State Duma will be offered to return astronomy to the school curriculum

The State Duma Education Committee will propose to return astronomy to the school curriculum, Mikhail Berulava, deputy chairman of the committee, told the Russian News Service . On the eve of the Moscow planetarium began collecting signatures about this. Polls showed: a third of the Russians is sure that the sun rotates around the Earth, and over the years, the proportion of mistaken is growing.

"We will make a draft change in the law on education, the committee. And I think that taking into account the opinions of all interested, this subject will return to the curriculum," the deputy said.

He noticed that the study of this discipline is important for the formation of the scientific picture of the world. “I believe that this was a mistake - to bring astronomy from the curriculum. Astronomy must (must be) ... And life requires this, and the development of mankind, therefore, without this direction, I think, this is an incomplete picture of the world,” Berulava said.

The Moscow planetarium, with the support of Roscosmos, initiated the collection of signatures for the return of astronomy lessons to the school general program. "Based on our own experience, we can say that modern youth is interested in everything related to the cosmos, but the level of knowledge in astronomy leaves much to be desired. We are sure that astronomy is necessary at school as a separate subject," the planetarium website says.

RIA Novosti in a review , where astronomy is called "a miracle that does not leave a place" science indicates that the "erosion" of the subject began in Russian schools since the mid-90s. Now there is no official ban on teaching. However, now astronomy does not appear in the federal basic curriculum. Schools can, if desired, introduce it as a course of choice, but usually the additional hours go to specialized subjects. As Interfax notes, now astronomy is taught in schools with in-depth study of physical, mathematical and natural sciences, and in ordinary schools initial knowledge gives in the framework of the lessons of natural science and physics.

In October, the head of the Ministry of Education and Science Dmitry Livanov said that the ministry did not plan to return astronomy to the school course.

According to a survey of VTsIOM , which was conducted in 2011, a third of the country's inhabitants are sure that the sun rotates around the Earth. Another 6% found it difficult to answer this question. At the same time, sociologists noted that over the years, the share of such respondents is increasing.

This view was included in the three scientific errors of Russians along with the confidence that radioactivity is the work of human (55%) and the fact that antibiotics kill viruses in the same way as bacteria (46%).