ACTION RESEARCH AND REFLECTIVE PRACTICE: AN INTERVENTION PROGRAMME WITH PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS

Promoting quality education implies that teachers are reflective professionals, agents of innovation and change leaders, able to train students with critical thinking skills, problem-solving, creativity, collaborative work, and communication. In this conscious reflection, it becomes fundamental to shift the focus from teaching to learning, including the teacher himself, leading to developing new skills and attitudes, given the imperative of change. Thus, it is essential to establish teachers' continuous training relevant to initial training, which enhances their professional performance and, consequently, educational improvement. However, the pedagogical practices implemented in training must reflect congruent teaching with what is recommended as desirable in the professional version of future teachers, making the articulation between theory and practice a practical reality. In this action-research process, a pedagogical intervention programme was implemented in the course unit Didactics of Geology II of the master’s degree in biology and geology, according to an inquiry-based methodology focused on the active participation of the students and collaborative work among peers. With a holistic view of the Earth system for understanding the geological phenomena and processes, practical work was done. The laboratory and experimental geosciences activities were adapted from Orion’ previous work and contextualised according to the Portuguese Curriculum of the K7 grade. It was possible to collect evidence showing that pre-service teachers were encouraged to change their visions about how (geo)science can be learned and taught. Results reveal that the practical activities promoted (geo)science reasoning, meaningful learning, and professional development.