**Author details**

Leandro Duso

if the teaching staff involved in a collective project were able to discuss strategies to overcome them. It is clear that some factors are not easy to resolve and, in some cases, are under the control of the school's Principal and Vice‐principal, such as allocating space and time for more effective discussions to take place, in addition to more adequate remuneration for the teachers. The analyses of questionnaires and interview transcripts enabled us to identify the principal factors that interfere with using controversial subjects in the classroom. One of these aspects is emphasis on memorization and the little attention given to aspects related to the process of construction of scientific knowledge or to the epistemological aspects of science. This is strongly linked to teachers' initial training, where the emphasis is on depositing the subject content learnt, passing it on to the students so they are instrumentalized to pass external assessment

exams and university entrance exams, ignoring the context and the reality of society.

they will employ them.

92 Science Education - Research and New Technologies

as pre‐established content that the students must master.

ing them to exercise their citizenship.

of working groups explicit and providing opportunities for integration.

Another factor is the teachers' lack of experience and, consequently, the students' lack of experience with discussions in the classroom, which means they do not have the necessary skills for this type of activity. Of particular importance is a lack of knowledge about how to design and manage classroom discussion activities, obviously in relation to controversial subjects. Although they did use a space for, for example, simulation of a jury, the teachers had concerns with relation to mediating these activities. This insecurity, related to a lack of experience, demonstrates the extent to which theory and practice are separated in the classroom. Both initial training and ongoing education explore the importance of group activities and of discussion, but teachers do not have experience with these activities, making it less likely that

Other constraints are related to the large quantity of curricular content in science subjects; the teachers' concepts of science teaching and the socioscientific issues approach; and a lack of educational resources. These teachers end up opting for direct presentation as teaching strategy and concern themselves with transmission of knowledge, filling their lessons with fragmented elements from the curriculum, when they could be utilizing aspects of knowledge production and the epistemology of science, with the result that they create an idea of science

It is our understanding that using the SSC approach within the sciences alone will not achieve integration between the different subjects. Along the same lines, taking this approach to teaching the humanities or languages, in isolation, will also fail to achieve this success. The project teaching method is one means of bringing these subjects together, because it works, organizes, and teaches in a way that is collective and integrative, making the social dynamics

In addition to integration, which is fostered by the project teaching method, we need to go further, by planning projects with the SSC approach, since, in order to develop citizenship, we cannot limit ourselves to discussion but must provide opportunities for the students to act on their discussions, that is, enable them to go beyond the school walls and into society, motivat-

Analysis of the teachers' responses showed that, in general, the staff are open to new ways of working, including the strategy proposed, involving use of socioscientific controversies in an Address all correspondence to: dusoleandro@gmail.com

Federal University of Pampa, UNIPAMPA, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
