• Open Access

Utilizing public scientific web lectures to teach contemporary physics at the high school level: A case study of learning

Shulamit Kapon, Uri Ganiel, and Bat Sheva Eylon
Phys. Rev. ST Phys. Educ. Res. 7, 020108 – Published 17 October 2011
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Abstract

This paper describes a teaching experiment designed to examine the learning (i.e., retention of content and conceptual development) that takes place when public scientific web lectures delivered by scientists are utilized to present advanced ideas in physics to students with a high school background in physics. The students watched an exemplary public physics web lecture that was followed by a collaborative generic activity session. The collaborative session involved a guided critical reconstruction of the main arguments in the lecture, and a processing of the key analogical explanations. Then the students watched another exemplary web lecture on a different topic. The participants (N=14) were divided into two groups differing only in the order in which the lectures were presented. The students’ discussions during the activities show that they were able to reason and demonstrate conceptual progress, although the physics ideas in the lectures were far beyond their level in physics. The discussions during the collaborative session contributed significantly to the students’ understanding. We illustrate this point through an analysis of one of these discussions between two students on an analogical explanation of the Aharonov-Bohm effect that was presented in one of the lectures. The results from the tests that were administered to the participants several times during the intervention further support this contention.

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  • Received 19 January 2011

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevSTPER.7.020108

This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.

© 2011 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Shulamit Kapon1,*, Uri Ganiel2, and Bat Sheva Eylon2

  • 1The Jaime and Joan Constantiner School of Education, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel
  • 2Department of Science Teaching, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel

  • *Corresponding author. kaponsh@post.tau.ac.il

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Issue

Vol. 7, Iss. 2 — July - December 2011

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It is not necessary to obtain permission to reuse this article or its components as it is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI are maintained. Please note that some figures may have been included with permission from other third parties. It is your responsibility to obtain the proper permission from the rights holder directly for these figures.

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