Handbook of Research on Science Education

CHAPTER 8

Postcolonialism, Indigenous Students, and Science Education

Elizabeth McKinley

Auckland University

Science education research, particularly in the English-speaking world, has become increasingly concerned with the diversity of students in the classroom, as evidenced by increasing numbers of review articles on issues of equality and equity in the last 10 years (see, for example, Hipkins et al., 2002; Krugley-Smolska, 1996; Lee, 2003). However, much of the diversity literature does not fully address the issues of indigenous learners and their communities in postcolonial societies. This literature has tended to treat minorities as requiring similar, if not the same, solutions to what is perceived as non-participation and non-achievement ...