Pupil's alternative conceptions of heat and heat transfer in physics

Abstract

The first part of the study includes a review of how pupils' scientific concepts arise, develop, and how they influence learning. The study on the pupils' ideas about heat and heat transfer by conduction, convection, and radiation was carried out through interviews accompanied by demonstrations of heat experiments. After a pilot phase, 25 pupils from Form 1, 2, 3, and 5 were interviewed in all. The purpose of this study was to find out to what extent pupils have different conceptions from those held by scientists, and how these ideas can be changed by the teaching of Physics. It was found that pupils' ideas about heat is that heat is a fluid which is stored in objects and transferred from one object to another. Statements describing heat which were given by pupils of different ages did not differ, and even though some pupils had been exposed to formal instruction they still associated the term 'heat' with the meanings they had encountered before instruction.