Videoquiz “La edad de la Tierra”: recurso didáctico para entender el avance de la ciencia en el tiempo

Abstract

The age of the Earth has been a recurrent question throughout history, from religious people to scientists. More than 500 hundred years have passed until scientists reached an absolute age of Earth without a  doubt. Here we present a 30’ video where six of the hypotheses that have been postulated are explained, trying to answer that important question, mentioning the assumptions and the arguments against each hypothesis. Also, in the video experiments are shown to explain the scientific concepts based on those hypotheses. These concepts have been formed over time in many scientific disciplines: Geology, Biology, Physics, and Chemistry. The complete video is presented here, with a duration of 30 minutes, ready to be projected in the classroom. The links to six videoquizzes are also presented, one per hypothesis, where questions are incorporated before the video to attract the attention of the students to the main points; and they are asked to answer them after having seen the video. The results of a questionnaire answered by more than 500 students from secondary schools in central Mexico are also reported here. It is concluded that this video can function as a teaching strategy on how scientific knowledge evolves, using a question that has been tried to be answered for more than five hundred years from different scientific disciplines.

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