Pedro Reis, who teaches in Portugal, explains which methods and strategies he uses when certain science lessons aim to promote citizenship education.
Education for citizenship is one of the main justifications for science education. Currently scientific literacy is thought to constitute a vital element for all citizens’ intellectual independence and for the performance of an active role in decision-making as regards scientific and technological proposals. A society where the power to decide is the privilege of experts cannot be considered democratic.
It is up to science teachers to develop the necessary scientific knowledge and the abilities (of critical thinking, problem-solving and decision-making) to assess the consequences and correct problems arising from rapid scientific and technological growth.
In the attempt to develop these competencies in my students, I often resort to research and discussion activities with controversial themes related to science and technology. These activities focus on real-life situations with the objective of sparking discussion about the social, economic, environmental, ethic and moral implications of choices and behaviour (both personal and collective) in the fields of biotechnology, health and the environment.
One of the latest activities I built (http://nonio.eses.pt/bioquest/) invites students to undertake an investigation about the different types of impact that the Alqueva enterprise (a big dam recently constructed in Portugal) has.
Many people see this dam as an agricultural, energetic and the revolution of the tourism for the whole South of the country. However, others consider that its enormous reservoir will have catastrophic consequences, destroying the natural and cultural patrimony and raising heavy impact, both biological, geological, climatic, agricultural, social and economic.
In this activity, the students worked in groups and began by analyzing the complex set of arguments (whether social, economic, technological or political) used by advocates and opponents of the dam (based on information derived from several sources: enterprise coordinators, environmental groups, media, scientific journals, etc.). Each element of the group was responsible for investigating and writing up a report about one of the sets of impacts of the enterprise. Then, each of the group had to discuss its members’ reports (with the different opinions they conveyed) and make decisions about the enterprise (in favour; in favour but with some conditions; against).
The final (well informed) decisions were sent to me by e-mail. The activity ended with the whole class presenting and discussing the conclusions drawn by the different groups.
Besides the objectives already referred to, this activity allowed students to come into contact with different ways that citizens (individually or in group) have of participating actively in decision-making processes related to scientific and technological enterprises: an important aspect of exercising citizenship.
