Abstract:

Evagorou (2011, p. 133) describes an experiment in Cyprus developing project Technoskepsi involving students aged 9-12 years and their teachers, in a primary school (K12). Using some computers with text editor, students built stories of their villages (neighborhoods) from some socio-scientific issues (SSI), investigating everyday experiences and images of the city, with internet aid and guided tours. In our case, we try to establish a dialogue between formal and non-formal education, guided by controversial socio-scientific issues (Reis & Galvão, 2008; Sadler, 2011). The city of Piuma, located on the coast of Espírito Santo state in Brazil, has about 18,000 inhabitants, whose region has an economy based on fishing and crafts. But every year this city suffers from the increasing population in carnival period, reaching about 30-40 thousand. This fact impacts the quality of life of the people of that city, for example, environmental sanitation, supply of drinking water and safe collection and selective waste. Also, after the Carnival period, we can see the increase in cases of sexually transmitted diseases and teen pregnancy. Based on the pedagogy of projects of Hernandez (1998), built a school project production of amateur documentaries, called Project “CurtaCiência”, involving high school students in Piuma city. Four documentaries were built using movie maker, based on the following guiding questions (issues):
(a) Waste accumulation: lack of education or destination need?;
(b) Use of drugs in adolescence: a social or educational issue?;
(c) Carnival and health: and after the party?; and
(d) Shells with craft tales: occupation or increased income?.

So the aim of this research was to analyze the pedagogical potential of this school project, seeking to identify the dialogues produced between formal and non-formal education. This qualitative research, case study, was conducted from observations and interviews, analyzed based on Bardin (2011, p. 47), and focus group interviews were analyzed based on Gatti (2005, p. 11 ). The research was conducted from November 2013 to June 2014, the Piuma campus of Federal Institute of Espírito Santo State (Brazil), with participation of thirteen students from the technical course integrated into the high school and teachers, all volunteers, was carried out in five steps:
[Step I]: selective test for selection of high school students;
[Step II]: formation of the work team with training workshops - photography production, brainstorming, documentaries scripts, and Movie Maker;
[Step III]: Understanding the controversial socio-scientific issues to form working groups (WG);
[Step IV]: Building documentaries with workshops, research themes, interviews and photographs; and
[Step V]: Final meeting. Presentation of documentaries for the school community.

The pedagogical and philosophical analysis was performed based on the aspects of non-formal education and the movement of Science, Technology, Society and Environment (STSE) and scientific literacy. This study had the main authors: Attico Chassot, Glen Aikenhead, Maria Evagorou, Anna Maria Pessoa de Carvalho, Décio Auler, Wildson Luiz Pereira dos Santos, Fernando Hernandez and Maria da Glória Gohn. Thus, the school project provided an opportunity for students to reflect on the social, economic, technological, cultural, environmental, in addition to scientific issues, guided by a controversial social-scientific theme of the city of Piuma of Brazil.

Keywords:

STSE, controversial socioscientific issues, non-formal education, documentaries.