Conference Program

Teachers' continuous professional development is crucial for improving science education, which is often perceived as too theoretical and inaccessible by students, particularly in the case of chemistry. This empirical study presents a laboratory-based training programme, grounded in action-research, designed for a small group of in-service mathematics and science teachers of Italian lower secondary school. The aim is to foster active learning (1,2), enabling teachers—as reflective practitioners—to rethink their teaching practices and prepare students to engage with contemporary socio-scientific challenges, in line with a vision of science as a democratic and situated practice. This is crucial as many science teachers in Italy has not received a specific professional training on science education issues regarding citizenship.

The training programme was designed to promote active learning for teachers in a setting analogous to the school environment (1), incorporating moments of critical reflection. It consists of two cooperative work sessions: an initial hands-on laboratory session followed by a reflective classroom session (focus group) (3). The first part takes place in the chemistry laboratory, where participants engage in an experimental inquiry, characterised by a phenomenological approach that does not require submicroscopic modelling of matter (4). This approach draws on an historical and epistemological analisis of acids and bases (5,6), using materials from everyday contexts. The second part focuses on reflecting on the knowledge and epistemic practices activated in the laboratory, with the goal of assessing their transferability to the school context.

This case study aims to analyse how a teacher training experience based on investigative—rather than confirmatory—experimental activities in a chemistry laboratory, employing a macroscopic phenomenological approach to chemical phenomena and using materials from daily life, can promote, by homology, active teaching practices. These practices should set students in a context of knowledge production through direct inquiry and collective negotiation.

The research methodology involves audio recording of the sessions to analyse the emerging professional knowledge and its links to teaching practices. The analysis of knowledge is based on a threefold perspective: chemical knowledge, Pedagogical Content Knowledge (2,7), and the Nature of Science (8), with particular attention to the role of everyday chemical knowledge and common sense. The connection of the professional knowledge to teaching practices is evaluated by analysing the reflective focus group, addressing the foundational aspects of the training: laboratory activities, investigative approach, and macroscopic approach to chemical phenomena.