History of physics in physics teaching

Anders H. Gormsen defends his MSc thesis.

Abstract

This thesis is based upon a personal observation. During my studies at Copenhagen University the course History of Physics stood out against the general theoretical courses. Getting to know the history of how theories were born, helped me understand these theories. This raised the question whether knowledge of the history of physics would improve understanding of physics among pupils in Danish high schools. I order to answer that question, I have developed a short teaching sequence, focusing on how three 19th-century scientists approached the principle of energy conservation. Using multiple choice-test, writing exercises, interviews and observations from the pupils’ work, I found that the pupils had a small improvement in their knowledge about energy conservation and energy transformation. But more importantly, there was an appreciation that knowledge about the thoughts and processes that lead to the first description of energy conservation gave a better understanding of theories and formulas.

This finding is also widely found in literature about science didactics. I show that the theory of narratives and a ”biological-evolutionary” -point of view can explain that. Humans will naturally tend to explain experiences with the use of narratives. Knowledge is the stories that we create. A story contains events, which through a story is put together to generate a meaning of the events. The use of the history of physics in the teaching of physics provide the events our meaningful narratives need. Including the history of physics in the teaching of physics is, however, no miracle remedy. You still have to have a plain structure in our teaching. You need variation etc. However, history of physics is an obvious approach to illustrate the nature of science. I will recommend using the history of physics as a part of a common approach in the teaching of physics. Not only in the Danish high schools but also primary and secondary schools as well as at universities.

Kandidat: Anders H. Gormsen

Vejleder: Ricardo Karam (IND) og Ian Bearden (NBI)

Censor: Keld Nielsen (AU)