Abstract

MATURANO, Carla Inés  and  MAZZITELLI, Claudia Alejandra. Social representations of prospective teachers of Physics and Chemistry about the textbook. Rev. Actual. Investig. Educ [online]. 2017, vol.17, n.2, pp.172-191. ISSN 1409-4703.  http://dx.doi.org/10.15517/aie.v17i1.28203.

The textbook of Natural Science is considered one of the most used resource for teaching and learning in these disciplines. The contents taught and the activities carried out in class, frequently proposed in textbooks, are often away from the interests of students. Therefore, it would be useful to investigate the representations that the prospective teacher has about this social object to highlight characteristics of their future practice. This paper presents the results of an exploratory study carried out with prospective teachers, aimed at characterizing social representations about the textbook of Natural Science. The theoretical assumptions and methodology, consisting in a technique of evocation and hierarchy, are based on the framework of the theory of Social Representations. Eight university students attending their final year of the professorship in Physics and Chemistry at the National University of San Juan (Argentina) constitute the sample. The results obtained, from a predominantly qualitative approach, have allowed us to find not only the content and the structure of the representations under study, but also the attitudes associated with them, highlighting an excessive attachment to the manual as a resource for designing classroom activities. These results would be useful for making recommendations about the textbook with the aim of optimizing its use in their future professional practice, going beyond the traditional teaching model and incorporating elements of other alternative models that promote interest in learning science.

Keywords : social representations; textbook; natural science; Argentina.

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