We can distinguish the claims of cognitive constructivism from those of metaphysical constructivism. which is almost entirely irrelevant to science education. Cognitive constructivism has strong empirical SUPPO” and indicates important directions for changing science instruction. [t implies that teachers need to be cognizant of representational. motivational and epistemic dimensions which can restrict or promote student learning. The resulting set of tasks for a science teacher are considerably larger and more complex than on the older more traditional conception, but the resources of cognitive sciences and the history of science can provide important parts of the teachers intellectual tool kit. A critical part of this conception of science education is that students must develop the skills to participate in epistemic interchanges. They must be provided opportunities and materials to develop those skills and the classroom community must ha\‘e the appropriate features of an objective epistemic community.

During the last two decades, science studies have increasingly been dominated by ideas related to social constructivism and the sociology of scientific knowledge. This paper offers a critical examination of some of the basic claims of this branch of science studies and argues that social constructivists cannot explain some of the most characteristic features of the physical sciences. The implications of social constructivism for science education are considered. I conclude that if education in physics consistently followed the philosophy of sociology of scientific knowledge in its more extreme versions it would mean the end of physics. However, the rejection of social constructivism does not imply a rejection of social or cultural studies of science or their value in science education.

This article indicates something of the enormous influence of constructivism on contemporary science education. The article distinguishes educational constructivism (that has its origins in theories of children’s learning), from constructivism in the philosophy of science (usually associated with instrumentalist views of scientific theory), and from constructivism in the sociology of science (of which the Edinburgh Strong Programme in the sociology of scientific knowledge is the best known example). It notes the expansion of educational constructivism from initial considerations of how children come to learn, to views about epistemology, educational theory, ethics, and the cognitive claims of science. From the learning-theory beginnings of constructivism, and at each stage of its growth, philosophical questions arise that deserve the attention of educators. Among other things, the article identifies some theoretical problems concerning constructivist teaching of the content of science.