Divulgação científica e aprendizagem das ciências

Apresentação efetuada no "XVI Encontro Nacional de Educação em Ciências (ENEC) - Ciência como cultura", Lisboa, 2015.UI/CED/1661/2013, UI/CED/1661/2016info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Concepções de futuros professores de ciências físico-químicas sobre a utilização de actividades laboratoriais

De acordo com uma perspectiva construtivista do ensino e da aprendizagem, será de esperar que os futuros professores de Ciências Físico-Químicas tenham ideias prévias acerca do modo como esta disciplina deve ser ensinada e que essas ideias influenciem as suas aprendizagens em disciplinas que visam prepará-los para um ensino mais eficaz, como é o caso das disciplinas de Didáctica/Metodologias de ensino da Física e Química. O objectivo deste estudo é diagnosticar as concepções prévias de futuros professores, quando chegam à disciplina de Metodologia de ensino da Física e Química, no que se refere à utilização de actividades laboratoriais. Para efeitos de recolha de dados, pediu-se a futuros professores que se imaginassem professores do 8º ano e descrevessem como dariam uma aula cujo objectivo fosse ensinar o conceito de Reacção Química. Os resultados indicam que os futuros professores recorreriam bastante às actividades laboratoriais mas não as utilizariam da forma mais adequada

Os Livros de Divulgação Científica e as Biografias de Cientistas para Jovens

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Portuguese school textbooks’ illustrations and students’ alternative conceptions on sound

School textbooks are an outstanding resource in school physics. The illustrations included in the textbooks may play an important role in the learning process as they can facilitate the understanding of the scientific content. Acoustics is both a part of the 8th grade physical science syllabus and a physics topic that includes abstract concepts, such as the concept of wave. Besides, students hold several alternative conceptions on sound. Therefore, textbooks’ illustrations should be carefully chosen in order to facilitate students’ learning and to prevent their alternative conceptions from being reinforced and/or induced by them. Thus, this study aims at analysing the illustrations included in Portuguese 8th grade school physics textbooks in order to find out whether or not they may promote the reconstruction of students’ alternative conceptions on “Sound and Hearing”. The results of the study show that often textbooks’ illustrations do not facilitate learning. In fact, some illustrations were found to be incomplete or even incorrect, others compare to alternative conceptions held by students and others include analogies that may lead to alternative conceptions. Thus, science teacher education needs to prepare teachers to look critically at school textbooks so that they become aware of the powers and limitations of textbook’s illustrations and find ways of overcoming their inconvenience

Promover o questionamento durante as visitas de estudo a centros interativos de ciência [o que dizem os monitores experientes]

Este estudo com oito monitores experientes de dois centros interativos de ciência Portugueses foca-se nas representações dos monitores sobre o questionamento dos alunos (13-14 anos) no âmbito de visitas de estudo a secções de ótica. Os dados recolhidos, através de entrevistas semiestruturadas aos monitores, revelam que na maioria das visitas de estudo a interação dos alunos com os módulos resulta num questionamento de nível cognitivo baixo e que são vários os fatores que condicionam o questionamento (a maioria dos quais relatados na literatura). Várias estratégias implementadas a nível institucional têm promovido o questionamento dos alunos, por exemplo, criação de fichas semiestruturadas ou de “questões de abertura” junto aos módulos. Para além disso, os monitores consideram que podem facilitar a aprendizagem dos alunos assumindo um papel de questionadores ao invés de transmissores de conhecimentos. Alguns exemplos de estratégias de questionamento que os monitores dizem implementar refletem criatividadeThis study with eight science museums educators from two interactive science centres in Portugal focuses on their representation on students’ questioning during school visits to a thematic exhibition about optics. Data collected through semi-structured interviews show that for monitors most of the students’ questioning is low cognitively. It also shoes that several factors affect the type of questioning that occurs during students’ interactions (most of them already identified in the literature), and several institutional interventions have contributed to increase students’ questioning, such as semi-structured worksheets or adjacent questions to the exhibitions. In addition, museum educators believe they can promote learning through questioning and some of the strategies that are being implemented with this aim show creativity.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT

The relevance of fiscal rules for fiscal and yield developments

Numerical fiscal rules mitigate the bias of pro-cyclicality, as an alternative to discretionary measures conducted by policy makers. We assess whether fiscal rules impact budget balances and sovereign yields, and we perform a simulation exercise to compute debt developments of EU countries, assuming that they had implemented a numerical expenditure rule in 1990. Our panel analysis covers 27 EU countries between 1990 and 2011. We find that fiscal rules contribute to the reduction of budget deficits, specifically expenditure rules, which significantly impact primary expenditure and conclude that countries with rules experienced lower sovereign bond yields. The simulations show that when the same rule is applied to different countries, it produces very different results, particularly on account of the initial level of primary expenditure

Celiac Disease and Associated Autoimmune Conditions

Introduction: Celiac disease (CD) is a chronic, immune-mediated enteropathy that has been increasingly associated with other autoimmune conditions. The aim of this work was to review which autoimmune disorders have been associated with CD, highlighting the strength and clinical impact of that associations. Methods: Review of the published literature in PubMed between 2002 and 2023. Systematic reviews, meta-analysis, case-control and cohort studies were preferred for analysis. Results: CD has relevant associations with type 1 diabetes mellitus, autoimmune thyroid disorders (in particular, Hashimoto’s thyroiditis), systemic lupus erythematosus, arthritis rheumatoid, autoimmune hepatitis, primary biliary cholangitis, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, microscopic colitis, IgA nephropathy and psoriasis. Other autoimmune diseases such as autoimmune gastritis, Addison’s disease, Sjogren’s syndrome and non-infectious uveitis have been described as being potentially associated with CD, but the available data is weak to assume a relevant association. Conclusion: This review confirms that CD has important associations with others autoimmune diseases. Physicians who manage patients with CD or with any other abovedescribed autoimmune condition must be aware of that possible coexistence. This knowledge will allow early diagnosis and treatment of patients with concomitant diseases and the improvement of outcomes.Introdução: A doença celíaca é uma doença crónica imunomediada que tem sido cada vez mais associada a outras patologias autoimunes. O objetivo do presente trabalho foi rever quais são as doenças autoimunes comumente associadas à doença celíaca, destacando a evidência científica e o impacto clínico dessas associações. Métodos: Revisão da literatura publicada na PubMed entre 2002 e 2023. Para análise foi dada preferência a revisões sistemáticas, meta-análises, caso-controle e estudos de coorte. Resultados: A doença celíaca tem apresentado associações relevantes com as seguintes patologias: diabetes mellitus tipo 1, doenças autoimunes da tiroide (nomeadamente, tiroidite de Hashimoto), lúpus eritematoso sistêmico, artrite reumatoide, hepatite autoimune, colangite biliar primária, doença de Crohn, colite ulcerosa, colite microscópica, nefropatia por IgA e psoríase. Outras doenças autoimunes tais como a gastrite autoimune, a doença de Addison, a síndrome de Sjogren e a uveíte não-infeciosa, têm sido descritas com alguma frequência em doentes com doença celíaca, contudo os dados disponíveis são insuficientes para assumir uma associação relevante. Conclusão: Esta revisão confirma que a doença celíaca apresenta associações importantes com outras doenças autoimunes. Médicos que avaliem e sigam doentes com doença celíaca ou com qualquer umas das doenças autoimunes acima referidas devem ser conhecedores dessa possível coexistência. Esse conhecimento poderá permitir o diagnóstico e tratamento precoce de utentes com doenças concomitantes e, consequentemente, uma melhoria dos resultados clínicos

Economic forecasts and sovereign yields

The European Commission releases twice a year economic forecasts for some macro and fiscal variables (GDP growth rate, inflation, budget balance, among others). In our research we will try to understand if the corrections made to these forecasts have an impact in sovereign yields. We will perform an econometric analysis in a panel of 15 EU countries (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland, France, United Kingdom, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden), covering the period from 1999:1 until 2012:1, and after we analyse each country individually, on the basis of a SUR analysis. We find that corrections in the EC’s forecasts do impinge on the 10-year sovereign bond yields, particularly corrections in fiscal variables, but this impact is different across countries, being more pronounced in countries with less favourable economic conditions.UECE is supported by FCT (Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal

Connecting mathematics and sciences through children’s literature: an experience with Pre-service Preschool Educators

Having in consideration that science and mathematics can be articulated through children’s literature, this study, focused on future preschool educators, aims describe how future preschool educators’ use children's literature to create mathematical and science tasks and to analyze how future educators mobilize pedagogical content knowledge to build those learning tasks. Future educators, divided into groups, were asked to select a book from a list provided to them and to designed science and mathematics task. Results suggest that they had difficulties in designing the tasks and that many of them were closed-ended and based on behaviorist theories of education. However, there were some exceptions.En tenant compte du fait que les sciences et les mathématiques peuvent être articulées par le biais de la littérature pour enfants, cette étude, dirigée vers les futurs éducateurs préscolaires, vise à décrire comment ces derniers utilisent la littérature pour enfants pour créer des tâches mathématiques et scientifiques et à analyser comment les futurs éducateurs mobilisent les connaissances en matière de contenu pédagogique pour construire ces tâches. Les futurs éducateurs, divisés en groupes, ont été invités à choisir un livre dans une liste qui leur avait été fournie et à concevoir des tâches en sciences et en mathématiques. Les résultats suggèrent qu'ils ont eu des difficultés à concevoir les tâches et que beaucoup d'entre elles restaient sur des théories behavioristes de l'éducation. Cependant, il y a eu quelques exceptions !Portuguese national funds through the FCT (Foundation for Science and Technology) within the framework of the CIEC (Research Center for Child Studies of the University of Minho) project under the reference UIDB/00317/2020. The contribution of A. Gomes to this work is funded by the National Funds through the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) and co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the COMPETE 2020 – Operational Program for Competitiveness and Internationalization (POCI) within the CIEC (Research in Child Studies) of the University of Minho with the reference POCI-01- 0145-FEDER-007562. The contribution of A. S. Afonso to this work is funded by CIEd –Research Centre on Education, project UID/CED/01661/2019, Institute of Education, University of Minho, through national funds of FCT/MCTES-PT

Economic forecasts and sovereign yields

We assess whether the correctionsmade to the EC macro and fiscal forecasts (GDP growth rate, inflation, budget balance, debt ratio, current account) have an impact in sovereign yields. We perform a panel analysis of 15 EU countries (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland, France, United Kingdom, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden), for the period from 1999:1 until 2012:1, and we also analyse each country individually, on the basis of a SUR estimation.We find that corrections in the EC's forecasts impinge on 10-year sovereign bond yields, particularly corrections in fiscal variables, beingmore pronounced in countries with less favourable economic conditions. The penalization for the yields is higher in corrections for the current and next years than for previous years.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio