Microscópios do museu Galileu: alternativas para o ensino de ciências

Abstract

This study's guiding question is "How are the microscopes in the Galileo Museum organized and characterized?" The aim is to understand how the microscopes in the Galileo Museum are organized and characterized. In addition, it specifically intends to reflect on the contributions of this collection to science classes. This study consists of exploratory and qualitative research, carried out virtually on the Galileo Museum website; all tabs accessed were translated from Italian to Portuguese using the Google Translate tool available in the Google Chrome browser. Some tabs on the website were accessed to reach the page with objects listed by room, where the total number of microscopes in the location was verified. To organize and quantify the total number of instruments, by room, a table with 3 columns was created: name/number of rooms; number of microscopes; and types of microscopes and inventories. Subsequently, descriptive tables were prepared for each of the instruments listed in Table 1, presenting 5 columns, namely: description of the object; number of room/theme; name of the builder; place of origin; and year/century of construction of the artifact, with these paintings accompanied by pictures of the respective objects. The existence of 48 microscopes was found in 9 of the 18 numbered rooms of the Galileo Museum, which are numbered in Roman numerals and have themes that name them, with only the last one, which has no artifacts, being the only one not numbered and entitled simply “Interactive rooms. Galileo and the measurement of time”. The room “XIV. The precision instruments industry” has the largest number of artifacts, being 16 microscopes. Among these objects, there are those that were built with materials of animal origin and can be used in biology classes to initiate ethical discussions about the harms of using these materials in such a way. As well as those that were used in demonstrations for students during lectures or in experiments, highlighting their importance in practical activities that can be carried out with students. In addition to the artifacts that contain optical instruments such as the Lieberkühn, invented by the German physicist Johannes Nathanael Lieberkühn, which can be used to discuss the contributions of physics and physicists to the invention and improvement of these devices. Among the final considerations, it was seen that the arrangement of the microscopes in the Galileo Museum, in only 9 rooms, reveals how the grouping of the instruments in each room took into account aspects that contribute to understanding the themes addressed in the places. It was noted how the artifacts have such striking and distinct characteristics, varying according to their period of construction, place of origin and the builder, so that they help to define them even when the instrument does not have this information recorded in any way. It was observed how the fact that these microscopes were built at different times, by different individuals and have different shapes, can contribute to classes on the history of microscopy. Furthermore, as its various components are of animal origin and function explained through physics, it opens up space to work on physics and biology topics in science classes.