Workshops on Islam, Science and Education – Islamic Educator Learning Community

About the Project:

This project aims to begin an academic and practitioner dialogue on the broad field of Islam, Science and Education, particularly in Muslim contexts. Our long term aim is to support educators seeking to address and navigate perceived conflicts between the teaching of Islam and the teaching of Science and to address challenging questions from their learners.

We acknowledge that competing epistemologies, ontologies and ethical perspectives make this a challenging and controversial field. The project aims to develop critical consciousness in both educators and learners to consider challenges to a positivist approach that sees Science as ‘objective knowledge’ and to recognise the role of Science as part of a wider modernist and colonial project. Further, we seek to develop educator confidence to approach the teaching of Science through an ethical orientation that supports Scientific research from within an Islamic worldview and to acknowledge that there are multiple ways of doing this. Finally, we seek to support educators to draw on the Islamic intellectual tradition and scholarly adab to begin to navigate the teaching of Science in Muslim contexts. As always, the Islamic Educator Learning Community Platform is a space for respectful dialogue towards education in Muslim contexts. The views expressed by individuals in this project are their own and are not the policy or views of the platform or those running it.

The Islam, Science and Education Conference is part of the Cambridge Dialogues: Rethinking Islamic Education project at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. The educator workshops are in partnership with the Islamic Educator Learning Community Platform

About the Workshops:

The workshops were designed to engage with educators about the core topics to be covered at the conference, to understand the state of the field and identify educators’ perspectives on the issues and challenges in the classroom. The workshops are now complete and the presentation recordings are available below.

Islam, Science and Education: An Introduction – Dr Nadeem Memon

The first presentation provides a brief overview of the context of Islamic schooling in relation to science curriculum dilemmas. The slides for this video are not available.

Islam and Science: An Overview of the Field – Dr Shoaib Malik

Dr Shoaib Malik presents an overview of the developing academic field of Islam and Science. Slides Available Here.

Decolonial Teaching Approaches for Islam and Science – Usama Javed Mirza

What are some practical ways in which, and to what extent can, the curriculum and teaching of science and Islam be decolonised? Slides available here.

Islamic Educator Learning Community – Dr Farah Ahmed

How can the Islamic Educator Learning Community collaboratively generate resources to address the challenge of Islam and Science in Muslim schools? Slides available here.

Pedagogical Inquiry through an Islamic Framework – Dr Fella Lahmar

Dr Fella Lahmar provides teachers with a guide to conducting a classroom inquiry in their Science classroom and sharing their findings via the upcoming conference. The slides for this vide are not available. Slides available here.