La integración de los trabajos prácticos en la enseñanza de la química como investigación dirigida

Abstract

Despite of the importance of practical work for learning science as well as the nature of science, labwork often transmits an atheorical and empiricist view of scientific research and it is framed like a cookbook-style lab, that is, as a sequence of instructions students must follow with serious shortcomings from the methodological point of view, (i.e.: lacking of hypothesis, absence of inductive and deductive critical thinking). We show how this situation might be overcome by a guided-inquiry-based chemistry education where different kinds of practical work can be integrated in a coherent way within the learning of concepts, models and “paper and pencil” problems. As an example, we transform a conventional “labwork sheet” about the rate of a chemical reaction (sodium thiosulfate with hydrochloric acid) in a problematized sequence of activities, including detailed educational comments for each one of them.