Trusting in science and understanding how it evolves as we learn more is a critical element to our view of the world.

Ask students to:

Respond to this question: Why trust science? This can be a discussion or brief written response.

Pose this idea to the students: Given that we are always building on our prior knowledge and evolving our understanding of our world and other worlds, this is an opportunity to draw on your prior knowledge and everything we have been doing and studying so far in this unit.

Break students into small peer review groups of three, or as a class, have them read out their statements and give each other critical feedback based on the extent to which the statement was convincing.

Have students revise their statements based on the feedback they got if needed. Individual statements can be added to a master collaborative google doc.

After listening to the statements, solicit from the students the common themes or ideas that the statements fall into. Create or have students create a master class document with statements that are similar near each other on the list.

→ Suggestion: Create a google sheet so that students will be able to collaborate on the next activity using this list.

Make some extra space at the end of the Master List for students to be able to write additional reasons that Dr. Tyson gives in his video on “Why Trust Science” during the next activity in Explore and Explain.

Give students access to the spreadsheet with the class statements or have students access a copy of the master class list so that each student has their own document.

Ask the class to:

• Watch the video of Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Astrophysicist (they can look up what that is on the prefix/suffix list) and look for evidence of their reasons in his talk and put a checkmark next to the ones he talks about on their Master List.
• Write additional reasons that Dr. DeGrasse Tyson gives for trusting science at the bottom of the Master List.

Compile any new additions and distribute a final draft of the Master List so they will now have a working set of compelling statements to draw from.

Next, watch this 20 minute radio interview with Naomi Oreskes on the radio show Science Friday with host Ira Flatow about her book Why Trust Science? that you can play for your students.

As they are listening, ask them to jot down any thoughts they have about what she is saying, or any questions that come up.

Have a class discussion about the following question: 

How is what Dr. Oreskes says in the interview related to what you have already learned about why we should trust science? 

They can also read an excerpt from Dr Oreskes’ book Why Trust Science?  before considering the question above.

You can also consider this as an extension to the activity instead of making it part of the Explore and Explain discussion.

Share and discuss An Excerpt from Naomi Oreskes’s book, Why Trust Science?