INTRODUCTION

Since the pre-Socratic philosophers the philosophical thought has expressed itself on the concepts of art and beauty. The XX century witnessed the expansion of these reflections into the field of education. In that moment new pedagogical ideas considered the relation between art and education. These ideas put creativity as a central point in the didactic-pedagogic process, valuing art as a tool for the development of other human achievements. On the other side one cannot deny the role played by creativity in the development of science. It is then possible and important to consider a transforming pedagogical process that, by using art to renew the teaching of science, stresses this higher dimension of the creative thought.

Gaston Bachelard developed a philosophical thought of great importance for knowledge development. The consequences of his ideas have enlarged the limits of epistemology and aesthetics. His ideas made a revolution in the literary and art critics as well as in the pedagogy of science.

From a philosophical viewpoint Bachelard has a fundamental role in questions like the importance of art and poetry in pedagogy, not only as didactical tools but giving them autonomy and studying them as creative processes. In his proposal, he values man in a society as a producer of science, technology and poetry, all with equal value in the creation of a rational and imaginative thought that is able to determine changes in both man and thought. Reason and imagination complete each other. By considering poetry as the fundamental instance of the matter and all things he expands the dynamics of this process to art. Though art, as a cultural product, manifests itself at the sensible level through matter and techniques, and science, as formal thought, undo nature and sets new phenomena, both originate from a transforming creativity. Bachelard sees art as rooted in the imaginative processes and in the work of matter. Science creates phenomena to be studied well beyond the empiric level, in order to build formal universes. Both touch metaphysics and demand work to reach their goals. Nothing is given to us at the level of art and science: everything is built. Everything is created. Bachelard, however, thinks that we create the same way as the artisan works with clay: transforming matter and, at the same time, transforming ourselves.

In one of his works (L'Intuition de l'Instant) Bachelard sketches an anthrop-philosophical conception where he stresses the importance of the relation between science and poetry, and between science and art, for the growth of man as an individual and as a social being.

Bachelard, who created a philosophical thought that values the perspective and need of transformations and changes in the scientifical reasoning throughout history, thinks that to know always means a rupture with tradition, able of creating other ways of thinking and imagining the world and another language to describe and evaluate the world. It is important to notice that the notion of epistemological break is a dynamical one that is completed and expanded into others, like the epistemological obstacle. The creative actions and the dynamics of science, poetry and arts dwell in the center of Bachelard's pedagogy.

OBJECTIVES

JUSTIFICATION

Education, more than any other human activity, has time as a cruel measurement of what has not been done. Acknowledging this fact and been aware of the tremendous difficulty of reforming the school system, a group of researchers and teachers offers a small contribution to education through a project that, rather than centered on the institutions, values students and their abilities. This change in focus is not a rhetoric one, it is a consequence of the conviction that it is urgent stop seeing students as simple absorbers, totally ignorant of the knowledge transmitted by teachers and books (see "Cuidado Escola!"). In this new approach students play the main role in producing knowledge in the school; therefore, students must be encouraged to go beyond memorization and repetition of tasks and to seek pleasure in discoveries, in the establishment of hypothesis, and in experimental activities. Our project expects to start with a small group of students and schools, representative of different social, economical and cultural realities of Rio de Janeiro.

It is a known fact that many high school students fear subjects like physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics and do not achieve a good performance in them. This results in a high number of dropouts who join the ranks of socially and culturally excluded citizens.

Finding didactical material that can fulfill the needs of such students has been a fruitless task making it even harder to implement any significant change in this scenario.

It is then urgent the creation and development of diversified didactical material intended to make classes more dynamical; therefore, motivating students to work actively in their learning process. This material will be a tool in the teacher's hand.

The project also includes a cycle of lectures on arts as a way to contribute to the cultural and human development of high school students.

All didactical material of quality implies the use if several techniques and technological media allowing its use in different classes.

The present project hopes that the didactical material that may come to be produced will become a rich tool to be used in a new and broad project of distance education. The material is not intended to be isolated and hard to understand and to use. On the contrary, it has been designed as both entertaining and motivating, ready to be used in new creations.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The Physics Department of UERJ has agreed to provide space for the workshop, which will be located at room 3017 at the F wing on the third floor. This room will have the necessary computer infrastructure and will be the place where students will meet to create their comic strips. There, students will have access to a variety of drawing material and equipment.

The project starting point is the establishment of big network involving professional of different levels, several institutions, undergraduate students, and high school students. This network will be gradually implemented after group meetings.

As soon as we receive invited opinions on the project, a meeting group meeting will be scheduled. This will be the opportunity for all to talk about their particular interests. The group will then define the number of students that will take part in the project during its first year.

The second meeting will put together students. That's when the project coordinator will explain the goals and the project methodology and will invite the students to create their characters.

Researchers and teachers will set the times when they will be present in the workshop. Due to the students time constraints, seminars, lectures, video presentations and other activities will, whenever possible, be scheduled for the afternoon hours.

Whenever possible, students shall get explanations on all areas of the project by a process of guided rediscovery. In this process researchers and teachers encourage the students to create the situations where they would like to get more explanations and then lead them into doing their own discovery. In this process we shall leave personal tendencies to determine who will draw a particular comic strip.

Teachers and researchers will meet regularly to decide on the themes that will be worked with the students based on teacher's classroom experience.

The project also intends to provide basic training in computer for the students involved. In all activities students will always be encouraged to work in group.

Teachers will meet regularly to evaluate the project progress and the material produced at the workshop. All the material will be made available monthly in the project web site and, whenever possible, they will be turned into slides so they can be immediately used in classes.

AREAS COVERED IN THE PROJECT