The students of the school “Cavalacanti of Sesto fiorentino” (FI) were observed on 20 November as part of an experimental project for science teaching promoted by Indire in collaboration with the Teachers College of the Columbia University.

The experimentation is based on the use of a hydroponic greenhouse in class, a natural system allowing close observation of the growing of the plants from the scientific point of view and that is suitable for the study and observation also by very young students. The research uses this tool to start an innovative laboratory teaching centred on environmental education and is useful to introduce the scientific method in the classroom.

The Indire researcher Lorenzo Guasti, responsible of the project and Tamar Fuhrmann of Columbia University, participated as observers, in the lessons in one of the classes taking part in the project. The experimentation uses an adapted for the Italian school system version of the Bifocal Modeling – a method for science learning, developed by the working group of the American researcher, that connects physical experimentation with digital modelling.

Besides the school “Cavalcanti”, the project involves the primary school “Vespucci” in Florence and the secondary school  “Keynes-Gramsci” of Prato.