Sequência didática sobre botânica e livro paradidático sobre organografia vegetal para o ensino médio

Abstract

To study botany is of paramount importance in the citizen formation of each individual, as it is necessary to recognize that we depend on plants. Throughout my teaching work, I noticed the lack of interest of many students in botany, as we can see in the literature. It is a recurring challenge to arouse interest in botany in the students. Didactic resources and pedagogical practices are fundamental to stimulate the interest of students through a learning process. Therefore, this work sought to gather practices and resources as subsidies to teachers and students. The general aim of this study was to awake in the student the interest, appreciation, and recognition of the importance of learning botany in his life. This project was applied in two classes of the 2nd year of high school, at the Escola Estadual Doutor Noraldino Lima, Fortaleza de Minas, Minas Gerais. The development of this project was carried out in two stages: the first consists of a didactic sequence, in which pedagogical practices were applied to address the importance of plants; the second was the production of a paradidactic book, in which a plant character narrates the text about plant organography playfully, but accurate in conceptual terms. The paradidactic book is a complementary material to the students’ textbooks and combines content with their daily life. Among the activities of the didactic sequence, the students preferred the visit to the flower shop and video recording, urban afforestation, and the supermarket activity. During the visit to the flower shop, the students found representative plants of the four groups, and recorded videos explaining their characteristics. In the urban afforestation activity, the students identified tree species occurring in the streets in their neighborhood or surroundings of their residence in farms. In the supermarket activity, students observed and searched for the composition of daily products with plant-origin substances. These activities had the most evident characteristics of the inquiry teaching approach, highlighting the importance of its application. The didactic sequence brought these activities together with an inquiry approach, constituting an interesting tool for teaching botany. The inquiry approach inserted in the activities in this work was the facilitating factor, as it involved students in carrying out the activities, characterizing student leadership at all times.