Fostering functional understanding in students through the use of physics demonstrations

Abstract

The topic of Electrostatics in Physics was used to study the effectiveness of demonstrations in promoting functional understanding among secondary school students. One class of secondary school students was used as the test group while another class of students served as the control group; the latter group was taught the topic via the conventional chalk-and-talk approach. Analyses of students' responses to survey instruments as well as of another instrument to gauge content acquisition and functional understanding show that the use of demonstrations promotes a learning climate which is conducive for the acquisition of key concepts and also helps to scaffold students' thinking in a more pronounced manner as compared to the traditional approach. Despite having a better academic standing, the control group performed only slightly better than the demonstration group. Some implications of this study are discussed.