Studying Optics with young people and adults through a diversified didactic sequence

Abstract

In this paper, we discuss the application process of a didactic sequence for teaching young people and adults about Optics at high school level. The sequence incorporates teaching strategies such as video exhibition, reading and discussion of science popularization papers, demonstrations and reconstruction of experiments. The activities take into account the contextualization of physics concepts to everyday phenomena, developing the student’s intellectual autonomy and critical reasoning. In this sense, we use the sociohistorical theory of Vygotsky as a reference, as it associates the apprenticeship and the individual’s development with his social interaction. Two activities of the sequence we consider essential are: the pre-test questionnaire, identifying the students’ needs, as well as their spontaneous concepts about optics; and the post-test questionnaire, which made it possible to identify a tendency of learning in most of the students, indicating an initial process of scientific concepts construction from spontaneous ones.