Classrooms are complex in their real sets. To understand such sets and their emergent patterns, network approach provides useful theoretical and methodological tools. In this work, we used network approach to explore two domains of complexity in a classroom: the interpersonal domain, via social networks; and the representational domain, through collective semantic networks. This work is grounded in both Social Network Analyses and Social Representation Theory for gathering information from interpersonal and representational domains. We investigated a physics high school classroom by proceeding sociometric tests and by using words freely evoked by students to explore relations between students’ dyad’s weights, in social networks, and emerging consensus in semantic networks. Our findings showed closer relations between social ties’ weight and consensus formed on intra-school representational objects, while consensus on extra-school representational objects is less dependent on the classroom interpersonal ties’ strength.

The current COVID-19 pandemic raises reflection on the new roles of science education in citizen education in a world characterized by civilization risks, derived from the socioeconomic development. This specific type of risk is treated as manufactured risk as proposed by the sociologist Ulrich Beck. In this work, we report a document analysis starting from Beck's risk society theory, followed by notions of reflexive modernity, risk perception and the Cynefin decision making model for complex problems. COVID-19 pandemic is characterized as a manufactured risk and we present features of it. We state that students are unable to deal with manufactured risk because of the type of problems they are usually prepared to solve at school and the limited risk perception they have. In order to acquire a better science education, we propose the integration of wicked problems in science programs alongside the use of a multidimensional schema, so-called amplified risk perception space, a tool to locate students' risk perception. We hope to contribute to prepare citizens for a world of global and complex events, such as the current pandemic.

The buzzing foraging behavior of female bees for pollen harvesting called the attention of early pollination biologists. Flower types that demand this buzzing behavior comprise about 20,000 species of different and phylogenetically unrelated plant taxa, suggesting that it had independently evolved many times among the flowering plants. Between the late 1970s and early 1980s, theoretical papers had modeled the energetics of buzz pollination, but, up to this moment, no hypothesis was experimentally tested concerning the theoretical basis of the energetics of buzz pollination. We present a cost‐effective and simple apparatus, including a digital and highly accurate frequency generator, and a device for the transference of buzz‐frequency energy to the receptive floral unity. The receptive floral unities may comprise the entire or partial androecium, or the tubular corolla, or, in some cases, the whole flower. This apparatus can be easily used in both laboratory and field conditions of research, as natural air currents are avoided, and the response of pollen liberation can be quantitatively measured by pollen grain counts that can be captured by adhesion in slide poured with an isosmotic lactate–glycerol media. The maximum displacement of the hardwire beam/claw system was 0.1170 ± 0.0006 mm @ 150 Hz; 0.021 ± 0.003 mm @ 250 Hz; 0.010 ± 0.001 mm @ 350 Hz; 0.0058 ± 0.0001 mm @ 450 Hz; and 0.0082 ± 0.0005 mm @ 550 Hz. Hypothesis contrasting frequency emission and pollen liberation measured as pollen grain counts may be tested in a species flower type by simple linear regression if pollen counts are normally distributed, or ordinal logistic regression, with non‐normal counts. The comparison among different flower‐type requirements can be tested through appropriate statistical methods for both normally and non‐normally distributed pollen grain counts.

Neste trabalho exploramos, por meio de avaliações multi-formato, a Evolução Conceitual de um grupo de estudantes do ensino médio (N=28) em um tópico da Física (Acústica). Nos apoiamos numa vertente reconsiderada para Mudança Conceitual, na qual a complexificação conceitual é utilizada como contraponto à versão inicial dessa teoria. Foram utilizadas diferentes formas de representação proposicional dos estudantes (mapas mentais livres e redes semânticas estimuladas), além de testes de múltipla escolha e declarações de autoeficácia. Os mapas mentais mostram uma inclusão incremental de elementos da ciência por parte dos alunos. As medidas topológicas das redes semânticas foram confrontadas via Análise de Componentes Principais com traços latentes de habilidade, obtidos por Modelagem Rasch nos testes de múltipla escolha, e também com a declaração do senso de autoeficácia dos sujeitos de pesquisa. Os dados empíricos analisados mostraram um crescimento das características topológicas das redes semânticas, associado ao aumento no senso de autoeficácia e também do traço latente de habilidade. Esses resultados indicaram um aumento da complexidade nos sistemas de conhecimento dos estudantes, durante o processo de aprendizagem.