93573 - Workshop on Transversal Nature Science (G.C)

Course contents

Interdisciplinary laboratories of nature Sciences

(only for students who started their graduate course in/after A. Y. 2020/2021)

SCIENTIFIC LABORATORIES: OVERVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

Given the 360° education required for future primary school teachers, the interdisciplinary Laboratories of nature Sciences were planned to be both interdisciplinary, thus involving the four scientific disciplines of the spring term of the third course year, and multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary as well: maximum effort will be put into highlighting links with non-scientific knowledge, in order to clarify that there is no dichotomy between sciences and humanities.

The main goals of this rearrangement of the scientific education of teachers are to:

• stimulate curiosity towards scientific themes;

• highlight the ethic and social impact of science and technology;

• communicate the importance of delivering a scientific educationstarting from the lowest school levels;

• provide conceptual and practical tools mandatory to plan and carry out science-based activities with pupils.

Science labs focused on single disciplines are activated as well, after being improved following aforementioned goals and rationales.

The interdisciplinary laboratory deals with a topic underpinning all the scientific disciplines involved in the master degree with the aim of showing that the same issue can be investigated under different frameworks, each related to a different discipline, and how we can obtain “a big picture” of a given issue by integrating all the different aspects. The title of the interdisciplinary laboratory is “Not just HtwoO: The unexpected features of water”. The scheduling will be communicated before the beginning of the course.

Teaching methods

Students will be divided into small work teams and will carry out simple experiments. The lab teacher will conduct also the discussion of results. Suitable experiments have been laid down so that they can be easily reproduced at pre-primary and primary schools.

Assessment methods

The laboratory provides 1 CFU, meaning 8 presence hours and 17 homework hours. In fact, laboratories involve not only the active participation of students but also a “final product”. After the completion of the laboratory experiences, where some disciplinary aspects are investigated and some strategies for stimulating scientific knowledge are proposed, the planning of a didactic activity is requested (which might be useful during school trainings as well). Recall the activity type and the teaching and learning strategy that have been adopted, taking part in these laboratories requires a previous participation into modules 1 and 2 of safety education on learning places, which is delivered remotely.

Students will be graded by lab teachers with -1, 0, or +1 (on a 30 scale). The grade obtained in the interdisciplinary Laboratory of nature Sciences will add to the final score of the integrated Chemistry and Ecology course. These grades will be available up to the completion of the grading procedure. You cannot register for any disciplinary exam (Elements of General Biology, Elements of Chemistry and Ecology, Elements of Physics) unless you have attended both the Laboratory on processes, models and interactions in Physics and Sciences and the disciplinary Laboratory of nature Sciences.

Office hours

See the website of Arianna Mancuso