Type of Study

A study framed in educational research-action (Sandín, 2003) was carried out since it sought to implement an improvement in teaching practice. This implied identifying metacognition processes, training for new educational references, peer review at certain times based on collaboration, and socialization of the achievements with the educational community.

Procedure

The process to apply the Tobón, S. (2019) formative project in master degree's students had the following phases:

Phase 1. Dynamization. Raise student’s awareness about formative projects and their relationship with science teaching, and planning a training project through a V-heuristic.

Phase 2. Development. A didactic sequence was taken in the area that the students were interested in and it was evaluated using a flow chart to detect needs. Based on the previous evaluation and planning, a new structure was formulated for the didactic sequence, which was the basis for its research protocol, subsequent thesis project, and/or article publication.

Phase 3. Socialization. Discussion forums for the presentation of projects with an emphasis on achievements and aspects to continue improving in the process. Presentation of a thesis to obtain a Master’s degree in Science Teaching.

Context of the experience

The Polytechnic University of the State of Morelos was created in 2004, serves just over two thousand students in six engineering degrees, one bachelor's degree, and four master's degrees and the educational model established from its beginnings is the Competency-Based Model (Upemor, 2021).

The Master’s Degree in Science Teaching (hereinafter MEC by its acronym in Spanish) is aimed at the professionalization of teachers in the areas of mathematics, biology, physics, and chemistry. It is offered in a semi-face-to-face way and four months periods for two years. Subjects related to educational research are included throughout the curriculum. The first two semesters: Educational research I and II. And the remaining semesters: Research Seminar I, II, III, and IV.

In this article, emphasis is placed on the first two semesters, which are those related to the presentation of their thesis research protocol. However, all the subjects indicated as the responsible subject teacher were followed up during the 2015-2017 generation:

Source : Self-made, 2021

Instrument

Flow chart for the detection of needs. The purpose of this chart is to self-evaluate the research protocol, considering the socio-formative approach. It is made up of six indicators that assess the feasibility of the project and the role of both the student and the teacher (See Figure 1).

Most of the MEC's activities, learning products, and assessment instruments were contained in a Moodle platform administered by the institution. It should be noted that the students met with the subject advisor twice a semester or at events that the institution held specifically for them. The advisor was free to intervene and adapt some of these materials and direct specific activities at these events to enrich their research work (See Table 2).

Source: Self-made, 2021

Phase 1 Dynamization

In this phase, it was possible to raise students’ awareness about formative projects and their relationship with science teaching. Most of the teacher-students had initial training in Biology, Chemistry, Mathematics, or related Engineering and indicated that they had little experience in the Competency-Based Model and academic writing.

As part of the activities on the platform, the student was asked to carry out self-administered work, they complied with the asynchronous activities, and the teacher had the function of generating assertive feedback, either through the platform's forums or through email, WhatsApp, and even by Skype or in person. However, for the writing of the reports, it was necessary to use the premise raised by Ferreiro (2007): Each time and each historical circumstance gives new meanings to reading and writing, especially if it is considered that various things happen in school that can be told in different ways.

They were ordered to search their files, both physical and digital; in the work of their students, in the evidence folders, and in their bookshelves where they had kept dreams, motivations, and ways of facing life. They knew of specialized literature. They used specific materials, YouTube sites to feed their classes, they began to become familiar with games, simulators, augmented reality, and artificial intelligence. Without knowing it, they were science communicators because they were in charge of the scientific literacy of their students (Meinardi, González, Revel, & Plaza, 2010). So, they had to read everything differently. The purpose had to be writing (Richardson, 2011).

The teachers recovered the best classes they had had, the response to emerging problems for both themselves and their students, as well as the vicissitudes of their teaching practice, and reported various experiences that deserved to be told or replicated. However, they had to be aware that, to write, a plan was necessary to help them visualize the way forward, so the matrices offered a form of systematization that favored the teachers' written production (Nambo et al., 2016). The method was the formative project. The initial evidence: the V-heuristic (See diagram 2).

Source. Self-made. Based on Tobón (2019)

The evidence of the V-heuristic in this formative process was of total relevance because it allowed them to distinguish the specific product that they would have to present as an undertaking and other more related ones. Likewise, it allowed them to see their planning without the conventional bureaucratic obstacles, as they themselves expressed it. In this way, social, personal, institutional, scientific, or environmental projects were proposed. Some project titles that went through the entire institutional process and managed to culminate as theses were the following (See Table 3):

Source. Self-made, 2021

The formative project was outlined as a support for the teacher to systematize and develop undertakings to work with daily emergent situations that would bring students closer to the development of their capacities. This project contemplated six important characteristics:

a) Analysis of previous knowledge: The student-teacher would identify the knowledge that allows their own students to learn in the best way, considering pertinent topics for the subject;

b) Planning: It would seek to obtain relevant products through the planning and execution of activities and the communication of the results;

c) Competencies: It would help to form one or several competencies related to the four pillars of education (being, doing, knowing, coexisting);

d) Context problems: It is the challenge of achieving a certain goal in an environment, which would imply transforming a given situation into an ideal or expected situation;

e) Entrepreneurship: It would generate relevant activities for both them and their students, related to the improvement of the social, individual, and environmental situation;

f) Evaluation: mainly through learning maps, socialization, and metacognition.

Phase 2 Development

Once the project that the students of the MEC wanted to carry out had been proposed and evaluated with the flow chart for the detection of needs and delivery of the research protocol (See Figure 1), a new structure was formulated for the didactic sequence. An example of the work done is as follows:

The methodology of the didactic sequences was reviewed in a High School in the state of Morelos, to which the master degree's student was attached, and the methodology of formative projects was implemented.

resents the format developed for the new planning proposal, which seeks to apply the references of socio-formation and is characterized by the following elements:

1) it focuses on expected learning as a key axis, instead of purposes and objectives, which is one of the recurring confusions among teachers who do not have previous teacher training;

2) the expected learnings are synthesized so that they are understandable and they are asked to work a maximum of two of them;

3) the resolution of context problems is incorporated, in such a way that the emphasis on content is overcome;

4) emphasis on approaching dynamic and motivating activities with students; and

5) have a simpler planning format that serves as a guide for students rather than being an administrative or activity control instrument.

Source: Self-made based on Vargas et ál. (2019)

Phase 3 Socialization

The previous example is part of an article that was written by a MEC student in co-authorship with his thesis supervisors. The proposal made his students improve their academic performance, so this proposal was replicated in other groups and institutions belonging to the High School.

The information management carried out by the teacher in the first instance served to identify valuable sites on YouTube for the teaching of chemistry. The project that started from the first semesters managed to materialize in a contribution to the state of knowledge, which represented one of the best ways of socializing the results of each of the formative projects. Likewise, discussion forums were developed that allowed master degree's students external feedback for their projects.

It should be noted that the project-based didactic planning proposed in Phase 2 also served as a basis for the master degree's student advisor to develop their own project, articulating the subjects in Table 1.

This was done to address the subject of writing and developing projects based on their own teaching experience. In this new proposal, the evaluation focuses on achieving an integrating product relevant to the environment and motivating for the students, which makes it possible to assess the expected learning of both subjects and the detection of needs and delivery of the research protocol (see Table 5).

Source: Self-made