Children and Preservice Teachers' Misconceptions and Scientifically Acceptable Conceptions about Movement, Force, and Gravity

Qualitative research conducted with fifty-eight (58) pupils old 9 to 12 and 85 preservice teachers of elementary education from Quebec in Canada on their alternative conceptions of force, motion, and gravity, demonstrates that they share many misconceptions despite the difference in age and training.

Most of their understandings differ radically from those established by the scientific community. They look like those developed in the pre-Newtonian Physics setting, such as the Greek philosopher Aristotle view and the 14th-century Impetus theory by the French philosopher Buridan. For this, we have given them a paper and pencil questionnaire of sixty minutes duration and composed of six questions. The results were analyzed based on previous research on students' and teachers' motion and force conceptions. Most of the misconceptions identified on analyzing the data were 1. The force exerted on an object is proportional to the speed; 2. The notions of mass and weight are synonymous; 3. The quantity of matter in an object on the Earth is different than in the Moon; 4. In the absence of atmosphere, there is no gravitation like on the Moon; 5. There are no forces exerted in an object at rest; 6. Gravity does not act on stationary objects; 7. The moving object must necessarily have forces exerted on them to keep them on movement; and 8. Without a continued application of force, an object could not continue its movement. The misconceptions identified are relevant for developing teaching strategies focused on the conceptual conflict with trainee teachers to move them towards scientific conceptions. To value their misconceptions, one must confront them with the erroneous theories on movement developed by renowned scientists.