Modelización de un ecosistema de humedal, soportado en el uso de Sistemas de Información Geográfica y de una aproximación histórica para la didáctica de la ecología

Abstract

This research characterizes the modeling processes 12 high school students developed around the Torca wetland ecosystem using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to study ecology from a historical perspective. With this, in addition to identifying the representations that students have of the ecosystem, it contributes to proposing a theoretical-methodological model for the teaching of ecology that seeks to expand the school's understanding of ecology as a theory, understanding that there are complex interactions between organisms and that each territory has coordinates and a history that tells where its current conditions come from, and the importance of knowing to care. A modeling cycle is designed using the constructivist paradigm and a qualitative approach to do this. It includes six activities: drawing, making models, debating, visiting the wetland, and making audiovisual resources with explanations from a systemic ecosystem perspective, including GIS and the historical view. Students understand the wetland ecosystem as a territory with historical events that led it to its current conditions, and that humans have transformed it to meet their needs, which then overflow causing pollution, and are forced to create restoration programs. Students develop skills with some difficulty in using GIS, relating them to digital tools that also serve to understand an ecosystem from the synecological interactions inherent to its coordinates. It is worth mentioning that the activities that function as mediation in the modelling processes (drawings, models, debates, and video creation) allow students to represent elements in which they are more skilled and competent since some are better at drawing and others at digital design; that is, they have preferences for representing in greater detail depending on the media and the same activity. As expected, the 12 students characterize organisms that are part of the wetland, recognizing their taxonomy and autoecology. However, the systemic understanding of synecology is represented by only two female students from the group of 12. The sequencing of the proposed activities contributes to the consolidation of the teaching of ecology and the students' levels of understanding, making them aware of being part of a system of interactions with the environment, so that they recognize their territory, then value it, and take care of it from their role as citizens in decision-making.