Next Generation Science Standards in a Historical Context - Part II:

Unlike the biblical account of Moses returning to the Israelites’ campsite after receiving the 10 Commandments from the Almighty, the Next Generation Science Standards have them delivered with a well-known, deep, rich and unpredictable historical background. Arriving at our latest iteration of science standards in 2013 entailed a journey that began centuries ago. Over the past 500 years, inventions, great minds, scientific and engineering tools, educational policies and practices, research on human learning, the founding of scientific organizations, science curriculum development, educational psychology, Congressional acts, laws, court rulings, novel educational initiatives, standards-based movements, cognitive science, revised science standards, demographic changes, technology, and periodic trips “back to the basics” under the guise of educational reform have all played explicit or implicit role in shaping today’s Next Generation Science Standards.  

What are some of the key milestones in the history of science education? How did we get to where are today with the NGSS? Those questions cannot be satisfactorily answered without stepping back in time and taking a journey on a conceptual and historical “time machine,” where we can become a vicarious eyewitness to science education history and the hundreds of pieces comprising the intricate jigsaw puzzle that is defining how students will learn science during the next decade.

We are often cautioned against “getting too deep in the weeds,” but the “weeds” documented herein are comparable to the living and non-living parts of a vastly complex ecosystem, where each of the interacting components (the producers and the consumers) could not exist without the others that make up the whole.

The precursor to the NGSS of 2013 was not the 1996 National Science Education Standards nor the AAAS Benchmarks for Science Literacy published in 1993. Instead, centuries of myriad events ranging from the development of science curricula to more tangential affairs -- compulsory education, the space race, Apple Computer’s iPad -- all unfolded over a massive expanse of time. With the occurrence of each historical event, the destiny and direction of science education took a new turn, bringing us to where we are in the year 2018.