Modelos Científicos Escolares en estudiantado de secundaria ¿Cómo explican la evolución adaptativa?

Abstract

We present the results of two activities carried out during a Didactic Unit on the learning process of the model of evolution by natural selection (MESN), which allowed us to collect evidence of the students' school scientific models (SCM), based on their narratives. The aim of this research is to characterise the initial and "final" SCMs, through the conceptions or ideas that students use when explaining problems of adaptive evolution. Three research instruments were implemented in virtual format due to the pandemic: an initial questionnaire and a semi-structured interview before the didactic unit, as well as a written evaluation at the end of the process. The analysis of the students' explanations was carried out using the constant comparative method. The results indicate that the initial SCMs are characterised by the ideas of individual change, environmental induction and a teleological (finalist) character; while the final SCMs are characterised by the ideas of prior variability, variant-effectiveness relationship, as conceptions coherent with the MESN, but with the maintenance of two initial conceptions.