Contribuições de um texto teatral histórico para o estudo da física nuclear no ensino médio

Abstract

The need to update the physics curriculum in basic education, by inserting themes of Modern and Contemporary Physics, has been defended by teachers and researchers for almost half a century, since this knowledge is increasingly present in everyone's reality, and are necessary to enable students to understand the world around them. Nevertheless, few changes have actually been made to the curricula. This paper presents a proposal about nuclear physics in basic education, more precisely in the first year of high school. We used a theatrical text to employ a historical approach to develop a didactic sequence, with the intention of favoring the construction of academic knowledge, also contributing to the academic and social formation of students, in a reflexive perspective. In order to use the history of science in a different, more dynamic and interesting way for the student, favoring the teaching-learning process, the theatrical text “Encontro com o Passado” was used during the lessons of this sequence, effectively contributing to the reflective reading and mobilization for the appropriation of the developed concepts. We used as a basis for the elaboration and development of the activities Vygostsky's studies on senses and meanings. The intention in working the senses and meanings in the concepts of Nuclear Physics, was not only to assist in the learning of concepts but also in the development of opinions. We observed that initially all information on the subject by the students was obtained through the media, which is contradictory at certain times, in some cases erroneous and incomplete. By studying these concepts showing all possible aspects of using Nuclear Physics so that they could develop their senses and meanings and thus conclude for themselves whether the aspects were positive and / or negative and whether their use was worth the risks. At the end of the work, it was possible to observe a greater understanding of the concepts of nuclear physics, a change in the behavior of students who became more participative and questioning during the classes and a certain indignation on the part of students regarding the distortion of information and even error in the information they had access to, thus evidencing changes in the meanings they had about nuclear physics. Given the results found, we believe that more efforts should be made in an attempt to bring to the classroom the themes of nuclear physics, both for the importance in society due to the various applications it has, as well as for being a theme which allows studies of history and philosophy of science as a way to highlighting the relationships between science, technology and society.