Comprensión del modelo hereditario de Mendel tras la enseñanza habitual en alumnos de educación secundaria obligatoria

Mostrar que una nueva propuesta de enseñanza produce mejores actitudes y aprendizajes en los alumnos requiere disponer de un análisis de lo que se hace y se consigue con la enseñanza habitual. Para realizar dicho análisis se ha efectuado un estudio histórico y epistemológico de la evolución de las ideas en genética clásica, identificando los problemas que están en su origen, las ideas que permitieron avanzar y los obstáculos que hubo que superar. Como resultado de dicho estudio se han seleccionado un conjunto de indicadores de aprendizaje que deberían manifestarse en aquellas personas que hubieran comprendido los aspectos esenciales del modelo de herencia mendeliana, que se imparte en 4º de ESO. Dichos indicadores se han utilizado para analizar el aprendizaje tras la enseñanza convencional del tema. En este trabajo se presentan los resultados obtenidos que muestran las deficiencias más comunes y justifican la necesidad de una propuesta diferente.

Coordination of aproximations in secondary school students’ understanding of limit concept

The aim of this research is to characterize the coordination of the processes of approximation related to the understanding of the limit of a function. We analyze the answers of 64 post-secondary school students to 7 problems considering the dynamic and metric conception of limit of a function. Results indicate that the metric understanding of the limit in terms of inequality supports that the student is capable of coordinating the approximations in the domain and in the range when lateral approximations coincide. However, the student is not capable of this coordination when lateral approximations do not coincide. This indicates that the metric understanding of the limit begins with the previous construction of the dynamic conception in case of coincidence of the lateral approximations in the range.

The importance of promoting multimodal teaching in the foreign language classroom for the acquisition of social competences: practical examples

This article analyses the way in which the subject English Language V of the degree English Studies (English Language and Literature) combines the development of the five skills (listening, speaking, reading, writing and interacting) with the use of multimodal activities and resources in the teaching-learning process so that students increase their motivation and acquire different social competences that will be useful for the labour market such as communication, cooperation, leadership or conflict management. This study highlights the use of multimodal materials (texts, videos, etc.) on social topics to introduce cultural aspects in a language subject and to deepen into the different social competences university students can acquire when they work with them. The study was guided by the following research questions: how can multimodal texts and resources contribute to the development of the five skills in a foreign language classroom? What are the main social competences that students acquire when the teaching-learning process is multimodal? The results of a survey prepared at the end of the academic year 2015-2016 point out the main competences that university students develop thanks to multimodal teaching. For its framework of analysis, the study draws on the main principles of visual grammar (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006) where students learn how to analyse the main aspects in multimodal texts. The analysis of the different multimodal activities described in the article and the survey reveal that multimodality is useful for developing critical thinking, for bringing cultural aspects into the classroom and for working on social competences. This article will explain the successes and challenges of using multimodal texts with social content so that students can acquire social competences while learning content. Moreover, the implications of using multimodal resources in a language classroom to develop multiliteracies will be observed.

Some reflections on the impact of globalization in the teaching and learning of English in socalled “expanding circle” countries

This article deals with the ongoing debate on the complex role of English as an International Language, be it understood as a homogeneous entity (one language with an international role [EIL]) or a heterogeneous one (different varieties (WE or ELF) grouped under one label, «English») as well as on the implications of this «globalising» status for its teaching in non-native settings. Given the complexity of this phenomenon, whose study is still in its infancy, we attempt neither to provide definitive answers nor adopt a prescriptive attitude, but simply contribute to the discussion and clarification of this, to some extent, emergent, controversial situation.

Different moments in the participatory stage of the secondary students’ abstraction of mathematical conceptions

This study provides support to the characteristics of participatory and anticipatory stages in secondary school pupils’ abstraction of mathematical conceptions. We carried out clinical task-based interviews with 71 secondary-school pupils to obtain evidence of the different constructed mathematical conceptions (Participatory Stage) and how they were used (Anticipatory Stage). We distinguish two moments in the Participatory Stage based on the coordination of information from particular cases by activity-effect reflection which, in some cases, lead to a change of focus enabling secondary-school pupils to achieve a reorganization of their knowledge. We argue that (a) the capacity of perceiving regularities in sets of particular cases is a characteristic of activity-effect reflection in the abstraction of mathematical conceptions in secondary school, and (b) the coordination of information by pupils provides opportunities for changing the attention-focus from the particular results to the structure of properties.