(German title: Experimentelle Umweltbildungsangebote in Schülerlaboren unter Entwicklung und Verwendung neuer Smartphone-Experimente)

The increasing mechanization of our society brings with it many benefits as well as risks. In particular, so-called systemic risks such as nuclear power, noise pollution, air and water pollution, etc. remain unnoticed because our human senses cannot perceive or record such impacts or their absolute extent at the time of exposure. Opportunities for the individual, time and location-independent recording of environmental influences occurring in everyday life therefore play an important role in education for sustainable development and in the development of scientific literacy as a path to social participation.

The missing link between individually occurring environmental influences and time- and location-independent recording can be established, particularly in the above-mentioned subject areas, through the use of smartphones and tablet PCs. On the one hand, this is due to the fact that a good third of young people in Germany now use a tablet PC and more than 80% use a smartphone. These devices are therefore an everyday tool, especially for the younger generation, and are therefore available regardless of time and place. On the other hand, smartphones and tablet PCs can also be used in a variety of ways as small, portable, mobile measuring laboratories for experimentation in science lessons and especially in environmental education. These everyday media are already equipped with many internal sensors (e.g. microphone and camera, acceleration, magnetic field strength and sometimes even temperature, pressure and humidity sensors). The data recorded by the sensors can be read out via associated apps, which enables both qualitative and quantitative experiments. These small, portable and mobile measuring laboratories can replace complex experimental equipment and are well known to learners from their everyday lives. A high level of familiarity with their operation can therefore be expected. Building on this experience, environmental awareness and in particular the experimental investigation of current environmental issues can be promoted in science and technology education courses as part of research-based learning approaches. This results in great potential for the use of new digital media in environmental education, especially with regard to young people who would not want to experience nature on their own initiative. In addition to the development of new teaching concepts in the field of environmental education, teacher training and teacher training represents a second field of action that is still open. Only when teachers are qualified as multipliers for the implementation and communication of environmental topics will they be able to use these concepts in their own lessons.

In line with the need for action identified in this regard, not least by the DBU, the project “Experimental environmental education programs in school laboratories using new smartphone experiments” aims to reduce the deficits in the area of environmental education for learners and teachers. Building on the content-related and, above all, structural preliminary work of the applicants, the three subject areas

• Subject area 1: Investigation of noise and noise protection (grades 7/8),
• Subject area 2: Protection of air and water (grades 9/10) and
• Subject area 3: On the trail of radioactivity (grades 12/13)

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On the one hand, these belong to the systemic, invisible risk areas of our environment and, on the other hand, are highly relevant to everyday life for learners. In this project, school-related smartphone experiments for environmental education are being developed for all secondary school grades and prepared for teacher training and further education as well as for pupils. This also reflects the cross-sectional task of environmental education across various grades through to teacher training and further education. The overarching didactic-methodological concept in each subject area is always based on a context relevant to everyday life, which in the second step is related to the learners' immediate environment and which they actively explore with smartphone experiments in the sense of research-based learning. In the process, independent exploration of the central scientific method is promoted in the form of learning circles (learning at stations) within the framework of the individual subject areas using current environmental education offers. As the pupils carry out the experiments in the context of the subject areas both in the school laboratory and as a follow-up at home, they are also encouraged to engage in informal learning outside of the coordinated learning experience in the school laboratory and outside of formal educational programs. One of the tasks of the project is therefore not only to use the internal sensors already installed in the mobile media, but also to develop suitable, simple and inexpensive external smartphone sensors.

Link to all offers of the teaching area for schools