Our home image comes from the frontespiece of Francis Bacon's great 1610 treatise on science. The ship heads out between the "Pillars of Hercules" at the western end of the Mediterranean Sea, a metaphor for discovery. The sense of wonder that inspired such voyages was integral to the emergence of modern science. At the same time, exploration was fueled by desire for power and profit, two other factors that have helped shape science (for better and worse) both then and now.

Who We Are: Our Aim

We are a network primarily of science teachers. Through this website, we aim to offer resources for teaching "history and nature of science" and "personal and social dimensions of science," profiled in many national standards and now featured in many state requirements. We believe teaching should reflect the most recent research and standards of quality in the field of Science Studies. Hence, we also aim to link teachers with each other and with professional historians, philosophers and sociologists of science.

What You'll Find

This is not a click-and-go website. It is an online library, a repository of information for teachers to plan lessons and to learn more deeply about "nature of science" through history and social studies of science. Some information, especially about further links, is reference, and we hope you can find what you're looking for quickly and easily. Other information, aimed to support professional growth and curriculum development, is in more extended essays--intended for printing and reading offline. It is text intensive: no fancy video clips here. The Resource Center contains curriculum modules, essays, historical updates, book and video reviews, case studies and discussion about how to teach more effectively (see tour). This site serves secondary school and college science teachers (and also perhaps K-6 teachers); it is not designed for K-12 student research projects. We welcome your comments

History

Our group began in 1989 with a group of teachers attending the First International History, Philosophy and Science Teaching Conference in Tallahasee, Florida. Our focus remains on practice and the concerns of classroom teachers. We have networked through a quarterly newsletter and, now, through this website.

To learn about what the SHiPS website offers, please take the tour.