Misconceptions in Science Education

The current era, the age of knowledge and accelerated technological development, is characterized by the rapid pace of occurrences that impact all areas of life, including education. The scope and availability of information challenge everyone seeking to engage in meaningful learning that combines existing knowledge and the creation of new insights. However, despite the easy availability of, and access to, information, misconceptions in science and mathematics remain firmly rooted, with learners providing incorrect responses, often given instantly and based on their own intuition.

How does giving an immediate, intuitive response impact its quality? What are the features of an intuitive response? How is this related to misconceptions? How does this change the role of the teacher in structuring the knowledge of learners who are incessantly bombarded with vast amounts of technology and knowledge? And how can misconceptions help us understand?

Based on comprehensive research, combining quantitative and qualitative methodologies, this book explains how misconceptions can contribute to the understanding of learners—elementary and middle school students and pre-service teachers majoring in science and mathematics. The book’s chapters follow the “aha” moments that participants in the study experienced: when the learners understood the source of their own incorrect response, when a sense of spontaneous and authentic empathy was evoked among pre-service teachers in wake of their experience with an incorrect response of their own, and when the researcher rediscovered that the chief role of the teacher in leading a meaningful process of creating knowledge is based—today more than ever—on human interaction, involvement, engagement and empathy, affective features that are crucial for the significant process of creating knowledge.