Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) is a framework developed by UN, UNESCO, and UNFPA that promotes a curriculum-based process of teaching and learning about gender and sexuality. Based on the CSE act, in 2008 the CSE Curricular Guidelines were created by the Federal Council of Education in Argentina. These guidelines represent the first level of curricular development concerning Comprehensive Sex Education, as they set out basic educational aims and contents to be incorporated into all levels, modalities, and disciplines(Spanish, History, Geography, STEM, etc) of the Argentinean educational system. Here we present the design of an instructional sequence for Secondary School Chemistry Teachers. The instructional sequence consists of three cycles: a modeling cycle, an inquiry cycle, and a CSE integration cycle. Each cycle has a different aim at training chemistry teachers: i) modeling cycle: engaging in modeling practices and constructing good-enough versions of key school-based scientific models, ii) inquiry cycle: using those constructed models to answer relevant questions about the world and iii) CSE cycle: the application of the CSE Curricular Guidelines in their teaching. To exemplify each of the cycles in the instructional sequence we outline them here. To promote the teacher's construction of the osmosis and diffusions the teachers carried out different experiments to evaluate their initial models and were asked to discuss the results and improve their initial drawings by revising their models. Then in the inquiry cycle, the teachers are presented with a controversial phrase said by a denialist doctor: “The condom does not protect a person from anything, the AIDS virus passes through porcelain”. Then the students are guided through different experiments to evaluate which substances are able to pass through the plastic of condoms. The final cycle is based on a workshop about Sexually Transmitted Diseases/AIDS proposed in the CSE Curricular Books. During the instructional sequence, we use a framework based on Identity Spectrum Research in order to be compliant with having a gender perspective. The design and implementation of this instructional sequence promote teachers to be involved in talking about phenomena to make sense of them, participating in modeling practices such as using, expressing, analyzing, and modifying their models linking them to CSE Curriculum Guidelines.

Designing an instructional sequence linking comprehensive sexuality education with chemistry: Modelling osmosis and diffusion processes

ACS Spring Meeting 2021

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.