UN APPROCCIO DIDATTICO INNOVATIVO PER L’INSEGNAMENTO DELLE GEOSCIENZE NELLA SCUOLA SECONDARIA DI II GRADO

This project is constituted by two fields of research the Didactic and the Geosciences that are deeply interconnected and have their core in the teaching-learning process for the context of the upper secondary school. This research was born as a replay to several criticisms highlighted in the school, academic and social environment, especially for the acquisition of Earth Sciences Literacy, which is necessary to face the outgoing environmental challenges. Schools and education systems are privileged places where competences for Geoscientific literacy can be developed and the Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, in particular Goal 4, can be implemented. Indeed, the Geosciences have a crucial role to play in the realisation of sustainable development, as they contribute to the achievement of the SDGs. For these reasons, the research project has been planned to achieve two principal scopes: 1. making a contribution for the improvement of teaching-learning in Geosciences; 2. promoting teachers to give same dignity and space to this discipline regard other Sciences in the Natural Sciences planning and in the didactic practice at school. In order to address the first scope, I focus on epistemic studies about Nature of Geosciences, didactic research and learning psychology. These allow to apply effective teaching methods and approaches for meaningful learning of Geosciences and to identify knowledge structuring in this discipline and specific competences of geoscientists. For the second scope, I identify the actions to be implemented and the target to whom the actions are addressed, i.e. upper secondary school teachers. These scopes are closely interrelated.For the first scope, it was realised: a framework of skills/competences that is organic and consistent with those of geoscientists, with European key Competences and with Literacy in Geosciences, on the basis of the ministerial documents of the Italian upper secondary school reform; four laboratory activities on Global Climate Change, focused on the Inquiry approach (Inquiry Based Learning – IBL) and some inductive methodologies (Data Puzzle, Model Based Learning - MBL, Laboratory experiment - Inquiry Based and Digital Game Based Learning – DGBL), to provide teachers with ready-made materials; the instructional model PCE-7 to help teachers design laboratory activities for secondary schools. The framework and PCE-7 model constitute a didactic scaffolding that is intended to guide the teacher in applying a constructivist-cognitivist methodological procedure and teaching approach to improve the teacher's teaching process.For the second scope, a questionnaire was designed to survey a sample of secondary school Natural Sciences teachers in Sicily, in order to understand how science teachers perceive the Geosciences and what they need to make the teaching-learning process in this discipline more effective and meaningful. This is a preliminary step, which is necessary in order to structure the subsequent phases of experimentation. Based on these results, two editions of the Workshop in Geosciences: Teaching Methodologies for the Development of Competences in the Geosciences - "Climate Change as seen by geoscientists", was structured for the training of teachers in upper secondary schools. This allowed them to test and implement the PCE-7 instructional model and its associated didactic activities with students. In addition, this experimentation was carried out with university students of the LM Geoscience Didactic course, in order to obtain a technical opinion from those who are likely to choose the teaching profession in the future. The experimental phase made this possible: i) testing the effectiveness of the didactic materials produced to implement a meaningful and lasting learning process for students in Earth Sciences; ii) guiding teachers and university students in the application of the inductive approach and of innovative methodologies in order to improve the quality of teaching in the Earth Sciences; iii) raising awareness of the need to give the Geosciences equal dignity and space in teaching practice.The data collected were examined through a mixed methodology, using both quantitative and qualitative analysis. The evaluation of the results is extremely positive and shows that the experimented activities on Global Climate Change and the PCE-7 model are effective in improving the teaching-learning process, developing critical thinking and enhancing pupil performance. Additionally, they allow schoolchildren to understand the sense and meaning of the work done, which increases student motivation and promotes more responsible behaviour towards the environment. The whole pathway and the associated teaching materials (teacher's guide, metacognitive tests, verification tests, evaluation materials and student activity sheets) were evaluated very positively by teachers and university students. They appreciated the innovative didactic approach and methodologies used, as well as the ready-made laboratory activities. In particular, pupils have appreciated the innovative teaching methods and working in groups. The final product of this research is the Teacher's Workbook, which will be distributed and disseminated as widely as possible among secondary school Natural Science teachers and students of the Geoscience Didactics course.