Ensino de nanotecnologia no ensino médio por meio de diferentes metodologias teórico-práticas

Abstract

Lack of interest, problems of concentration, and difficulties in keeping students' attention are common complaints that come from educators in the natural sciences. Pedagogical theories and government curricular orientation documents defend that the scientific concepts must be presented from the students’ daily perspective to overcome these problems. Ones also defend a reduction of disciplinary frontiers in order for the student to see a connection between scientific content and daily life, increasing the students’ interest for the subject. Due to it, several educational researches started to seek innovation in chemistry teaching. Some of the proposed activities defend the use of educational themes that feed the students' curiosity in understanding how modern processes work, because they make a more positive view of chemistry. Nanotechnology fits perfectly in this proposal, not only because of its vast applications in diverse areas, but also for being a novel theme for most students. Because of this, a study using nanotechnology as a captive topic in chemistry classes was done. In this study, different methodologies based on the combination of two theoretical and two experimental methods were analyzed in order to compare their performance when applied to six sophomore high school chemistry classes. The methodologies were analyzed according to the conception of nanotechnology acquired by the students and their acceptance by the nanotechnology theme. It was found that methodologies that lead to the transgression of disciplinary frontiers stimulate the development of a better-grounded and everyday-applied reasoning, besides making the student more interested in the topic and giving them the feeling that the classes were connected with their daily lives. It was also noticed that the act of asking interpretive and investigative questions during the experimental procedures in laboratory classes, instead of asking them after the procedures were done, helps in the interpretation of the phenomena occurred during the experiment, as long as theoretical classes that demonstrate applicability of content and attract students’ interest precede the experimental activity.