SECONDARY TEACHERS’ AND STUDENTS’ PERCEPTIONS OF DISTANCE EDUCATION IN SCIENCE: FOCUS ON LEARNER-CENTERED, ACTION-ORIENTED, AND TRANSFORMATIVE LEARNING

The shift from conventional, face-to-face classroom teaching to distance education is a complex process that brings various challenges. To better understand the impact of this transition, the researchers examined the perceptions of secondary science teachers (n = 42) and students (n = 137). Specifically, the study focused on evaluating learner-centered, action-oriented, and transformative learning – referred to as LCAOT learning – in science distance education. The researchers developed a 26-item, 4-point Likert scale questionnaire that was distributed online to the target respondents. Additionally, the researchers interviewed teachers and students and analyzed various documents, such as self-learning modules and learners’ activity sheets, to triangulate the survey data. The findings revealed that the principles of LCAOT learning were apparent in science distance education and exemplified through tools such as the Know, Want to Know, and Learned charts and personal journals. The study also revealed that teachers and students faced challenges during the transition to distance education, including inadequate equipment and poor internet connectivity. However, they responded to these challenges by using various means of communication, collaborating with peers, and exploring new roles and identities. The researchers recommend using the developed instrument and continuing to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching strategies employed in distance education in science, as well as further studies on the impact of LCAOT learning on students’ academic achievement

Students’ Perception to Online Distance Learning (ODL) and Socio-Emotional Skills During Covid-19 Pandemic

This study assessed the perception of online distance learning and the socio-emotional learning skills of grade 11 chemistry students in the Philippines during the Covid-19 pandemic. The Socio-emotional Skills Domains of Science Students Questionnaire (SSD-SSQ) is administered at the end of the school year. The study revealed high average socio-emotional skills in all the socioemotional learning domains (TaskPerformance, Emotion Regulation, Collaboration, Openness, Extraversion, and Compound Skills). Thematic Analysis is utilized in the research to determine the perceptions of the students. Responses of the students in their E-Portfolio were collected and analyzed. The study generated the following themes: opportunities to express, awareness and management of emotions, variation of activities, and interaction and support system. This study revealed the importance of socio-emotional learning in developing resiliency

Coulomb Correlation and Information Entropies in Confined Helium-Like Atoms

The present work studies aspects of the electronic correlation in confined H$^{-}$, He and Li$^+$ atoms in their ground states using the informational entropies. In this way, different variational wavefunctions are employed in order of better take account of Coulomb correlation. The obtained values for the $S_r$, $S_p$ and $S_t$ entropies are sensitive in relation to Coulomb correlation effects. In the strong confinement regime, the effects of the Coulomb correlation are negligible and the employment of the models of independent particle and two non-interacting electrons confined by a impenetrable spherical cage gains importance in this regime. Lastly, energy values are obtained in good agreement with the results available in the literature.Comment: Version accepted for publication in European Physical Journal

Electron Confinement study in a double quantum dot by means of Shannon Entropy Information

In this work, we use the Shannon informational entropies to study an electron confined in a double quantum dot; we mean the entropy in the space of positions, $S_r$, in the space of momentum, $S_p$, and the total entropy, $S_t = S_r+S_p$. We obtain $S_r$, $S_p$ and $S_t$ as a function of the parameters $A_2$ and $k$ which rules the height and the width, respectively, of the internal barrier of the confinement potential. We conjecture that the entropy $S_r$ maps the degeneracy of states when we vary $A_2$ and also is an indicator of the level of decoupling/coupling of the double quantum dot. We study the quantities $S_r$ and $S_p$ as measures of delocalization/localization of the probability distribution. Furthermore, we analyze the behaviors of the quantities $S_p$ and $S_t$ as a function of $A_2$ and $k$. Finally, we carried out an energy analysis and, when possible, compared our results with work published in the literature.Comment: Version accepted for publication in Physica B: Condensed Matte