How to teach astronomy in Iranian experimental science textbooks and compare them with the books of OECD countries

They were quantitative and qualitative analysis of Iranian science textbooks in the subject of astronomy from the past to the present, comparing them with OECD, Chinese and South African textbooks and finally identifying their strengths and weaknesses.

The research was done by content analysis method. The statistical population was the entire subject of astronomy in the experimental science textbooks of elementary and middle school. The whole population was selected as a statistical sample.

In this research, first, the evolution of the astronomy educational content in Iran's curriculum from 1306 to 1380 was investigated. Also, the experimental science textbooks of elementary and middle school written in 1401-1402 were analyzed in terms of the number of pages, specialized terms, and astronomical topics, and the results were compared together. Then the astronomy topics of each course were compared with the astronomy of OECD countries, China and South Africa.

The analysis of the data showed that the amount of astronomical content in middle school (5.73% of the total content of the books) is slightly higher than elementary school (27.5% of the total content of the books).On the other hand, the number of astronomical terms used in middle school (48 items) compared to elementary school (20 items) has more than doubled, so that astronomical materials in elementary school are classified in 7 main titles with 18 sub-titles, but in middle school, the content is arranged in 11 main topics with 48 sub-titles.These results show that astronomy topics are discussed more in middle school.On the other hand, the results of the last part of the research showed that in the books of OECD countries, China and South Africa, important and up-to-date topics of gravity, cosmology, radio astronomy and astrobiology are raised. But in the astronomical content of Iranian books, there is no mention of them.