Science & Education

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-019-00071-z

ARTICLE

When Things Go Wrong

Implementing Historical-Investigative Activities in the Classroom

Renata da Fonseca Moraes Batista 1 & Cibelle Celestino Silva

1

# Springer Nature B.V. 2019

Abstract
In this project, we worked in partnership with school teachers who are frequent users of
experimental kits available for loan to schools using the historical-investigative approach. The
original kits bring a traditional approach to experimentation, without the presence of the
history of science. We developed and implemented new guides to the kits, without changing
their materials and instruments. Design-based research supports the development methodolo-
gy; the school science topics covered in this paper are Joseph Black’s studies on latent and
specific heat. Although some of the challenges faced in the implementation of historical-
investigative approach are known and well-documented, the present article addresses teachers’
perspectives and some of the problems they faced in the implementation process, most of them
related to school and teacher working conditions. Even though this is a case study with a small
number of schools and teachers, it is possible to say that there is a huge gap to overcome before
the historical-investigative approach can be implemented in large scale.

1 Introduction

Considering contemporary studies that highlight the benefits of inquiry and history of science
(Cachapuz et al. 2005; Viennot 2010; Forato et al. 2012; Höttecke et al. 2012; Maurines and
Beaufils 2013; Allchin 2014; Heering and Höttecke 2014), we worked in partnership with
school teachers who are frequent users of experimental kits available for loan to schools. The
original kits bring a traditional approach to experimentation, without any reference to the
history of science. As a traditional approach, we understand the “cookbook” style, with direct
instructions for conducting the experiments, step-by-step procedure, which limits the involve-
ment and cognitive development of students. Despite its limitations, teachers tend to prefer the

* Renata da Fonseca Moraes Batista

tata.fis@gmail.com

Cibelle Celestino Silva

cibelle@ifsc.usp.br

1
São Carlos Institute of Physics, University of São Paulo, PO Box 369, São Carlos, SP 13560-970,
Brazil
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

cookbook style because it is easier for them to teach and for the students to conduct the
experiment. Teachers also feel safer with this type of material since they need to overcome a
few challenges in class (besides their long list of everyday school tasks). At the same time,
students’ engagement is mostly restricted to follow particular instructions in order to generate
data, organize them into predefined tables and graphs, do some calculations, and eventually,
provide answers to some questions. The data gathering in this kind of activity is like a black
box in which students follow the instructions automatically without developing any conceptual
and procedural understandings (Gallet 1998; Hofstein and Lunetta 2004; Peters 2005; Cheung
2008; Lott 2011).
In this context, we developed new guides to the kits about heat, simple machines, and
refraction and reflection of light without changing their materials and instruments, but with a
new didactical approach that included investigation and reference to the history of science. The
new guides were developed in partnership with school teachers who are frequent users of the
kits and contributed to the project with their pedagogical knowledge. The historical-
investigative (HI) experimental practices were implemented at schools. Some of the challenges
faced in the implementation of the HI approach are known and well-documented (for instance,
Henke et al. 2009; Höttecke et al. 2012). This article discusses other problems that are typical
of a huge school system with inadequate material and professional conditions. Unfortunately,
this kind of reality is not rare around the world. We intend to contribute to the field helping
other teachers and researchers to advance towards successful implementation of HI practices at
schools, which still is an open research field.

2 Inquiry Learning and History of Science

Physics teaching presents several challenges that influence the teaching and learning process.
Abstraction, mathematical formulation, conceptualization, modeling are some of the issues
that teachers must deal with in their teaching. It is therefore necessary to look for new
methodological approaches with the potential to make physics classes more efficient, contex-
tualized, and attractive to students. Several methods can be used by teachers in the classroom
to improve teaching, including experimentation, history, philosophy, and sociology of science
and inquiry learning.
The distribution of experimental kits to schools is a long tradition in Brazil. Several
projects were developed along the twentieth century aiming at improving science edu-
cation with the use of practical activities. In the early 1950s, the recently founded
Brazilian Institute of Education, Science and Culture (IBECC) produced the first labo-
ratory kits developed in the country. In the 1960s, the famous US projects Physical
Science Study Committee (PSSC), Biological Science Curriculum Study (BSCS), Chem-
ical Bond Approach (CBA), Chemical Education Material Study (CHEMS), and School
Mathematics Study Group (SMSG) were introduced in Brazil with a positive impact at
the time. Despite the translation and dissemination of the new teaching materials, the
improvement of the learning of Brazilian students did not occur accordingly. Problems
associated with the absence of laboratories and equipment to carry out the activities
proposed in the manuals and the lack of preparation of teachers made it difficult to
disseminate the new materials on a large scale, and thus the use of these materials
diminished over time (Barra and Lorenz 1986). The curricular projects introduced in
the Brazilian educational environment, with their singular vision of the nature of
When Things Go Wrong

scientific disciplines and the way of teaching the sciences, influenced the development of
teaching materials in Brazil in the next decades (Lorenz 2008).
In the late 1960s, the Brazilian Foundation for the Development of Science Teaching
(FUNBEC) produced laboratory equipment and teaching materials on a large scale
(Carvalho 2006; Martins et al. 2014). In the 1970s, other projects were elaborated, such as
“The Scientists,” a series of 50 experimental kits for the study of chemistry, biology, and
physics, which were sold in newsstands. Such kits contained a biography of the scientist
related to the topic, the experimental material, and instructions for experimenting (Martins
et al. 2014). These materials emphasized the learning of “the scientific method,” with a strong
empiricist bias, which was typical in science education during the 1960s and 1970s.
In the 1980s, a team at the University of Sao Paulo, under the leadership of Professor
Dietrich Schiel, developed “Experimentoteca,” a set of experimental kits that teachers could
use in a loan system, as in a library (see more below). The traditional approach is still the most
common in experimental kits in the country and has a low impact on education. Also, the vast
majority of schools lack laboratories and resources, and the precarious infrastructure of schools
are factors that contribute to the small number of experimental classes in science courses
(Rezende et al. 2003; Alves 2006).
Experimentation is part of physics education, providing students with the opportunity to
interact with experimental materials in order to understand physical phenomena. Despite being
present in school curricula, investigative laboratory classes are rare due to several factors, such
as the high number of students in the classroom, difficulties in developing practical activities
that facilitate an effective learning, teachers’ insecurity about conducting activities that may
lead to unexpected results, among others (Marx et al. 1994; Chiapetta and Adams 2000;
Rezende et al. 2003; Yoon and Kim 2010; Yoon et al. 2012; Sasseron 2015). Therefore,
laboratory activities carried out by teachers in the classroom are mostly of a “cookbook” style,
in which students follow a previously established work plan, performing step-by-step proce-
dures in an automatic mode. This approach often limits students’ actions to filling gaps and
answering some questions about a phenomenon without reflecting on what the students know
and how the experiment is related to the problem in question. Strictly guided activities limit
students’ cognitive engagement and the understanding of scientific concepts and procedures
(Clark et al. 2000; Volkmann and Abell 2003; Peters 2005; Gooding and Metz 2012).
In the first half of the twentieth century, the American philosopher and pedagogue John
Dewey (1859–1952) advocated for inquiry learning. He argued that everyone should investi-
gate the nature of physical and social environments, being more active by asking questions and
trying to answer them. In his inquiry proposal, teachers and students define a problem; students
suggest a solution, develop, and test it until a conclusion is formulated (Dewey 1910, 1997). In
Brazil, this teaching strategy gained force in the second half of the twentieth century and was
introduced in 1997 in the National Curriculum Parameters (PCNs) emphasizing that students
should work on diverse subjects and perform experiments to investigate phenomena or
situations.
Currently, investigative teaching is considered as capable of fostering competencies related
to scientific knowledge and general formation of students such as questioning, reflecting,
discussing, observing, exchanging ideas, arguing, explaining, reporting findings and conclu-
sions (Abd-El-Khalick et al. 2004; Carvalho 2004; Grandy and Duschl 2007; Allchin et al.
2014). Inquiry learning is an old strategy that has evolved according to educational trends.
Although it is a widely recognized and promising approach, there is no agreement on what an
inquiry lesson consists of. Notwithstanding, some consensual elements can be mentioned
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

(Abd-El-Khalick et al. 2004; Grandy and Duschl 2007; Machado and Sasseron 2012; Carvalho
2013; Allchin et al. 2014):

& To construct a problem and present it to students. The problem should favor the creation of
hypotheses, ideas, debates, reflections, and arguments
& The presence of experimentation and evaluation of data
& To confront the initial expectations of the problem with the analysis and discussion of the
experimental data to obtain a solution
& To prepare reports (in the form of texts, draws, schemas, tables, graphs) and to discuss the
conclusion of the problem collectively
& To focus on the appropriation of the scientific knowledge by students and its application to
the problem, under the guidance of the teacher

Therefore, when conducting investigative activities in the classroom, students are active in the
search for solutions to the proposed problems. However, it is necessary that the activities
contribute to the development of students’ ability to reflect so that previous knowledge
generates a new one. Thus, the teacher must guide students through the inquiry process,
providing conditions in order for them to understand what they are doing and why they are
doing it. It is important to acknowledge that, despite the above interpretation of inquiry, the
appropriation of teaching methods by teachers is not straightforward, or that all teachers do not
equally implement it. It is very much constructed by the teachers, who are subject to
professional pressures, constraints, and personal inclinations (Galamba 2016).
Teacher and students’ engagement is imperative in investigative activities since their roles
will define the inquiry level of the activity. Several researchers discuss how investigative a
class or activity can be (Schwab 1962; Pella 1969; Tamir 1991; Priestley et al. 1997; Borges
2002; Carvalho 2006). From the original proposal of Pella (1969), Carvalho (2006) defined
five levels of inquiry openness.
Level I does not characterize an inquiry activity since the teacher proposes the problem,
hypothesis, work plan, and conclusions. The teacher is the protagonist in the class, while
students only gather data following indicated instructions. This type of class is predominant in
traditional teaching and experimental manuals of laboratories (the famous “cookbook style”)
(Carvalho 2006; Alves 2006; Lima and Marcondes 2011). In level II, the activity begins to
gain an investigative aspect. In this level, students have the freedom to draw their conclusions
from the experimental results. Students discuss the solution for the problem, first in small
groups and then with the whole class. Still, the teacher proposes the problem, the hypotheses
for its solution and the work plan for the experimental procedure. In level III, the teacher
suggests a problem and provides hypotheses for its solution while students propose a work
plan to test the suggested hypotheses, obtain the results, and draw their conclusions. In level
IV, the teacher offers a problem to the students, and the rest of the process is under the
students’ responsibility, i.e., to launch hypotheses, suggest a work plan, test, obtain the data,
and conclude. Lastly, level V is considered for graduate courses in which students have the
freedom to propose the problem and to solve it. Then, the student is responsible for the whole
process, including intellectual and experimental work.
It is important that the problem proposed in any level of inquiry be interesting for students
so that they can feel engaged in investigating and solving it. From a pedagogical point of view,
the investigative activity has to contemplate learning and to foster the formation of concepts,
the understanding of scientific work, the acquisition of critical thinking, the reflection on
When Things Go Wrong

physical phenomena, and the development of argumentation (Carvalho 2006; Sasseron 2015).
The teacher’s role is crucial since she/he is the mediator of the investigative process; it is her/
his job to provide the conditions and guidance to students to understand what they are doing to
solve the proposed problem.
History of science can, among other contributions, help teachers avoid distorted views
on the processes of construction of scientific knowledge, and provide the development of
activities in the classroom that support the learning of concepts and procedures typical of
scientific activity. History of science allied to inquiry learning results in the HI approach
(Kipnis 1996; Henke et al. 2009; Höttecke and Riess 2009; Heering and Höttecke 2014).
The HI approach comprises the use of investigative activities guided by historical
episodes to create teaching and learning situations that allow reflection on specific
contents of science. According to Heering and Höttecke (2014), the HI approach is as
follows:

& Contextualizes science with its history and philosophy

& Emphasizes the social and cultural aspects of history and philosophy
& Enables the teaching and learning of scientific content
& Allows students to explore natural phenomena on their own
& Enables students to reflect on their actions and fosters reasoning skills
& Connects investigative activities with the science of the past

The HI activity does not prepare students to manipulate materials automatically by searching
for a numerical result, as usually occurs in a cookbook lab. In the HI approach, students are
expected to engage in an investigation through active participation in order to build new
knowledge. It is not enough that students enjoy the experiment. With teacher’s mediation,
students problematize a situation, contextualize it and relate it to the content, create hypotheses
which are discussed and tested experimentally, and interpret their results.
Notwithstanding its potentials, the use of the HI approach in the classroom is not a trivial
task, and teachers face several difficulties and obstacles in its implementation (Höttecke and
Silva 2011). To better understand the process of development and implementation of the HI
approach, we researched how teachers understand and incorporate the HI approach in their
practices. In this article, we address issues related to (1) the development of new guides with
the HI approach starting from already existing kits that were not changeable and (2) the
obstacles faced by teachers in the process of understanding the new approach, implementing,
and applying it in the classroom.

3 The Research

Inspired by the HIPST Project (HIPST Project 2009; Höttecke et al. 2012), the research was
based on collaboration between researchers from the university and school teachers who
participated actively in the whole process which includes the development, discussion,
analysis, decision-making, and production of new materials. It is an ethnographic case study,
i.e., the ethnographic approach bounded within a case study protocol (Fusch et al. 2017). This
method allows the study of the process of development and use of new materials by teachers in
their natural environment, taking into account the components of a situation, their meanings,
interactions, and influences.
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

We worked with high school teachers to redesign the experimental kits guides of
Experimentoteca of the Center for Scientific and Cultural Dissemination (CDCC) located in
the city of São Carlos, Brazil.1 Experimentoteca operates as a public library by lending kits
with experiments of physics, chemistry, biology, and mathematics to teachers. Each kit has ten
copies of the same experiment; thus, about 40 students can work simultaneously, at least from
the practical point of view (Fig. 1). A guide accompanies each experimental kit with a general
question relating the topic to an everyday life situation, a theoretical explanation about the
content, the objectives, and specific instructions to experiment. The guides were developed in
the 1990s, and their style is the most common in school labs (Clark et al. 2000; Borges 2002;
Volkmann and Abell 2003; Hofstein and Lunetta 2004; Cheung 2008; Klassen et al. 2012;
Trindade et al. 2015; Gonçalves and Marques 2016).
Our research group recruited five physics teachers from local public schools, who partic-
ipated voluntarily in the project. The teachers work in at least two different secondary schools,
teaching 30 h per week to groups of 35 students on average (students’ age 16). Students have
two classes of physics per week, of 45 min each, except for the evening shift which has only 1
class of 45 min. The teachers had initial training in physics and one had a master’s degree in
solid-state physics. They had been teaching for approximately 10 years in public education.
The selected teachers2 were frequent users of Experimentoteca, and therefore familiar with the
kits and their guides.
For data gathering, we used audio and video recording of the classes, focused interviews,
semi-structured questionnaires, direct observations, and teachers’ logbooks. The units of
analysis were the selected segments of interview transcriptions. Also, we captured and saved
clips of relevant moments of the lab classes, selected excerpts from the interviews, and
identified specific annotations in teachers’ logbooks that could be useful in answering our
research questions. The results were triangulated to assure the validity of the data analysis.
For the development of the new guides, we adopted design-based research (DBR), a
method for collaborative work, integrating research and development of educational
interventions in learning environments (Design-Based Research Collective [DBRC]
2003). The new guides were developed in three phases: a first version was elaborated
by the research group and presented to the teachers, who discussed it and proposed
modifications. A second version, including the changes suggested by the teachers, was
applied by the teachers. Finally, a final version was written incorporating changes
proposed by the teachers after its application. The new versions of the guides were
elaborated considering level IV of inquiry (Table 1), with materials assigned to teachers
and students. The teachers’ materials consist of formative and practical parts. The
formative part presents the HI methodology and the scientific content related to the
topic. The practical part proposes an initial problem related to daily life to be posed to
students by asking them to reflect and create hypotheses to solve the problem. The
material carries a short historical text related to the topic with excerpts from primary and
secondary sources, a proposal of an experimental set, and suggestions of how a teacher
can mediate the class. The students’ material contains the same historical text and an
invitation to elaborate an experimental plan to solve the problem proposed by the
1
CDCC is a science center linked to the University and has other sectors such as Library, Cineclub, Internet
Access Room, Astronomical Observatory and sectors with exhibits about biology, physics, and chemistry. CDCC
promotes courses and workshops to students and teachers, exhibitions, scientific and cultural events, movie
sessions, and others activities. All these programs annually receive about 65,000 students and visitors.
2
Three teachers abandoned the project along the way.
When Things Go Wrong

Fig. 1 a Experimentoteca’s collection of experimental kits; b kit of thermology

teacher. We developed six new guides about latent heat, specific heat, heat engines,
simple mechanical machines, reflection, and refraction of light. In this article, we present
the results of the development and implementation of guides about latent and specific
heat.3
The partner teachers contributed to the elaboration of the new guides with their pedagogical
knowledge. They were aware of the importance of the initial problem in the guides, although
they disregarded it when using the guides with their students (section 5.2). Teachers were
concerned if students would manage to work with the level IV of inquiry (Table 1) and
expressed some concerns such as “I have doubts if we will not have to give a “ kick “so they
know exactly what to do ... Usually, we explain the procedures [to be done]” [T01]. After a
discussion among them and with the researcher about implementation strategies of level IV in
the classroom, they better understood it and advocated for its inclusion in the guides. They
approved the historical text created by the research group after same changes in its language
level suggested by them. Also, the teachers considered important that students’ guide contains
an image of the experiment to help students, since there is no indication of experimental
procedure in the first version of the guides: “the problem is that you present the materials, there
is no way, you have to give some orientation, everything is new for the students [...] so [with
the image] it is perfect. I prefer with the image.” [T02] Finally, teachers considered the new
guides adequate for being implemented in the classroom.

4 The Historical Text

The historical text in the guides contains excerpts of primary sources that were selected
considering the students’ reading level and conceptual understanding. To avoid mis-
conceptions about the historical context and nature of science, simplifications,

3
The original and redesigned versions of the guides can be found in http://www.ghtc.usp.br/perfil-de-cibelle-
celestino-silva-1.html#instructional-materials
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

Table 1 Levels of inquiry activities

Level I Level II Level III Level IV Level V

Problem T T T T S
Hypothesis T T T S S
Work Plan T T S S S
Data collect S S S S S
Conclusions T S S S S

T, Teacher; S, Student. Source: Carvalho (2006)

translations, and omissions in the historical text were made with caution since this
could also lead to wrong views of nature of science. History of science in the
redesigned guides serves as a source of investigative situations and contextualizes
the topic with historical information that allows dialogues and discussions on meta-
scientific questions, which are not discussed in the present article. The historical text is
intended to guide students in the inquiry process and to help the teacher guide the
students. The historical text can play different roles in the investigative experimental
class, which are summarized in Table 2.
The historical content can act as an initial stimulus for students’ inquiry; in this
case, students read it before they work on their ideas and hypothesis about the
proposed problem. The historical content can also be used during the activity,
supporting students to plan and design the experiment and in a discussion about
materials, relevant variables, and experimental procedure with colleagues and the
teacher. On the other hand, if the historical content is used after the students have
developed and tested solutions to the proposed problem, it can support reflection on
what has been accomplished and inspire the interpretation of the results. The teacher
can use this moment to compare students’ ideas and results with those obtained by the
historical actors. It is relevant to note that teachers were free to choose how and when
to use the historical text.
The texts about specific heat and latent heat bring quotations of Black’s accounts of
his experiments with different materials. Joseph Black (1728–1799) was a British
physician, chemist, and physicist. Among his interests was the nature of heat and its
relation to different materials. He performed experiments and observations with different
masses of heated iron blocks, mercury, water, and ice. Black distinguished heat from
temperature and understood heat capacity as the amount of heat a substance can retain
(Black 1803). He also performed experiments with different materials (iron and wood)
with the same mass and size heated by a hot piece of iron. He concluded that each body
contained different amounts of heat that were related to physical properties of the body,
which he named specific heat. Among several experiments, Black investigated the
amount of heat involved in the change of ice state. He realized that only the quantity
of ice changed during the melting, not its temperature. Black related the amount of heat
needed for melting the ice with its mass and a property of the ice that he eventually
called latent heat (Black 1803).4

4
For the activities related to specific and latent heat, please see footnote 3.
When Things Go Wrong

Table 2 Potential roles of the historical content in investigative classes

Heuristic Source of problems, inspiration for planning, etc.

Motivational Inspiration, engagement, etc.
Reflection Reflection about experimental practice, interpretation of results, data analysis

5 Developing and Implementing Historical-Investigative Activities

in the Classroom: an Apparent Disaster

In order to understand the development and implementation of HI activities, we investigated

issues related to teachers’ perspectives on the HI approach, what this approach implies for the
class management, how teachers adapted their practice to it, which gains related to students’
performance teachers noticed, and what kind of practical obstacles were faced.

5.1 Teachers’ Perspectives on the HI Approach

Within the focused interviews, teachers were questioned about their views on the roles of
experimental classes, what they understood as the HI approach, what their difficulties in using
the new guides were, and how they could be improved. The teachers recognized the relevance
of experiments for physics education. At the same time, they expressed a naïve view on the
role of experiments, neglecting the roles of abstraction, idealization for theorization, and
mathematization of physics.

Experiments are important to show what is really happening in physics. What is physics? Physics is the
science of our daily life; it is a philosophy of natural science. In our every day, it is easier to observe in
practice what is happening and then make numerical calculations. I mean mathematics because often the
result comes through mathematics, but you do not really know what happened in practice, so experiments
are necessary [...] Seeing several phenomena of physics is much better than to calculate them. It elucidates
much better the physics itself than the equations. Of course, math is always important, no doubt. You
cannot miss the theoretical part. [T01]

The participants considered the openness of experimental activities (level IV of inquiry in

Table 1) as positive:

I even find it more interesting to leave students free to develop content than to follow a cake recipe. If
students perform what is being asked in the guide [cake recipe], they do not investigate […] anyone can
do what is asked and arrive at satisfactory results but without understanding what is happening. It is better
if students do by themselves, even going wrong the first time, the second time, few times, but of course
with the guidance of the teacher but without following a recipe, letting get them on their own. [T02]

Although the teachers had heard about inquiry learning and the history of science before, it
was the first time they used such approaches in the classroom. Thus, they felt a lack of
confidence while using the new guides, as illustrated by one of the teacher’s speech:

I had heard of both approaches but had never used or applied them. It was the first time. I understood the
approach, but all the experiments I have done in the past were following the traditional style of the guide.
[...] I was also felt insecure in the first time with the HI approach […] because if it were an experiment that
had a cake recipe, students would follow it step-by-step. It is much easier for the teacher to work that way,
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

for sure. […] In some parts of the experiment, several issues, that despite not having a cake recipe, I had to
tell them. Even without a guide, I had to give some directions. [T02]

Teachers’ skills for moderating inquiry classes and dealing with HPS were less than required.
Thus, they quickly moved to the traditional laboratory classes, offering direct instructions to
the students, despite the fact the teachers’ version of the guides suggested several strategies to
use the HI approach. In general, despite the problems cited above, the teachers considered that
the HI approach contributes to teaching a contextual physics, beyond the idealized classical
problems that emphasize the mathematical manipulation of formulae and equations. Moreover,
they considered important to discuss topics of physics that can be related to everyday
phenomena.

5.2 The Historical Text

One of the goals of the project presented here was to renovate the guides without changing the
materials already available in the kits of Experimentoteca. Therefore, for the selection of
excerpts from primary sources, it was necessary to choose sources related to themes of physics
and materials already available in the kits. Furthermore, the text must be accessible to students
from conceptual and language aspects. The length and complexity of the text must be adequate
for students’ reading abilities and a 90-min class. The balance between historical details and
length is an important requirement since a historical text must portray conceptual and
contextual aspects in accordance with contemporary historiography and convey adequate
notions about the nature of science. Teachers highlighted the fact that the guides take students’
language skills into account:

I liked it [the guide]…it is better than the traditional one. The historical text is not large. There is nothing
beyond students’ understanding; they can understand the idea that is being transmitted. It is not
exaggerated at all […] [T02]

Teachers considered that the historical content engaged students in the investigative process:

[…] the guide gave a historical context and a background to what was happening, then it talks about the
experience, it talks about what happens. It really helps and guides the student. It [the historical text] gives
a start, from where the student has to begin. So it helps in this [experimental procedure] part of the
process. […] So I think the historical part is important to give the context of the experiment, to guide them
in what is happening and how they should proceed in their own experimentation. So, the historical context
is important; the theoretical foundation is important too. To students perform the experiment satisfactorily,
without following a cake recipe, they need to have a very clear goal, so the context it is important [to
clarify the goals] [T02]

According to them, while students are planning and performing the experiments, the historical
text provides a context, which is relevant in order to situate the students in the HI activity, to
inform about the activity and to suggest students what they have to accomplish.

5.3 The Importance of the Initial Problem

The proposition of an initial problem is a key element of the inquiry approach adopted in this
research because it initiates a dialogue between the teacher and the students. The initial
problem must address a general issue, relating the topic to students’ daily life so that they
can relate it to their previous knowledge. During the elaboration process, the group struggled
When Things Go Wrong

for creating problems that were challenging to students, broad enough to allow discussions
and, at the same time, accessible to their previous knowledge. Nevertheless, even though
teachers had understood the relevance of the proposition of an initial problem and participated
in its elaboration, they failed in relating it to the experiment and sometimes they did not even
launch the questions to students, going directly to the experimental activity or the reading of
the historical text. Therefore, there was not a clear reason for the activity, and it made it
difficult to relate the historical text with the experiment, a process that could generate several
interesting questionings and dialogues among students.

5.4 Level of Inquiry

Along with the development of the new guides, the group agreed on designing the guides
according to Level IV of inquiry (Table 1). However, during the implementation, this level of
inquiry was not reached. Teachers attributed it to the fact that students are not accustomed to
inquiry methods:

If we had several classes, so they understood that they had to do everything, plan, explain, discuss, then it
would have better results for sure [...]. As I said, we could achieve the Level IVof inquiry, as long as they
already had a good theoretical understanding of the situation, discipline, interest, and participation too
[…]. Disregarding typical characteristics of a teenager such as indiscipline and lack of attention, we could
have achieved Level IV of inquiry if the laboratory were a constant for them. If the laboratory were used
frequently, they would get used to it. Otherwise, it is challenging for the students [...]. Weekly lab classes
would be the ideal since it is not possible, I believe Level III of inquiry would be better. Level IV is too
advanced, not due to students' competence, but mainly because of the time we have available to take
students to laboratory class. [T01]

The level of inquiry in the guide will also vary according to teachers’ performance in the
classroom. As the mediator of the investigative process, a teacher’s intervention in the
classroom will dictate the real inquiry level of the class. Thus, the greater the intervention of
the teacher, the less open and investigative the class is. The level of openness will also vary
according to students’ background and motivation because if they are not motivated to solve
the problem and engaged in discussing possible solutions, there will be no effective
investigation.

5.5 Practical Problems

The analysis of video recordings of classes and interviews revealed that teachers devoted a
considerable amount of time dealing with practical problems that hamper any style of lesson
but are even more problematic in the case of inquiry lessons. Teachers had to deal with the
management of time in inquiry classes and school infrastructure issues. Students rarely had lab
classes and were not used to the environment; thus, they were easily distracted. Teachers lost a
considerable amount of time trying to explain the activity due to indiscipline inside the
classroom. In some cases, the class turned into a big mess with the teacher avoiding to assume
the role of mediator. The teacher attributed this behavior to the fact that students never went to
the laboratory or experienced a new approach and to students’ immaturity to work in the
laboratory.
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

I think it was the fact, perhaps, that they are going to the lab for the first time, maybe. They were insecure,
so they were undisciplined, which was not nice. Students need to have more maturity, not the maturity as
individuals but as experimenters, to know what to do at each appropriate time, without following a guide.
Maturity comes with time, comes with the use of the laboratory. They do not have this maturity because
they hardly come to the laboratory. So if they went to the lab more often, they would better experiment.
[T02]

The HI approach was a novelty for students who were not accustomed to being cognitively
engaged in classes. As a result, in order to fulfill the activity in the available time, the teacher
had to explain the proposed activity several times, to intervene and sometimes to tell students
exactly what they should do in some parts of the experiment:

I did not find it completely satisfactory due to the lack of time, so I had to make several interventions to
guide them, which was not the idea. I had to make the interventions to speed up the class. So the ideal
would be to have more time. [T02]

The teachers also pointed out difficulties related to the physical structure of the school that
does not contribute to a good lab class. The school labs were small to accommodate a large
group of students (usually about 35 students), which caused some problems in the HI approach
process:

Time and patience of students! They would have to be more careful and disciplined and to have more
patience. The number of students influences a lot. The JA School laboratory is large, laboratory with
better working conditions. The laboratory of the JN School is small, the workbenches are small, and the
number of students is large. So it was more complicated to guide everyone. [...] Having fewer students is
better, of course […] the number of students and space influence a lot. [T01]

According to them, it is even harder to mediate an inquiry class with a large number of
students in a small room. One of the problems that arose is the increase of indiscipline among
students. There are also safety issues that added difficulties to the teacher; for instance:

The use of a Bunsen burner is dangerous. I was worried because they are teenagers […] Since the
workbenches and the room are small, and the group is large; it is complicated to guide everyone not to
burn and to pay attention to what they are doing. [T01]

Unfortunately, at the time of the activity in which fire was involved, the students played around
with fire and did not pay much attention to what they were doing even with the teacher’s
warnings and conversations. Due to this kind of behavior, the teacher tried to finish the activity
as soon as possible by providing several suggestions to students on how to experiment. These
factors that are already present in a traditional class became more problematic in laboratories
making it difficult for teachers conduct the class because in a HI class students have more
freedom to conduct the activity and can be easily distracted.5
Despite the problems pointed above, we noticed a drastic change in students’ behavior
when they had a chance to return to the laboratory. For instance, one of the teachers had taught
a group of students in one evening, and it was an unsuccessful class, with lots of indiscipline
and mess; the students were distracted and did not perform the activity at all. However, during
the next week, the same group asked the teacher to be back to the laboratory, and he gave them
“a second chance.” According to the teacher, the students had asked for a second chance

5
Besides, we emphasize that the partner teachers already used the experimental kits from Experimentoteca, but
the results discussed in this paper were obtained with groups that had never been in the laboratory before.
When Things Go Wrong

because they had heard about the activities from another group of students that had engaged on
them and enjoyed them very much. This time, students worked with other materials, but still
on heat. The first activity was about specific heat, whereas the second was about latent heat. In
the “second chance” students engaged in the inquiry, discussing, questioning ideas and
hypotheses of their colleagues, and elaborating and carrying out experimental procedures.
According to the teacher, the class went much better because students’ were relaxed about the
novelty of the visit to the lab because they had been there before, and motivated by what they
had heard from another group of student. Therefore, we perceive that being used to the
laboratory and a new style of activities improves student’s behavior and attitude towards
inquiry activities and teachers’ performance as mediator.

6 Final Considerations

In this research, we worked in partnership with school teachers on the development and
implementation of HI guides for experimental kits used at schools. The present article analyzes
teachers’ perspective and some of the problems they faced in the implementation process, most
of them related to school and teacher working conditions, which are typical in Brazilian public
school systems. Notwithstanding its potential, the use of the HI approach in the classroom is
not a trivial task, and teachers face several difficulties and obstacles in its implementation
(Höttecke and Silva 2011). Among them, it is the time necessary to study and understand a
new approach; the fact that teachers need to develop new skills for acting as a mediator in the
classroom; teachers’ doubts about the method and their insecurity towards innovation that may
be related to their attitudes and beliefs about teaching and new approaches. Also, teachers need
to learn about the history of science and search for new teaching materials.
In this research, teachers deemed the HI approach useful and exciting because it contex-
tualizes the topic, and makes students more active in classes, by participating, asking ques-
tions, and even going beyond the proposed content. Moreover, according to the teachers,
students should be allowed to make mistakes and try different procedures in lab classes
because it is important for them to build a feeling of how real science is produced. Teachers
regarded the format of the guide and the historical text as adequate. Nevertheless, they
recognized that their actions in class could be improved by including more lab classes and
practical activities in their program, giving less direct orientations during the HI activities and
developing attitudes that facilitate students’ engagement.
Despite being active actors in the elaboration process, teachers felt insecurity during the
application of the HI guides in their classrooms. Part of the problem is that teachers and
schools are not prepared to go beyond traditional teaching. Factors already present in tradi-
tional classes such as the lack of time, a high number of students per room, indiscipline, and
inadequate infrastructure become even more problematic in lab classes making it difficult to
teachers to conduct and mediate inquiry lessons. The second part of the problem is related to
teachers’ preparation and disposition to deal with open situations, like inquiry activities (Marx
et al. 1994; Crawford 2007; Davis and Smithey 2009; Höttecke and Silva 2011; Yoon et al.
2012; Gouw et al. 2013; Plummer and Ozcelik 2015; Santana et al. 2017). The practice and
rhetoric of the teacher in this kind of activity are critical since she/he is the mediator, and his
intervention in the classroom will determine the level of inquiry openness.
Teachers’ skills for moderating inquiry classes interfered with students’ engagement in the
inquiry because they needed to feel an environment that is open and conducive to dialogue,
 R. da Fonseca Moraes Batista, C. C. Silva

discussion, and reflection. If the teacher is not prepared to conduct discussions and create an
ambient that engages students to participate actively, the inquiry process is lost, and the class
can easily turn into a traditional one. When teacher and students got used to HI activities, we
identified an improvement of teachers’ skills for creating and conducting discussions, and
engaging students to participate actively. Students’ behavior improved, and they became more
interested in the activity. Students declared that they liked the activities very much and learned
more.
Although students’ attitudes were not the focus of our research, it is clear that their limited
experience with laboratory and practical classes was an obstacle to be overcome with more
visits to the lab and not a problem of the guides themselves. It was possible to identify positive
attitudes among students towards a method that challenged them and valued their engagement
in classes. Unfavorable attitudes of students such as indiscipline, impatience, lack of interest,
and insecurity in performing the activities are not exclusive of HI classes. In addition, teachers
need to be aware that students’ engagement is crucial in a HI class and that it is important that
they develop attitudes that involve and welcome students to the investigation.
It is clear that the development of materials is not enough for a successful implementation of the
HI approach in classrooms. Since HI is an approach that demands time and preparation, besides
teachers’ and students’ real engagement, in order to be effective, it is important to invest in long-term
partnerships with teachers and schools, providing opportunities for them to practice new didactical
strategies to deal with problems and obstacles that sometimes go beyond their milieu (Höttecke et al.
2012; Henke and Höttecke 2015; Ruhrig and Höttecke 2015; Penuel 2017). We understand that, as
occurs with other teaching methods, it is difficult for teachers to abandon their epistemological and
didactical attitudes and beliefs and embrace HI approach (Armstrong 1902; Rezende et al. 2003;
Höttecke and Silva 2011; Santana et al. 2017). Therefore, it is important to invest in in-service
training to disseminate this approach and encourage other teachers to work with it.
Even though this is a case study with a small number of schools and teachers, it is possible
to say that, considering the current working conditions, we are skeptical that, in the short term,
the HI approach can be implemented in large scale in Brazilian public schools.

Acknowledgments We want to show our gratitude to our partner teachers and the reviewers’ contributions to
the improvement of the manuscript.

Funding Information This study was partially funded by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de
Nível Superior–Brasil (CAPES) and National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).

Compliance with ethical standards

Conflict of interest The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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