History of science and science museums: an enriching partnership for elementary school science

• Autor(a) principal: Faria, Cláudia
• Data de Publicação: 2015
• Outros Autores: Guilherme, Elsa, Gaspar, Raquel, Boaventura, D.M.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10451/46847
• topic: Elementary education; Science education; Science museums; History of science

The activity presented in this article is intended for elementary school students and focus on the pioneering oceanographic work of the Portuguese King Carlos I. This activity involves the exploration of the exhibits belonging to two different science museums, the Aquarium Vasco da Gama and the Maritime Museum. Students were asked to study fish adaptations to deep sea, through the exploration of a fictional story, also based on historical data from the work of the King that served as a guiding script for all the subsequent tasks. In both museums, students had access to observations of: historical collections of organisms, oceanographic biological sampling instruments, fish gears and ships. They could also observe the characteristics and adaptations of diverse deep-sea fish species. The present study aimed to analyse the impact of this activity on students’ scientific knowledge, on their understanding of the nature of science and on the development of transversal skills. All students considered the project very interesting. The obtained results suggest that the activity promoted not only the understanding of scientific concepts, but also the development of knowledge about science itself and the construction of scientific knowledge. This emphasizes the relevance of creating activities informed by the history of science. As a final remark we suggest that the partnership between elementary schools and museums should be seen as an educational project approach, in which the teacher has to assume a key, mediating role between the school and the museums.