(This article is available for subscribers of the The Wall Street Journal at http://www.wsj.com . A synopsis of the article follows.)

In a January 19 article in The Wall Street Journal, reporter Robert Tomsho looks at how inquiry-based instruction is faring in an atmosphere of increased testing in science. Many educators have increased the classroom time they devote to inquiry-based instruction that gives students hands-on opportunities to explore scientific concepts. Teacher Jay Marcks from Pioneer Elementary School in Green Bay, Wis., has had success with inquiry-based teaching.

"They're learning more," says Mr. Marcks, than if he was just explaining it to them. "I love it."

Many educators support this approach, and the National Science Teachers Association indicated in its 2004 position statement on "Scientific Inquiry," that it should be the "the centerpiece of the science classroom." In addition, states like Texas now mandate that "high-school science students spend at least 40% of their time on hands-on lab and field work."

As inquiry-based teaching gains traction, it is "colliding" with the trend of states and the federal government pushing to implement standardized education and student testing. "Forty-two states now test students in at least three grades, up from 24 states in 2002." The National Assessment of Educational Progress is "taking a step back from the inquiry-based model and rewriting its next test to include fewer questions based on student experimentation and more questions based on material typically taught in lectures and textbooks."

With the increase of tests coming next year as part of the No Child Left Behind act, some policy makers and educators fear that students who receive much of their science instruction through inquiry based teaching will score poorly, other express concern that the pressures of testing will thwart an important movement in science education.

"There will be a major drive back toward direct instruction," says Wayne Carley, executive director of the National Association of Biology Teachers.

Similar to struggles over how to teach English and math, the debate about how to teach science has increased because of testing. "Should teachers focus on delivering factual basics of knowledge most often gauged by such tests, or encourage students to do more open-ended thinking?"

Also at issue are worries about the poor international standing of U.S. students in science and its effect on the nation's economic competitiveness.

"The international tests don't support one teaching method over another. But it is clear that, in top-performing countries like Taiwan and Singapore, science curriculums are tightly focused and students move on more quickly to specialized courses in chemistry and physics. American eighth-graders 'spend a lot of time learning the parts of the eye,' says William Schmidt, a Michigan State University education professor who has worked on such tests. 'In other countries, [eighth-graders] are learning how one actually sees.'"

In a new model of inquiry-based teaching, educators "provide basic information and answer questions, but do less lecturing, and the emphasis is on learning by doing. Classroom kits and material are designed for open-ended experiments."

"Teachers provide guidance, says David Smith, director of the Center for Inquiry Based Learning, a Duke University office that advises schools; the child plays 'the role of scientist.'"

Focus on inquiry-based teaching gained traction in 1996 when the National Research Council called for encouraging students to "think for themselves and pursue scientific investigations." Some small-scale studies suggest success of inquiry-based instruction to improve performance, including one in El Centro, California. However, educators say there are few large-scale studies.

"Advocates of inquiry-based learning don't recommend abandoning all direct instruction. In his ecosystem project, Mr. Marcks lectures about the experiment one day a week and spends other class time answering students' questions and encouraging them to explain their observations, he says. 'You certainly cannot teach everything by inquiry,' Duke's Mr. Smith says."

Many worry, however, about the ability of science teachers to oversee open-ended inquiry, especially since many districts struggle to hire experienced science teachers and because many students enter high school lacking adequate skills in science.

"Vera Larkin, biology teacher and science coordinator at Watertown High School in Watertown, Mass., says she prefers letting her students discover things for themselves. But many of them have little understanding of the basics, she says. With so much ground to cover, 'I feel compelled to constantly teach and instruct.'"

The Thomas B. Fordham Institute, a conservative think tank based in Washington, D.C., believes that states are putting too much emphasis on inquiry-based teaching and learning. "The approach is 'fine to some degree,' says the institute's president, Chester E. Finn Jr. 'But like so many things in education, it gets carried to excess.'"

The board overseeing the National Assessment of Educational Progress recently voted to increase the amount of test questions devoted to "fact-oriented questions about principles, theories and laws." "Such questions will make up 60% of the 2009 science test, up from 45% of NAEP's latest test. NAEP officials say the shift is necessary to cover developments in science since the test's last overhaul in the early 1990s."

The controversy over these colliding educational trends has caused one district to "revolt." Sandra Mann, a biology teacher and science department chair of University City High School in San Diego says a new curriculum recently rolled out by the San Diego school district doesn't leave her enough time to teach the basics that her students need. For example, in one classroom students were asked to compare DNA sequences before they were told enough about what DNA is, she said.

"'The brightest kids did in fact get it and the others did not,' says Ms. Mann, who had to step in and provide more information. 'The kids find it frustrating, and it takes a long time.'"

When many of the teachers realized they had to play catch up to cover the material that would be on the state test, many of them began abandoning the new curriculum.