terms of what the communicatee takes away from the interaction. Science education would discuss teaching and learning, whereas science communication would often refrain from using a term such as teaching and rather focus on, for example, promotion of engagement. The science communicator, meanwhile, enjoys a greater flexibility to focus on any topic of relevance, independent of the limitations of curriculum or subject content. The two fields operate under different social cont
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