A concepção sobre a natureza do conhecimento científico de estudantes e professores do ensino médio da região de Santa Maria: influência de um curso baseado na resolução de problemas
Nowadays, science education has been extensively criticized mainly due to the fact that teaching science procedures have not allowed the formation of individuals that use science knowledge to solve problems on their daily lives. The low quality of science education certainly is responsible for the stereotyped view that population has about science and scientist, and also for the inadequate conceptions about the nature of scientific knowledge.Consequently, the development of methodologies that can enhance the quality of science education are needed. In the present report, the effect of a short course (40 hours) based on the resolution of problems (and that can be classified as apprentice centered) of high-school teachers and students from Santa Maria and surroundings were evaluated. The Nature of Scientific Knowledge Scale (NSKS) was used and this scale is sub-divided in 6 conceptual subscale (amoral, creative, developmental, parsimonious, testable, and unified). The results showed that the experimental courses (muscle contraction, digestion, respiration, and photosynthesis), in which the apprentices are engaged in solving their own problems, improved the students and teachers understanding about the nature of scientific knowledge. The improvement on the test (NSKS) occurred predominantly within the creative subscale, presumably due to the fact that the apprentices had to be creative in order to solve the proposed or generated problems during the course. These results suggest that it would be useful to teachers in service (as well as preservice teachers) to experience problem-based and experimental courses, because a better understanding of the nature of scientific knowledge by science teachers certainly will improve science education, at least with regard to the high-school students understanding.