Science Education

"Science does not seek to prove anything: “scientific proof ” is one of the great myths of our age. Rather, science tries to home in on an ever-more accurate picture of nature by proposing new ideas about it and eliminating false ones. Science is a process, a process that will continue to modify and refine our ideas about the world for as long as human beings will exist on Earth. "Ian Tattersall, head of the Division of Anthropology of the American Museum of Natural History in New York and professor of Anthropology at Columbia University.

The choice of developing scientific projects rests on the background of Controvento’s educators and on a pedagogical reflection. Science education has the potential to play a crucial role, taking shape as one of the methodological tools that make possible an active and critical approach to the analysis of reality and the building of knowledge. In addition, because of its close relationship with the issues debated by civil society, it is the keystone in the management of one of the most relevant of the modern crises: the environmental crisis.

Controvento’s science education projects develop an experimental and trans-disciplinary approach, targeting children, teenagers or young people.

 During the workshops, which can be either one off or structured into an educational path, the role of Controvento’s educators is primarily to facilitate and mediate. They, while offering a qualified point of view, are mainly creators of contexts in which participants learn through experience and discussion. Educators therefore encourage participation of the students, upon whom they place trust with the aim of supporting participation and autonomy and facilitate the building of a knowledge that is verified, debated and shared.

Science education projects can take the form of educational workshops on experimental sciences (projects "Apprentice Scientists", "Better to ask good questions than to maintain bad convictions", "School in nature"), workshops of ideas (projects "I Citizen in Transition", "Science in a Suitcase" and "The Sense of Doing Science") and meetings with researchers (projects "At school in a Genetics Lab", "Young European within the Building of the Knowledge-based Society" and "The Adventure of Science").

Controvento also organizes training courses dedicated to the experimental sciences education aimed at teachers, educators and science animators.