Recent doctoral dissertations from the universities of Helsinki and Jyväskylä update knowledge on the teaching and learning of essential concepts in physics.
Students encounter the concept of force not only in the Star Wars movies, but also in the physics classroom while studying Newton’s laws of mechanics.
In physics and other exact natural sciences the understanding and management of key concepts has an important role in the learning of central themes and issues. If abstract concepts are not actively processed and connected to reality, students may find them difficult to understand and as a results experience lack of motivation.
In order to develop conceptual understanding of a subject matter, students require familiarity with the associated language and representations such as symbols, graphs, diagrams and formulae. Additionally, the skills of physics teachers can be augmented through in-service trainings where they are familiarized with novel approaches and teaching methods.
Johanna Jauhiainen and Pasi Nieminen defended their doctoral theses in May 2013 in the University of Helsinki and Jyväskylä, respectively. Their studies provide new information on the usefulness of experimentation and representations in physics teaching. Both Jauhiainen and Nieminen approached their research themes through the learning and teaching of the concepts of force in Newtonian mechanics.
Both dissertations are available via the universities’ electronic archives:
- Johanna Jauhiainen: Effects of an in-service training program on physics teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge: The role of experiments and interacting bodies in teaching Newtonian mechanics
- Pasi Nieminen: Representational consistency and the learning of forces in upper secondary school physics
Text: Maija Pollari.