STSE, SCIENTIFIC LITERACY AND CRITICAL SCIENCE COMMUNICATION IN THE TRAINING OF SCIENCE AND BIOLOGY TEACHERS

Abstract

This chapter presents the analysis of the connections between Science, Technology, Society, and Environment Education, Scientific Literacy, and Critical Science Communication in the training of Biology teachers, aiming to understand how these perspectives can converge toward an emancipatory teaching practice committed to the exercise of citizenship. Based on a qualitative theoretical review, the study examines the historical and epistemological foundations of these movements, their conceptual convergences, and the challenges to their implementation in the context of Brazilian Basic Education. It discusses how the reductive, content-centered view that has historically shaped Science and Biology teaching can be overcome through the articulation of these approaches, which share a commitment to deconstructing the supposed neutrality of Science and equipping students to face contemporary socio-scientific dilemmas such as science denialism and disinformation. The study also analyzes how official curriculum documents, particularly the National Common Curricular Base and the Paraná Curricular Reference, incorporate these perspectives in a tangential and often technicist manner, highlighting the need for critical teacher education that goes beyond the prescribed curriculum. The findings indicate that the convergence of STSE Education, Scientific Literacy, and Critical Science Communication enhances the formation of subjects capable of critically reading and intervening in reality, provided it is supported by public policies that ensure adequate structural conditions for teaching. It is concluded that consolidating these perspectives as structuring axes of teacher education represents a fundamental social commitment to elevating Science and Biology teaching to the status of transformative praxis.