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PUBLICATION INFORMATION

TITLE OF PUBLICATION
THE "TEACHING EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCES" PLAN (IL PIANO “INSEGNARE SCIENZE SPERIMENTALI")
NAME OF AUTHOR(S)
Varoius authors
NAME OF PUBLISHER
Le Monnier (Annali della Pubblica Istruzione 5-6/2009 - 1/2010)
YEAR OF PUBLICATION
2010
LANGUAGE OF PUBLICATION
Italian
PUBLICATION TYPOLOGY
Report
TARGET GROUP OF PUBLICATION
School Directors, Researchers, Teachers
SIZE OF THE PUBLICATION
Over 10 pages
DESCRIPTION OF CONTENTS
The paper is a report belonging to the “Annals of Public Education”, the most important journal of the Ministry of Education (MIUR). It contains a detailed description of objectives and actions and the first round of results of the national plan “Teaching Experimental Sciences” (ISS). The ISS project is a response to the negative results of the past PISA 2006 assessment on school performances of Italian students in the field of scientific disciplines and a response to the Lisbon guidelines, that aim at enhancing quality and effectiveness of education in Europe. It is addressed to teachers of primary and of the first two years of secondary school; it aims to improve the methodological approach in the teaching of scientific disciplines recognizing the centrality of the student.ISS has the final objective of enhancing the scientific literacy of Italian students, above all by providing the continuous in-service training of teachers and promoting, by the work of the teachers themselves, important scientific educational experiences and practices. In other words ISS aims to enhance learning through the improvement of teaching.The main project activities consist in a continuous educational research (research-action) made by teachers, experts and researchers. Teachers choose the contents to develop, then design and carry out new practices with their students. The new practices are assessed on the base of students’ response and learning, are shared with other teachers, are discussed with the experts and, if needed, are corrected and tested again.
A characteristic of IIS plan is the implementation of laboratory didactics mainly intended like laboratory of the mind, as a tool to accompany students through the experience of the experimental research, that foresees discussion, critical analysis and the possible crisis of the protocol itself. In this modern perspective, teacher is no longer the person who says what to do and explains the contents of a discipline, but is a guide accompanying the student through the construction of his knowledge, by the critical analysis of what he sees and the discussion with his peers.The paper also contains some interesting suggestions and examples to design practices dealing with: environment, colours, universe and transformations.
REVIEWER’S COMMENTS ON THE PUBLICATION
The paper has been selected because ISS Plan is an innovative proposal of the Ministry of Education (MIUR) for the in-service training of teachers of scientific disciplines. The proposal is innovative for Italy because the in-service training of teachers is not contemplated by the education system and even the pre-service training is not sufficient (only primary school requests a graduation in Primary Education). Other important innovative features of ISS plan consist in the training between peers, research-action, transferability of results and verticality, meaning attention to the construction of the network of concepts that contribute to the learning of scientific subjects since primary school.
At this light, the strength points of ISS educational research are the following:
- the value given to new proposals coming from schools
- the systematic meeting and discussion between teachers of different school grades and with different experiences, at local but also at national level
- the possibility of sharing choices and “in itinere” correcting the educational proposals, on the basis of students’ needs emerging during the activities in the classroom.
WHERE TO FIND IT
http://www.annalipubblicaistruzione.it/riviste/annali/rivistaannali.htm
PDF OF THE PUBLICATION
17_annali-ISS.pdf
NAME OF THE REVIEWING ORGANISATION
University of Genoa

Comments about this Publication

Your comments are welcome

Date: 2013.07.15

Posted by Dominique Lambert (Belgium)

Message: The paper is a high profile reporting work taken from the most important journal of the Italian Ministry of Education (MIUR) called “Annals of Public Education”.
The topic of the publication is the national plan “Teaching Experimental Sciences” (ISS), its actions and results.
The ISS plan aims to enhance learning through the improvement of teaching. Born as response to the negative results of the past PISA 2006 assessment on school performances of Italian students in the field of science, the ISS project is addressed to teachers of primary and of the first two years of secondary school.
It’s interesting to see how the project wants to improve the methodological approach in the teaching of scientific disciplines recognizing the centrality of the student.
Also the in service training and its relevance is recognized, the ISS promotes indeed the continuous in-service training of teachers and focuses on the importance of promoting scientific educational experiences and practices by the work of the teachers themselves.
The publication doesn’t particularly underline the ICT and their potential as teaching method but one of the characteristics of the ISS is the implementation of laboratory didactics as a tool to accompany students through the experience of the experimental research, that foresees discussion, critical analysis and the possible crisis of the protocol itself.
In my opinion the added value generated by the publication is this modern perspective which teacher is no longer the person who says what to do and explains the contents of a discipline, but is a guide.
Students need in fact to be accompanied through the construction of their knowledge, by the critical analysis of what they see and the discussion with their peers.

Date: 2013.05.28

Posted by Michelle Herbert (Ireland)

Message: The paper focused on the problems that Italy are facing due to the decreasing number of students choosing Science to study. There has been a steady decline in the performance of Science students in Italy, as a result of this a national plan “Teaching Experimental Sciences” (ISS) was set up in order to improve the performance of students in the aspect of Science.
As there was various approaches set up to try and increase the number of students choosing Science and improve the performance of each student. One approach that was implemented was the “blended” model for Science Teacher training. This involved over 800science teachers. It was an innovative science teacher training courses for teachers of lower secondary schools for the duration of 3 years.
The aim of the ISS is to enhance learning through the improvement of teaching. Teachers choose the contents to develop, then design and carry out new practices with their students. These new practices are assessed on the base of students’ response and learning, are shared with other teachers, are discussed with the experts and, if needed, are corrected and tested again.
The data found was alarming particularly in southern Italy
- 2 hours of Science a week
- A large number of topics covered
- Unequipped classrooms (no scientific instruments, no computers)
- No science labs
- No lab assistants
The aim of the initiative was to change the current system through “research”. A hands on approach to teaching was highlighted as opposed to just theory.
Core units were developed for various topics and each core was structured to contain
- A video presentation
- Theory resources
- Learning activities
- Assessment tests related to learning activities
- Videolabs
- Online resources

This article was over 400 pages in length and as a result it was not possible to translate the article all together. The article had to be translated piece by piece which meant there was not a flow to the review when reading it.
It can be linked to Science in Ireland, and the most important point to note was that it is necessary to organise courses for teachers in order to encourage the uptake of Science.

National Reports on successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry The national reports on chemistry successful experiences to promote lifelong learning for chemistry are now available on the related section of the project portal. The reports presents examples of successful experiences in the partner countries and the results of testing of ICT resources with science teachers.

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