Correlation and causation in inquiry-based teaching Biology classes

• Autor(a) principal: Campos, Beatriz Busin
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Outros Autores: Silva, Maíra Batistoni e
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista da SBEnBIO
• Texto Completo: https://renbio.org.br/index.php/sbenbio/article/view/904
• topic: Ensino por investigação; Conhecimentos prévios; Microbiota intestinal; Ensino Médio; Correlação; Causalidade; Ensino; Biologia; Ensino Médio; Inquiry-based teaching; Preview knowledges; Intestinal microbiota; High School; Correlation; Causation; Teaching; Biology; High School; Educación basada en la indagación; Conocimiento prévio; Microbiota intestinal; Escuela secundaria; Correlación; Causalidad; Enseñanza; Biología; Escuela Secundaria

Correlation and causation are important concepts for the understanding of scientific knowledge, however they are commonly mistaken. We developed and applied a teaching sequence (TS) to investigate how high school students relate different variables in data analysis and to evaluate how a TS that discusses correlation and causation helps in the construction of evidence-based explanations. The investigative TS developed addressed the intestinal microbiota and, during its application, we found out that students usually infer causation through data that demonstrate correlations, often using prior knowledge to justify such inferences. We also consider that as the TS was applied remotely the interaction between peers, fundamental in the investigative approach, was not effective, explaining students' difficulty in recognizing and overcoming their mistakes.