Estudo de caso sobre as percepções do senso comum e conhecimentos científicos acerca de demonstrações de fenômenos físicos

Abstract

The efficiency of Education is commonly a topic of discussion. It is permeated by several problems and difficulties, such as the precariousness of the physical conditions of the school; precarious conditions of training, teaching work, school curriculum and inadequate teaching methodologies. Focusing on the teaching of Physics, it is highlighted that Education reflects in all social spheres. In a society there are people with different areas and levels of education, however, regardless of the level of education, a large portion demonstrates a relatively low knowledge in Physics. With the intention of investigating the knowledge in Physics and its relationship with concepts and empirical phenomena, conceptual experimental demonstrations were carried out in workshops for people from different levels of education, throughout 2021. The experiments used were easily accessible and reproducible. In the experimental demonstrations, some questions were asked, for example: when carrying out a certain experiment, considering the physical concepts present in it and the interaction between certain physical properties, what will the “behavior” of the system be? and why this happens? Participants were expected to demonstrate whether they could predict or explain the behavior of the experiments and their relationship to physics. With the realization of the workshops, it was possible to analyze and show the knowledge in Physics that people have, evidencing the effectiveness of learning Physics in this small portion of society at its different educational levels. The evidence and analysis of people's perceptions about Physics can provide a better understanding of the “level” efficiency in the teaching-learning process.