Analysis of high school students’ conceptual maps to investigate their understanding of DNARNA protein relation after accessing the GenBank

This article presents an analysis of conceptual maps elaborated by high school students during the application of a didactic unit (DU) about synthesis of protein. One of the activities in this DU involved the supervised access to the GenBank, a database for genes and DNA sequences available, at the...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: da Rosa, Rosane Teresinha Nascimento, Loreto, Élgion Lúcio Silva
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2016
País:Brasil
Institución:Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS)
Repositorio:Revista Investigações em ensino de ciências
Idioma:portugués
OAI Identifier:oai:ojs.www.if.ufrgs.br:article/138
Acceso en línea:https://ienci.if.ufrgs.br/index.php/ienci/article/view/138
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:high school
teaching of molecular biology
bio-computing
GenBank
conceptual maps.
ensino médio
ensino de biologia molecular
bioinformática
mapa conceitual
Descripción
Sumario:This article presents an analysis of conceptual maps elaborated by high school students during the application of a didactic unit (DU) about synthesis of protein. One of the activities in this DU involved the supervised access to the GenBank, a database for genes and DNA sequences available, at the National Center Biotechnology Information (NCBI), website. The purpose of this study was to check the students’ understanding of DNA-RNA-protein relation through the elaboration of conceptual maps. These maps were developed at the end of the DU by six volunteer students from grade 10 at the Militar School (CMSM), in Santa Maria, RS, Brazil. This DU was developed, outside of regular, school activities time. For the analysis of the conceptual maps, a score table proposed by Novak and Gowin (1996) was used. The model conceptual map had 52 points; in our study, two students got score 41, others three got 26, 10, 2 points and only one had no score. In the quantitative and in the qualitative analyses it was possible to indentify a significant improvement in these students´ conceptual relations about protein synthesis. The data suggest that the access to the GenBank, used as a didactic strategy in the DU, has made this improvement possible.