Lessons learned from a case study on teaching the socioscientific issue of ethanol, used as an ingredient of sanitizers, to promote students’ learning of and about chemistry during the COVID-19 pandemic

1 Introduction

Education in schools should provide students as future responsible citizens with education to become able to play an active part in society and to make informed decisions (Sjöström & Eilks, 2018). This also concerns science education since science and technology permeate so many aspects of our everyday life and society. All citizens in a society have to make decisions each day concerning their lifestyles and consumption. If this should be done based in an informed way knowledge from science and technology is needed. The decisions of students as future citizens will have an impact not only on the quality of their life but also on their health or the environment. Knowledge in and about science is important as well as the capability to use it in any relevant context to make informed and critical choices.

One curriculum framework to understand the interplay of science and society is socio-scientific issue-based (SSI) science education (Sadler, 2011). SSI-based teaching uses authentic and controversial issues from society for teaching and learning of and about science in general, or chemistry in particular. One critical SSI during the COVID-19 pandemic was the use and availability of hand sanitizer lotions. One main component of hand sanitizers is suggested to be ethanol (WHO, 2010). It was, however, that with the beginning of the pandemic availability of hand sanitizers as such, or ethanol to prepare them became scarce. This issue was taken up in grade-10 chemistry teaching as an SSI to promote learning about the chemistry of alcohols, their use in hygiene products, and what this meant to society in times of a pandemic. The lesson plan is described and experiences in its application in grade-10 online chemistry teaching during the pandemic are presented.

2 Background

The term Scientific Literacy (SL) has been used since the 1950s to stress the importance to have both the knowledge of science and the capability to use it in everyday situations (Hurd, 1958). Since 1999, PISA has contributed to the diffusion of the concept of SL as a political goal (OECD, 1999, 2017). Various concepts of SL have been formed through time (e.g., Bybee, 1997; DeBoer, 2000; Roberts, 2007, 2011) that take into account the importance of both knowledge and its use in a context. In 2018, Sjöström and Eilks reflected on the evolution of different visions of SL, starting from Roberts’ (2007) suggestion of two different visions of SL. In the discussion by Sjöström and Eilks (2018), Vision I privileges cognition, starting from the acquisition of science content knowledge and after that taking into account their applications. It can be regarded as “pipeline science” with one aim of preparing students for careers in science and technology. Vision II focuses on context-based learning in science to facilitate students to make sense of the importance that the science content learned has in the different aspects of everyday life. It could be regarded as: “Science for all”. A third vision of SL is more oriented toward critical thinking or “Critical Scientific Literacy” (Hodson, 2009, 2011), it implies cultural and humanistic components and can be regarded as “Science for transformation”. Vision III asks for reflections on the deep interconnections between science, society, politics, ethics, economy, environment, and cultural implications. It is highly related to the humanistic approach in the tetrahedron model presented by Mahaffy (2004). Figure 1 shows the representation of the three visions of SL and the different levels of the relevance of the humanistic aspect (Sjöström et al., 2020). Vision III is deeply connected to SSI-based educational approaches, which integrate science learning into authentic, relevant, and controversial issues from society. SSI-based learning is suggested to help challenge students’ interest in science and to promote their higher-order cognitive skills, like the capabilities of critical thinking (Marks & Eilks, 2009).

Figure 1:

Different visions of scientific literacy and related core aims of learning (Sjöström et al., 2020).

Knowledge of science and chemistry is important as well as the capability to use it responsibly and autonomously to solve problems. The presence of science and technology in almost every aspect of our life is so massive that Hoffmann (1990) stated that the lack of scientific knowledge is undemocratic. Nevertheless, citizens usually have negative and suspicious attitudes toward chemistry. Students do not like chemistry and repute it too difficult (Rochard, 2007). SSIs and authentic problems have been proven to be useful to motivate students and to engage them in discussions about chemistry and the interconnections between science and societal aspects (Eilks, 2002).

The capability to use knowledge to solve problems responsibly and autonomously is the focus of competence-based curricula. From 2007 (MIUR, 2010; MPI, 2007), Italian curricula became competence-based and started addressing the framework of the competencies for lifelong learning set by the EU (2006). The Italian Chemistry Guidelines for the Technical Institute (an upper secondary school with technical orientation) state that chemistry teachers should support the students to reach learning outcomes that enable them “to use the cultural and methodological tools acquired to place oneself with a rational, critical and responsible attitude towards reality, its phenomena and its problems, including the purposes of lifelong learning” (MIUR, 2010, p. 78).

The PISA 2018 outcomes (OECD, 2019) show that Italian students have a lower performance in science (468) than the OECD average (489). The score indicates even a decline from PISA 2015 in which the Italian students’ score was 481 and the OECD average was 491 (OECD, 2019). To overcome the scarce outcomes of PISA in many European countries, the EU (2018) released a new recommendation to enhance key competencies for lifelong learning: “In the knowledge economy, memorization of facts and procedures is key, but not enough for progress and success. Skills, such as problem-solving, critical thinking, ability to cooperate … are more essential than ever before in our quickly changing society”, and state that “new ways of learning need to be explored”. The Italian curricula were changed accordingly and are up-to-date. But, probably, the practice in many classrooms is not yet, in Italy and beyond (Genisa et al., 2020).

An analysis of the implementation of SSI-based learning (Genisa et al., 2020) shows that SSI-based science education is emerging in many countries, but not yet in Italy. To align the learning approach to the curricula and society’s needs, the use of SSIs for education can be helpful (Hofstein et al., 2011). SSI’s use for teaching aims to promote critical thinking and general educational skills for preparing students for active social participation (Holbrook & Rannikmӓe, 2007; Sadler, 2011). The educational goal is to enable the students as future citizens to make informed and critical choices about issues in which science is not the only aspect to be considered. In this perspective, students must learn not only the scientific bases but also they have to be prepared and trained in thinking about social, economic, environmental, and ethical aspects deeply intertwined with science and technology (Eilks et al., 2018).

3 Lesson plan design and intervention

4 Methods

The case study reports only the aspects related to the SSI approach. The content knowledge assessment combined exercises, tests, oral examinations and deliverables developed at home during the lockdown. The deliverables were assessed using a rubric that has been shared with the students before they started to work (Ambrogi et al., 2008).

Three tools were used to evaluate the teaching intervention. A pre-post questionnaire was used to see whether the students’ views on the SSI of using ethanol in hand sanitizers changed in terms of making the students more sensitive to the different dimensions that had to be taken into account when evaluating socio-scientific questions. A five-step Likert questionnaire was used asking for how important the following dimensions are to decide how to use ethanol: economy, politics, science environment, ethics, society, and governance. The dimensions were taken from the framework of the EU-funded project Irresistible (2013). The scale was from 1 (irrelevant) to 5 (very important). Mean values were calculated and compared.

A second questionnaire was used after the intervention to find out the students’ perception of online learning integrated with longer phases of group work assignments. Also here, five-step Likert scales were used from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Statements given were: Working in groups online was more difficult; working in groups online was more fun; working in groups online was a waste of time; by working in groups online I learned more; by working in groups online I learned a better use of the ICT; working in groups online was unfair to students with difficulties in getting the Internet; and working in groups online was helpful to the students with difficulties in getting the Internet connection. The answers were subject to descriptive statistics.

The Likert questions were accompanied by three open questions. The open questions regarded the students’ opinions about the new learning methods.

1. What are the main things that you have learned during the chemistry lessons about ethanol usage?

2. What do you think of the chemistry lessons and the work about ethanol we have done during the last weeks?

3. What did you like most about the chemistry lessons about ethanol?

According to Mayring (2000), the open questions analysis was qualitative. The answers were coded following categories derived from data.

5 Sample

Twenty seven students from a 10th-grade class (age 15–16) in northern Italy participated in the teaching intervention, and 19 students answered the questionnaire voluntarily.

6 Findings

Before the SSI-based learning module, the majority of the students considered science very important/important (83 %) to evaluate the use of ethanol. A much lower number of students (47 %) considered environmental aspects very important/important. The students’ evaluations of the economy were almost equally distributed between very important/important (34 %), neutral (33 %), and irrelevant/not important (33 %). The students’ evaluation of society was slightly lower, they reputed it important/very important (33 %), neutral (28 %), and irrelevant/not important (39 %). Few students reputed governance (12 %), ethics (11 %), and politics (6 %) as very important/important. A large number of students considered politics irrelevant (56 %) (Figure 2 left).

Figure 2:

Results of the Likert questionnaire used to investigate the students’ perception of dimensions for evaluating ethanol usage.

After the intervention (Figure 2 right), the economy resulted as the component with the major percentage of evaluation as very important/important (84 %), followed by environment and science both with 79 %. No one reputed science is irrelevant and 58 % reputed it very important. A growing number of students considered society important or very important (37 %) and the number of irrelevant/not important decreased (27 %). The consideration of very important/important increased for governance (32 %), ethics (21 %), and politics (21 %) (Figure 1b). A comparison between the means of the evaluations before and after the SSI-based learning module is presented in Figure 3. It shows that only the consideration of science was almost equal before and after the intervention. All other dimensions were seen as more important than before the intervention.

Figure 3:

Mean values of the students’ pre-post evaluation of the different aspects involved in the use of ethanol.

The second questionnaire investigated the students’ perception of online working in groups (Figure 4). The majority of the students strongly agreed/agreed (84 %) that the online group work improved their ICT skills. A majority of the students (58 %) strongly agreed/agreed in evaluating it as helpful for the students who had difficulties in getting the Internet, but a large part of them (48 %), strongly agreed/agreed in valuing it as unfair. A majority of the students strongly disagreed/disagreed considering the online group work a waste of time (58 %) or more difficult (53 %). A consistent part of the students was neutral (43 %) when considering if they learned more by working in groups online and one out of five strongly agreed/agreed (21 %).

Figure 4:

Results of the Likert questionnaire used to investigate the students’ perception of the online group work.

The answers to the first open question about the main things students learned during the intervention were classified into four main categories: (a) Social skills and personal development, (b) chemistry, (c) new methodology and interconnection between science and society, and (d) none of the previous (Table 6).

The major part of the students stressed the aspects related to social skills and personal development. “During this period, I learned that, even if you are far away, you can work in a group by working on a single part of the work and then putting all of them together and comparing as a team”; “I have understood the importance of delivering homework on time”. A considerable number of students appreciated the new methodology that motivated them. “I learned to work differently from what I did before and this allowed me to give a new stimulus to the brain and allowed me to have more desire to study”, and “The work on ethanol is very important because it talks about topicality”.

Concerning the second question “What do you think of the chemistry lessons and the work about ethanol we have done during the last weeks?” there were two main interpretations of this question, (a) focusing on the technical aspects of the teaching methodology, and (b) focusing on personal development. The outcomes are shown in Table 7.

Typical answers were: “The lessons were certainly different from the normal ones but not less engaging”, “They were interesting and we managed to understand the topics even if we were far away”, and “… the teacher has allowed us to reason and to come to a conclusion autonomously”.

Concerning the question of what the students liked most about the lesson plan, the majority of the students stressed the learning methodology and a consistent amount of them addressed cooperation and personal development (Table 8).

Examples of typical answers were: “For sure the work on ethanol because it was very constructive and it was since a long time since we did not work in a group in which you have to find much information and each one had to put his effort.” “I liked most the lesson at a distance because this made us autonomous.” “At the beginning, the great independence and the opportunity to reason by myself.”

Concerning the content knowledge assessment no differences were found to those obtained during regular lessons before the COVID-19 pandemic.

7 Discussion

This SSI-based learning module has had positive effects to promote students’ attention toward the aspects other than science involved in evaluating the use of ethanol. Before the module, the aspect that the major part of students valued very important or important was science followed by the environment. After the SSI-based module, the economy was the aspect that the majority of the students valued importantly. The total percentage of students who reputed science as very important or important remained similar to the previous but the percentage of students who reputed it as very important increased. In addition, the evaluation of the importance of the environment increased consistently. Governance, politics, and ethics increased in the scale of positive evaluation. The total number of students who considered politics irrelevant or not important was still great, but many students turned their evaluation from irrelevant to not important demonstrating increased attention toward the component. The evaluation of society remained mostly the same but the percentage of irrelevant decreased and the percentage of very important increased. The learning activity brought students to consider the different aspects related to the issue and to think and discuss the relations between science, society, economy, politics, ethics, and the environment. The SSI-based learning module fostered the students’ awareness of their social skills and personal development. They appreciated the opportunity to cooperate and exchange opinions about a relevant and topical issue. They became aware of their personal development, especially concerning the capability to organize the work and reasoning with responsibility and autonomy. The students were positive toward the online group work. They perceived it as an opportunity to maintain relationships in difficult moments and to enhance their ICT skills.

8 Conclusions

Although this case study has several limitations, being limited to one learning group only and with feedback from only 19 students some indications can be derived from this intervention. The findings of this SSI-based learning module indicate that SSI-based teaching even if done online has the potential to broaden the students’ view when considering questions of science and technology. After the intervention, they see more importance in considering also other aspects beyond science involved in the applications of a science-related issue. The students learned about the chemical properties of ethanol related to its structure and the methods for its production, which are part of the traditional chemistry curriculum. But, they also discussed the different aspects that its uses imply at individual, societal, and environmental levels. The human aspect, which is a relevant part of this approach (Sjöström et al., 2020), resulted to be the driving one. The students learned that the module enhanced their social skills and fostered personal development. They appreciated the opportunity to foster their social skills by cooperating and sharing opinions. Most of them perceived a sense of autonomy and responsibility in organizing independently the work and in reasoning on the different aspects discussed. The students perceived and valued the opportunity to foster their competencies. The education of future citizens should encompass learning content and society-related critical thinking. In our society, molded by science and technology, science content knowledge is important but critical use of it is crucial. Education calls for content knowledge and critical thinking. The first one is usually part of traditional teaching but the second one is not. SSI-based learning helps enhance students’ attitude of reasoning autonomously on aspects other than science, i.e., society, economy, politics, ethics, and environment while discussing a science-related issue. Nevertheless, the SSI approach is not common in Italy. The lack of SSI implementation could be due to the lack of teachers’ knowledge about it and this brings to consider the importance of investment in corresponding teacher continuous professional development.