Alternative Frameworks Amongst University of Plymouth Astronomy Students

Summary

Introduction

In recent years much research into conceptual understanding of science has been carried out. Oddly, Astronomy (one of the smallest sciences in terms of pupil numbers) is possibly one of the most widely studied subjects, with numerous papers being produced revealing the intuitive ideas of (usually) young school children. Within these papers it is generally recognised that if students cannot assimilate the fundamental concepts of a subject, then their own initial frameworks are altered accordingly, producing mis-conceptions.

Much of this research into pre/mis-conceptions, alternative frameworks etc, has been concerned with the knowledge of gravity or the shape of the Earth, the Sun and other such bodies. Another area heavily researched is that of phases/eclipses, and how the young children of today perceive these phenomena.

The research presented here takes the findings from earlier papers and extends it by assessing astronomy students at the University of Plymouth. The experiment probed two areas, the phases and eclipses of the moon and Sun and the ability of students to de-centre.

Previous Studies

It has been known for many years now that children usually start to think of the Earth as flat (Vosniadou et al (1989)), with age usually removing or adjusting initial frameworks. This may be demonstrated by assuming we have two children, A and B, which both hold the notion of a flat Earth. From the flat Earth model, child A may ‘leap’ to the concept of a spherical Earth straight away; the child's flat Earth conceptions have been removed and replaced with a model which the child is able to associate with ‘space’ and thus a spherical Earth.