Ready for the future?\\ Then, teach and think critically

Abstract

The main aim of this work was to create a complex educational kit for learning about poisonous plants growing in the Czech Republic. This set is intended especially for juniors at grammar schools, where it may be utilized in biology seminars. The kit aims to showcase interdisciplinary connections between biology and other natural as well as social sciences, which is a way of positively impacting students’ interests in the sciences through topics that are not strictly related to biology. Using the RWCT (Reading and Writing for Critical Thinking) method allows the students to connect what they already know with new knowledge, develop a complex opinion thanks to that connection and understand issues that overlap to different fields, which may not be necessarily related. The main contribution of this work lies in the educational set consisting of four parts: the teaching brochure, a board game, a matching game, and several worksheets. The whole set is designed to make the students actively think about the subject, its overlaps, and connections to other fields of study, and then to lead them towards creating a complex opinion on the given topic. Another important feature of the set is that it leads the students to make use of their textbook, rather than any digital sources of information (e.g.\ slides from a teacher, to which they are accustomed nowadays in classes). The teaching set was tested in a sample biology seminar classes attended by 18 students. Following the lesson, the usefulness of the set was evaluated through semi-structured interviews with three respondents, who had taken part in the class. However, more testing lessons and more similar interviews with attending students would be needed to conclusively prove the effectiveness of this teaching set.