The Pedagogy of Science and Environment: Experimental Evidence from Peru

Peer Reviewed icon Peer Reviewed
Date issued
Sep 2012
Subject
Science and Technology;
Primary and Secondary Education;
Teaching Effectiveness
JEL code
I21 - Analysis of Education;
I28 - Government Policy;
O15 - Human Resources • Human Development • Income Distribution • Migration;
I29 - Education and Research Institutions: Other;
O31 - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
Country
Peru
Category
Working Papers
In today's knowledge-based societies, understanding basic scientific concepts and the capacity to structure and solve scientific questions is more critical than ever. Accordingly, in this paper we test an innovative methodology for teaching science and environment in public primary schools where traditional (teacher centred) teaching was replaced with student centred activities using LEGO kits. We document positive and significant improvements of 0.18 standard deviations in standardised test scores. Such positive results are mainly concentrated within boys that were located above the median of baseline academic performance.