Investigação das contribuições do desenvolvimento e da utilização de aplicativos para dispositivos móveis no processo de ensino-aprendizagem de química

Abstract

The curriculum component of chemistry, in high school, and general chemistry, in higher education, as well as other components related to chemistry, address concepts normally considered difficult to understand by students. This fact often leads to high rates of student retention and dropout. Currently, Information and Communication Technologies are another tool available to teachers to mediate the teaching-learning process, seeking, through such resources, to facilitate student learning. In this context, research on mobile learning arises, with the popularization of mobile devices, especially smartphones, which with their mobility characteristics and diverse functionalities, have motivated several studies investigating the potential of using these devices. Thus, this thesis sought to answer the following research problem: applications for mobile devices and their contextualized content can contribute to the teaching-learning process of chemistry in Basic and Higher Education? To that end, the general objective of this research was to investigate the contributions of mobile applications and their contextualized content as tools in the teaching-learning process in chemistry. The present study had the following specific objectives: analyze the applications available on the Google Play Store related to chemistry and their potential in the teaching-learning process; to investigate the possible contributions of an application developed with the purpose of being a tool to support the teaching-learning process of chemistry in Higher Education; to verify the perceptions of teachers and students regarding the possible contributions of everyday issues to the contextualization of chemical concepts addressed in an application for mobile devices. To achieve the proposed objectives, this study is structured in three stages: 1- Survey and categorization of applications related to chemistry, available on the Google Play store, and analysis of their potential as tools for the teaching-learning process; 2- Investigation of the possible contributions of an application developed with the purpose of being a support tool for the teaching-learning process of Chemistry in Higher Education; 3- Verification of the perceptions of teachers and students regarding the possible contributions of everyday issues to the contextualization of chemical concepts addressed in an application for mobile devices. From the results obtained, we conclude that the use of applications and their contextualized content can contribute to the teaching-learning process of chemistry in Basic and Higher Education and we confirm the hypothesis that the use of applications for free mobile devices and the development of personalized Apps with contextualized content, without the need for programming knowledge, are viable alternatives that can contribute to the teaching-learning process of chemistry at different levels of education.