Exploring the Vine Cycle. Mobile technology in non-formal enviromental education settings

Abstract

[EN]Mobile and ubiquitous technologies offer unique potentialities to develop environmental education activities. This paper presents the preliminary results of a project developed with children aged between 6 and 12, which explored the vine cycle over one year, visiting farms in the vineyard area of Dão. Mobilizing a framework that integrates the authentic and meaningful learnings and situated cognition, it drew up a set of activities in which children were invited to take the roles of farmer, reporter and researcher. These activities were developed with the help of computers, electronic sensors, action cameras and audio recorders to explore the environment and the farm activities.