THE MEANING OF AND NEED FOR “INQUIRY BASED SCIENCE EDUCATION (IBSE)”

It is clear from many studies that European students' interest in science, mathematics and technology has been declining while their grade levels have increased. Another alarming issue for Europe is recruitment of students for science and technology related careers. According to the ROSE Project results, extremely few girls wish to become scientists, and even for boys the percentage is low. And in Europe, around 50% of boys gave a positive response to the question: “I would like to get a job in technology”, but very few girls indicated that they would like to pursue such a career option (Sjoberg and Schreiner, 2010). These kinds of results from project reports highlight the urgent need for more effective action on the teaching and learning of science in schools.