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Students' Understanding of the Special Theory of Relativity
and Design for a Guided Visit to a Science Museum
Journal:
International Journal of Science Education
Manuscript ID:
TSED-2007-0310.R2
Manuscript Type:
Research Paper
Keywords:
physics education, misconception, learning activities, university
Keywords (user):
Theory of Special Relativity, Teaching materials design, Schools
visits to museum
URL: http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/tsed Email: editor_ijse@hotmail.co.uk
International Journal of Science Education
peer-00516746, version 1 - 11 Sep 2010
Author manuscript, published in "International Journal of Science Education 31, 15 (2009) 2085-2104"
DOI : 10.1080/09500690802353536
For Peer Review Only
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Students’ Understanding of the Special Theory of Relativity and Design for a
Guided Visit to a Science Museum
This paper describes the design of teaching materials that are used as learning tools in school visits to a
science museum. An exhibition on the A century of the Special Theory of Relativity, in the Kutxaespacio
Science Museum, in San Sebastian (Spain), was used to design a visit for first year engineering students
at the university and assess the learning which was achieved. The first part of the paper presents the
teaching sequence which was designed to build a bridge between formal teaching and the exhibition visit.
The second part analyses the potential of the exhibition and the aforementioned teaching sequence to
influence the students’ knowledge of three aspects of the Special Theory of Relativity. The results
obtained show that the design of the visit, with both pre-visit and follow up activities, was effective as a
means of increasing students’ understanding and stimulating their ability to argue scientifically.
Key words: Teaching materials design, School visits to Museums, Special Theory of
Relativity
Introduction
In this paper we are going to describe the curricula design that are used as
learning tool in school visits to a science museum. Learning in informal contexts and
‘experience outside the classroom’ is being recommended as an important element to
promote interest in sciences and their learning and to encourage student motivation
(Pedretti 2002). Visits to science museums represent one such type of these activities
and they are used as part of the proposal to increase scientific literacy in both the
student and the wider adult population. However, the results of research into the use of
Science Museums as learning instruments for school children indicate that: a) teachers
generally establish very general, or limited, objectives for the museum visit; mainly
restricted to relating science to the social medium, or developing a practical science
activity already undertaken in class (Griffin & Symington 1997); b) Generally there is
usually very little preparation for the visit and little monitoring of the actual visit in the
museum, although the majority of research highlights the positive effects of good visit
preparation on student learning and attitude (Gennaro 1981, Falk & Dierking 2000); c)
The importance of interaction between the students, and between students and the
teacher, is highlighted (Hofstein & Rosenfeld 1996).
Educators and researches are interested in how to develop the role of science
museums in supporting school-based learning. This interest is illustrated by the
increasing number of research projects on the interface between school curriculum and
museums visits. Different studies have shown that visits to museums and science
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exhibitions, organised with activities to carry out during the visit and supported by
appropriate prior and post visit activities to discuss in the classroom, can considerably
increase student interest and knowledge (Anderson, Lucas and Ginns, 2000; Henriksen
& Jorde, 2001). Taking these findings into account, in this study we designed
educational materials which were designed to improve learning in the School-Museum
learning context and aim to incorporate the students’ own questions, or topics, which
have been previously analysed in class. This aims to ensure that students have an
understanding of the information supplied by the Museum, within the previously
decided parameters, and to promote critical analysis of the ideas resulting from the visit
and the application of these ideas to new situations.
This paper looks at teaching the topic of the Special Theory of Relativity in a
seminar for first year engineering students (students aged 18-19) which included a visit
to the “A Century of the Special Theory of Relativity 1905-2005” exhibition. The
exhibition was held in the Kutxaespacio Science Museum, in San Sebastian, with
collaboration from the University of the Basque Country (Guisasola et al., 2005) and its
objective was to provide intelligible and contextualised scientific information on the
fundaments of the Special Theory of Relativity and its technological and social
implications. The central topics of the exhibition were:
- The speed with which we can transmit information
- Reference systems: simultaneity of events and measuring time.
- The problem of the limit of the speed of light
- The origin of nuclear energy
The exhibition designers’ intention was to help visitors, particularly groups of
students over 15 years old, to use a scientific base to generate their own opinions and
arguments related to topics in telecommunications and nuclear energy (Guisasola et al,
2005). The exhibition included computers simulations which visitors can manipulate,
including a reconstruction of the famous experiment by Michelson & Morley and
explanatory panels. The panels use situations with which visitors are likely to be
familiar with to capture their attention and they use analogies to explain the scientific
principles.
This paper is centred on the design of the teaching sequence which uses visits to
the exhibition “A Century of the Special Theory of Relativity 1905-2005” as part of n
instructional approach which seeks to improve understanding of the Special Theory of
Relativity. We tried to answer the following research questions:
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- What type of prior conceptions do the students have of the Special Theory of
Relativity and its applications?
- How does the museum visit influence students understanding of the Special
theory of Relativity and its applications? Does the students’ understanding of
this theory increase? Do students use more scientific arguments when
discussing topics related to the Special theory of Relativity after visiting the
exhibition?
The exhibition was the result of collaboration between a team of lectures from
the University of the Basque Country (UPV) and the curators of the Museum. It is
necessary to state that selection of the problems covered in the exhibition (mentioned in
the previous paragraph) was proposed by the faculty team from the UPV. This selection
of problems and contents was based on three criteria. Firstly, a description of the
scientific context in which Einstein began his research and the scientific problems that
he tackled, as well as the solutions (The Special Theory of Relativity) that he eventually
devised. Secondly, an increase in interest and knowledge of the STR, centred on
technological applications of the STR that can most impinge on the everyday life of
ordinary citizens. Thirdly, upon the results of the investigation into students' alternative
ideas about the STR.
This was not a standard exhibition put together by the Museum staff, nor was it
outsourced to a company specialising in museum services, but rather a faculty team
from the UPV, which conducts research into science education, had the opportunity to
design the exhibition from the start, and conceived the content of the labelling, panels
and the form of the presentation.
Sample
A total of 35 students (63% male and 37% female) in the first year engineering
course participated in the experiment. These students study General Physics at
university and they also studied physics for a year and a half after they graduated from
secondary education. However, they have not covered the Special Theory of Relativity
in any of the physics courses they have taken and nor is it planned that they will acquire
knowledge on this topic within the course.
The students were chosen from a class given by a teacher who had worked on
the “A Century of the Special Theory of Relativity 1905-2005” exhibition in the
Kutxaespacio Science Museum. These students took a 4 hour seminar at university and
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visited the exhibition. As the experiment is not included in the official course
programme, we can assume that the teacher was probably more than normally involved
in motivating the students and presenting relevant activities.
Teaching Sequence
When designing the teaching sequence, we based it on the ‘contextual model of
learning’ by Falk and Dierking (1992, 2000) which incorporates many elements of what
we know about learning. The model looks at multiple contexts, creating a useful
framework to analyse the nature of learning, specifically in the non-school environment.
It is emphasised that learning occurs in a context and that, in the absence of any external
direction, each individual’s associations can be insignificant. Learning is not an
experience which is carried out in abstract, but in a specific situation in the real world;
combining personal, socio-cultural and physical aspects. Visitors to a museum are
considered as people who are actively involved in constructing and reconstructing
knowledge. The model is intentionally more descriptive than predictive.
In the sequence which we are presenting a teaching unit has been designed and
put into practice to act as a bridge between the school context and the museum context.
For this purpose, activities were designed for ‘before’, ‘during’ and ‘after’ the visit,
which provide a unifying sequence for the different contexts in which the students will
learn. Furthermore, the type of activities has been designed taking into account the
possibilities which are offered by each situation in school and in the museum. So, the
pre and post visit activities are based more on analysing and discussing carefully
selected situations involving STR, whilst the activities in the museum aim to provide
students with an opportunity to experiment, provide meaning and interest to the
questions raised, and let them search for information.
The teaching unit used as a research instrument in this work is summarised
below.
Pre-Visit Activities (2 hours)
The teacher explains (10 minutes) that the objective of the seminar involves
understanding the basis of the STR. Firstly, the students individually fill in a
questionnaire on their understanding of STR and its social implications (30’). These
topics are later covered in the pre-visit seminar. Once the questionnaire has been
completed, a debate is started on the four situations which have been designed:
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“Telecommunications”, “Your seconds are longer than mine”, “Are muons young or
old?” and “Experiment in the CERN”. Different opinions are expressed on the situations
which have been presented. The situations presented follow the sequence which will
later be seen in the exhibition and which we can summarise in the following way:
- “Telecommunications”: Is it possible to transmit information increasingly rapidly?
Is this problem related to the Special Theory of Relativity?
- “Your seconds are longer than mine”: Galileo and relative movement. Is it
possible that a phenomenon lasts for a different time depending on where we
observe it from? Is the speed of light of a torch faster in a high speed rocket than
outside the rocket at rest?
- “Are muons young or old?”: a practical example of different time measurements
for the same phenomenon
- “Experiment in CERN”: Does increasing the force applied to a body always give
greater acceleration? What does the famous equation E = mc2 mean? Does it have
any relation to nuclear energy?
The first of the situations, introducing problems related to the speed of light and
electromagnetic waves, is presented below.
Story 1: Telecommunications
Imagine a heart operation, or an organ transplant carried out between Osakidetza in Bilbao and a
Hospital in Quito in Ecuador. For the operation to be successful, it is vital for the information to arrive
via video conference (electromagnetic waves) in the shortest possible time and in the greatest possible
quantity. This is not science fiction, in 2001 the first operation was carried out with transoceanic
telesurgery. A team of experts from the European Telesurgery Institute in France carried out an operation
from New York, on a 68 year old patient located in Strasbourg. Two surgeons drove the robots from New
York, whilst the other two experts in Strasburg were in charge of controlling the computer system.
The information travelled 14,000 km, from its point of origin in the United States to its destination in
France. Due to the time which the information took to cover this distance and the coding period for the
data on video, the movements of the surgeons appear on the TV monitors with a delay of 155
milliseconds, "a time which lies within the safety margins, which estimate 330 milliseconds as a
maximum,” said the team.
The electromagnetic waves which transport the information take a certain time to travel from one
place to another. Also light, which is an electromagnetic wave, takes a certain time to travel from one
point to another.
The possibilities provided by communication at increasing speeds are growing and we are already talking
about a 'global world' and the enormous efficiency of new information technologies.
Do you believe that it is possible that the time will come when communication occurs instantaneously?
Explain your opinion.
Students were organised into groups of four. They first read the information
individually, and then discuss and answer the problem in groups. Before work-groups
start answering the questions, the teacher explains, with examples, how evidence is used
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to support scientific explanations; they need to be able to evaluate evidence in terms of
its adequacy, its relevance and its source. The teacher explains that, as will be seen in
the visit to museum, scientific explanations can draw on a range of evidence; in the
form of numerical data, recording of observations, or other established scientific facts,
so there is a need to explore different ways to justify their ideas and conclusions.
When students are working in groups, the teacher takes a backseat, supervising
the students, because students need time to think for themselves and to clarify their
ideas. When the students have finished their work, there is a round table discussion,
directed by the teacher. At the round table, each group must justify the answers that they
arrive at. Ultimately, there will be one or several explanations for each problem. The
teacher will insist that every explanation must be justified by evidence, or scientific
arguments (Guisasola et al 2008).
Visit to the Museum (1 hour 30’)
The visit took place two days after the pre-visit activities. The teacher and the
students meet in the entrance hall and they are shown the different parts of the Museum
on the map (rooms, panels, leisure areas, planetarium etc.). The teacher and the students
walk together from the entrance hall to the exhibition room “A Century of The Special
Theory of Relativity” of the Museum; the teacher asks them to look around and see the
different ways in which information is given. They can see interactive panels, real
experiments, computer simulations and multimedia presentations. The teacher reminds
them about the work which they have done beforehand at university and how it can help
them to centre themselves on the information which they want to obtain in order to
resolve the questions posed in class. The students review the notes they took in the class
discussion and the map of the exhibition.
The students divide themselves up into small work groups (4 people) which
were established during the class discussion. One of the members of the group, who acts
as secretary, carries a notebook and pencil - another member of the group could carry a
video camera to illustrate the group’s conclusions later. The students use a guide book
designed to direct the students towards the information they need to look for in relation
to the questions covered in the pre-visit activities. In the example we shown the process
will be as follows:
Guide book (What has happened?) In the "controlling a robot from the Earth" simulation, read
the panel information and then try to guide the robot to a certain point on a planet that has been chosen
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(Mercury, Venus or Mars). Does it take the same amount of time for the commands to reach the robot on
each of the three planets? What determines the amount of time that it takes for the commands to reach the
robot? Why do the commands take time to reach the robot?
Simulation panel: From Earth, you will command the movement of a robot on one of three
planets that you choose: a) Mercury; b) Venus; c) Mars. Mercury is 82 million kilometres away from
Earth, and light takes 2.2 minutes to cover this distance. Venus is 40 million kilometres away from Earth,
and light takes 2,2 minutes to cover this distance. Mars is 56 million kilometres away from Earth, and
light takes 3.1 minutes to cover this distance".
Exhibition information panel (located close to the simulation): Electromagnetic waves, which
transport information, require time to travel from one point to another. Like any other electromagnetic
wave, the speed of light in a vacuum travels at 300,000 Km/s. Light therefore requires a certain amount of
time to travel from one point to another, although due to its speed the distance must be very great in order
to note it. As you can see from the simulation, at distances as great as those from Earth to Mars,
commands sent from Earth Control Centre to the robot will take several minutes to arrive, and problems
may arise when trying to control the robot.
Information transmission speed is key in the Communications and Information Society in which we
live. Therefore, scientists and society have asked themselves: Is it possible to induce electromagnetic
waves to travel faster than 300,000 Km/s?
The students are free to move around the Exhibition. The teacher asks the
students about the reasons for choosing one exhibit or another and how the work is
progressing. The teacher moves between the different work groups showing interest in
the students’ activities, and asks them questions which stimulate them to look in greater
depth at the information given by the panels and to answer the questions previously
posed in class.
After about an hour, the students start to go to the Museum’s leisure area for a
10 minutes break. They can chat with other groups there about the information which
they have found and the progress they have made regarding the questions they brought
with them. Then they will go back to the exhibition and programmed exhibits together
to finish their research.
After one hour and a half the teacher reminds the group that it is time to return to
the bus. The students will have been handling interactive exhibits and taking notes from
informative panels or filling in their notebook. They are prepared to show the
information they have found and answer any questions which emerge in the later
session in the university.
Post Visit Activities (2 hours)
These activities were run in class in the week following the visit. In groups, the
students reflected on the information and the experiences from the visit and whether
their knowledge on the topic had changed regarding the pre-visit questionnaire. Later,
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they individually had to produce a final report which, among other questions, centred on
the following aspects of STR:
a. Is it possible to transmit information at a speed which is greater than the speed
of light? Have we reached the maximum speed for communications?
b. Can the same phenomenon last for different times depending on where it is
observed from? Give an example and justify it.
c. Why is the speed of light the maximum possible in our universe? If we push an
object with sufficient of force, couldn’t we exceed this speed?
d. What is the relationship between mass and energy at very high speeds? Give an
example and comment on it.
At the end of the session teacher takes the initiative in discussing and
reformulating relevant information from the activities and experiments. In this process,
students must propose well founded hypotheses and justify the approach which leads
them towards a specific explanatory theory.
Methodology
It must be highlighted that the experimental design does not consist of the usual
pre/post-test design, as the very instrument of research (the teaching unit) is part of the
treatment. So then, a difference which is observed between the pre and post-test results,
which is interpreted as a change in the students’ understanding, cannot only be
attributed to the visit to the museum, but rather to the overall pre-visit, visit and post-
visit teaching process. The design of the experiment is based on results from other
research into teaching/learning sciences in non formal contexts, which indicates the
need to make bridges between the school curriculum and visits to museums (Falk,
1997).
The students’ written answers to the questionnaires and reports were analysed
qualitatively, taking as references answer categories which were shown in other
previous research (Gil & Solbes, 1993; Ramada et al., 1996; Villani & Arruda, 1998)
which were clarified and reformulated during the process (Ericsson & Simon, 1984;
Kvale, 1996). Common tendencies have been identified in the students’ answers and
representative examples of their answers have been included here.
This study has built on Jiménez-Alexandre et al.’s interpretation of Toulmin’s
Arguments Pattern (TAP) (Toulmin 1958) using framework (Jiménez-Alexandre et al
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2000, Jiménez-Alexxandre and Pereiro-Munaz 2002,2005) to analyse argumentation
that occurs as students engage in decision making activities in pre and post-visit
sessions. The analysis will help to determine how the students use evidence to support
explanations and the quality of their argumentation.
Students’ Knowledge of the Special Theory of Relativity and its Applications
One of the research questions within this paper aims to identify students’
knowledge of and attitudes towards Special Theory of Relativity (STR). In this section
we will present some of the students’ conceptions. All the conceptions presented are
those shown by a minimum of 10 students.
In the case of the STR, the students found themselves in a new situation, which
was not intuitive and not very predictable. The process of understanding this theory
usually generates some anxiety, as they cannot usually draw on everyday experiences to
accept its plausibility, or corroborate its efficiency (Alemañ, 1997; Pérez & Solbes,
2003; Toledo, Arriasseco and Santos, 1997). In formal teaching, different studies
highlight secondary school students’ (14-18 years old) difficulties in acquiring an
abstract vision of the concepts of space and time, which are differentiated from the
explanations limited by perception and absolute reference frameworks (Castells &
Pinto, 2001; Saltiel & Malgrane, 1980). Also for first year engineering students,
analysing the movement from a reference system outside oneself is something which is
only achieved with quite a lot of training (Galili & Kaplan 1997).
The relationship between mass and energy is treated by students as a mere
relationship between magnitudes, ignoring its equivalency, or without establishing a
relation between them. Students are not usually capable of reasoning appropriately on
energy in nuclear fission processes. Also, students do not usually know about the
applications of STR and they consistently indicate that this knowledge has scarce value
for them and for science.
In this paper, the most common trends in students’ knowledge of STR and its
applications are shown in table 1.
Table 1. Student’ knowledge detected in the pre-visit questionnaire
Conceptions
(Number of reports, n=35)
Example answers
1. The theory is considered to be unrelated to
everyday experience (n=10) and they confess
that they do not know the theory, or they do not
answer (n=17)
1. “I don’t know what the theory is specifically
about, a lot of people talk about it, but nobody
says what it is exactly. I think that it is applied in
questions relating to space trips…”
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2. Only 15 (43%) students mention between 1
and 3 applications of the theory (10 space
exploration, 7 nuclear energy, 2 lasers and 2
atomic bombs)
3. Notion that communications could one day be
instantaneous (there is no limit for the speed of
communications) (n=23).
4. Confusion between reference systems and
bodies in movement (n=20), when they have to
explain that the same phenomenon can last for
different times.
5. When they are asked to explain the meaning
of the equation E=mc2 in words, 65% (n=23)
make superficial descriptions of the formula and
only 5 students give a physical meaning.
2. “It is applied to obtain nuclear energy; either in
the form of an atomic bomb, or as a source of
energy. In the study of space, black holes, etc.”
3. “Communications will one day become
instantaneous; they are not right now because of
technical problems which will be overcome in the
future.”
4. “..if two clocks located in reference systems
which move at different speeds mark different
times, this is due to the fact that speed depends
on space and time. Depending on the speed the
body is moving, the body will take different
amounts of time…”
5.“… Kinetic energy is equal to the mass of the
body, multiplied by the speed it is moving at
squared.”
The vast majority of the students confessed their ignorance of STR and they
confirmed it when they were asked about the meaning of the equation E=mc2 (item 4 on
the questionnaire). In this item, they are asked to explain the following statement:
“Einstein states that when the total force on a body increases, the acceleration of this
body does not always increase.” The majority of the students reason, in accordance with
Newton's Second Law from classical physics, that Einstein’s statement does not make
any sense to them.
This same ignorance is reflected when enquiring into their knowledge of its
applications. Only a minority of students could indicate an application. This result is
consistent with the vision that they have of STR, as something which is not related to
everyday life (Pérez, 2003).
The majority of students had never wondered about a limit for the speed of light,
or electromagnetic waves. This result is consistent with studies which indicate that the
teaching of optics and kinematics does not cover problems related to measuring the
speed of light and its epistemological relevance (Villani & Arruda, 1998).
They do not know how to distinguish between a reference system and a moving
body and consequently they do not understand what it means to measure time in
reference systems which move at different speeds. This result coincides with several
studies which indicate student difficulties in understanding the meaning of Inertial
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Reference Systems within the framework of classical physics (Galili & Kaplan, 1997;
Saltiel & Malgrane, 1980).
The concept of energy is one of the most fruitful and unifying concepts in
physics and is commonly used in technology, culture and society. Maybe this explains
why the most famous equation in science is E=mc2. However, energy is also one of the
most complex concepts in terms of learning and teaching difficulties (Doménech et al.,
2005). These difficulties are reflected in the answers obtained in the pre-visit
questionnaire, where most of them cannot provide any meaning for Einstein’s equation.
This result agrees with that obtained in the study by Solbes & Tarín (2004), which
showed that the mass-energy equivalence, as it appears in the STR, is not understood by
students in final year of Spanish Secondary Education (18 years old), who cannot justify
correctly the equivalence between mass and energy predicted in Einstein’s equation.
The Exhibition’s and Teaching Materials’ Potential to Influence Students’
Knowledge
The second research question covers the exhibition’s potential, in combination
with the pre and post-visit treatment in the classroom, to influence the students’
understanding of STR.
Firstly, we are referring to the question of whether suitable design combined
with the visit to a museum can increase understanding of the scientific principles. The
majority of students explicitly indicate in their post-visit report that their knowledge of
the Special Theory of Relativity and its applications has increased:
Example
...the visit to the exhibition has helped me to understand why the speed of light in a vacuum is the
maximum it can achieve. I didn’t think that the Theory of Relativity covered this question. I was surprised
by the simulation which justifies that the same clock can mark different times in different reference
systems. Furthermore, I have seen interesting applications, such as the muons and radioactive elements…
From the students’ comments it seems that we can deduce that there is a
subjective conviction that they have discovered new information and experiences which
have helped them to understand some aspects of relativity better. The students express a
better understanding of the STR’s social use.
One interesting question was to find out if some of the students’ preconceptions,
or distorted ideas, had modified as a result of the seminar and visit. Categorising and
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analysing the students’ pre-visit questionnaires and comparing them to the post-visit
reports show differences in some areas that were highlighted in the seminar-visit.
It is difficult to evaluate adequately all the answers given by the students. In
order to characterise the responses, the comments recognised as “an explanation”
(Cortazzi, 1993) were coded for occurrence of some easily recognizable features, such
as: alternative conceptions, scientific statements and argumentation from a scientific
point of view . For example, in the first question of questionnaire (see annexe), if the
student’s explanation has one or more scientific statements, which include justification
based on evidence, the answer was considered as correct and it was included in the
‘correct’ category shown by the grey columns ( pre-visit) and black columns (post-visit)
from figure 1. When the answers have any alternative conceptions or the statements are
not justified, they are not included in the ‘correct’ category.
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70
80
Speed of
light
concept
Time &
Reference
system
Mass &
Energy
aspects of the sequence
percentage of correct answers
pre-visit
post-visit
Figure 1. The grey columns indicates the proportion of pre-visit reports in which students
explain correctly. The black columns indicates the proportion of post-visit reports in which students
explain correctly. The first aspect of the STR contemplated in the exhibition deals with the understanding
of “The speed of light has a limit and is constant”. The second one “They comprehensively understand
that the same phenomenon can last different times depending on the reference system”. The third one
“They understand the equation E=mc2 qualitatively”.
When students explain question related with the first aspect “The speed of light
has a limit and is constant”, they use three types of correct explanations: a) Factually
using the experiment by Michelson & Morley (47%); b) Qualitatively using the
example of the “rocket and the torch” in the exhibition (34%); c) Using the time
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equivalence formulas in different reference systems which are shown in the exhibition
(75%).
In the reports, students made claims and put forward ideas about their choice.
When the claim was supported by a reference to evidence, it was identified as an
“argument”. These arguments were analysed using TAP (Toulmin 1958) in its simplest
form, which included a claim supported by reference to data and an explanation of the
link between the claim and the data. An example from the first aspect “the speed of light
has a limit and is constant” illustrates the approach:
Michelson and Morley used the speed of rotation of the Earth round the Sun to launch a ray of light in the
direction of the movement and another ray perpendicularly. When they did the experiment, they saw that
the two rays took the same time to cover a determined distance. So it was concluded that the speed of
light is constant in any chosen reference system and in a vacuum, never greater than 300,000 Km/s. ... If
we look at the example from the exhibition, what Michelson and Morley saw was that the speed of light
emitted by the torch was the same when it was a rest as when it was emitted from the rocket.
(report group 4)
Group 4 made the claim that the speed of light is constant and it has a limit and
the data to which they referred to came from “the Michelson and Morley experiment”.
A warrant for this argument might be the explanation of what Michelson and Morley’s
experiment shows.
Further support can come from backings that lend authority to the warrant. For
example, the equations from the exhibition appear in all the reports, with justifications
based on the Special Theory of Relativity:
Because when the speed is very high, similar to the speed of light, Einstein indicated that the Galilean
transformation breaks down. In the case of the torch and the rocket, it does make sense that the speed of
the torch is: coheteluz vcv += , but in accordance with Einstein’s equation, if we suppose that the speed of
the rocket is 0.9c, we have: c
c
c
c
c
cc
vluz ==
+
+
=2
3
2
29,1
9,1
9,0
1
9,0 (Group 6)
However, around 30% of students affirm that it is not possible to instantaneously
transmit information. They do not justify the limited speed of light. These students use
the exhibition information, but their explanations do not contain the elements of
argumentation. For example:
... if the information has to cover great distances, it cannot be instantaneous as electromagnetic waves
(light) must take some time and have limited speed...(Group 3)
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Regarding the second aspect (the same phenomenon can last different times
depending on the reference system), when looking at measuring the different intervals
of time for the same phenomenon according to the chosen reference system, around half
of the reports use justifications following the lines of the theory; explaining the example
on the average life of the muons and the number which reach the surface of the Earth,
which was described in the “Time” simulation in the exhibition:
This difference in time measurement for bodies close to the speed of light allows us to explain why
large quantities of muons are detected at the Earth's surface without having disintegrated on their journey.
(Group 9)
The report states that the same phenomenon can last different times depending
on the frame of reference and the data which they use to support this comes from the
“Time” simulation of the exhibition. The support for this argument is the explanation
for why a lot of muons are detected on the Earth’s surface.
In reference to the third aspect (mass and energy), the relationship between mass
and energy expressed by Einstein’s famous equation, there are three different types of
correct explanations: a) Using the CERN simulation in the exhibition (31%); b)
Qualitatively differentiating between mass at rest and mass at high speeds (31%); c)
Qualitatively reasoning about the impossibility of obtaining greater acceleration when
more force is applied (38%).
An example of the first type of explanation is the following:
In the “energy” simulation we saw, in the CERN laboratory, that when particles obtain great speeds the
mass and energy are equivalent and produce new particles…(Group 11)
The claim that energy and mass are equivalent and the data which they used
comes from the “energy” simulation. However, there is not an explanation to support as
a warrant of the argument.
Examples that do not use evidence and that the explanation is based in an
incorrect reasoning of the formula, are the following:
Einstein’s equation tells us that mass and energy are equivalent. When a body is moving at high speeds,
the energy which it has it can be transformed into mass and vice-versa; a reduction of mass can be
associated with an intense emission of energy, given by E = (mass loss) c2 . (Group 8)
A body’s inertia becomes enormous when it is moving at speeds close to the speed of light, so that no
matter how much energy we use, we will not manage to increase its speed…. This fact shows us that the
mass of an object increases with its speed, meaning that there is a relationship between the mass and the
object’s kinetic energy. Einstein showed this relationship in his famous equation. (Group 11)
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The supporting argument used is based on an incorrect idea that mass varies
with speed. The widespread nature of the misconception that mass varies with speed is
supported by many different research studies (Alemañ 1997, Pérez and Solbes 2003).
This could be due to the fact that traditional teaching introduces concepts, such as
relativistic mass, which are now outdated. The concept of the ‘relativistic mass’
appears in more than 80% of Spanish physics texts in the final year at secondary school,
with very different and contradictory focuses on their meaning (Pérez and Solbes 2006).
However, current consensus only uses mass at rest, or unvarying mass, and many
general physics books which used relativistic mass in previous editions now no longer
do so. Einstein, working from the introduction to space-time by Minkowski,
categorically, did not recommend the use of mass depending on the speed:
“It is not good to introduce the concept of mass M = m / (1- v2/c2)1/2 of a moving body as it is not a clear
definition. It is better not to introduce another mass concept other than ‘mass at rest’ m. Instead of
introducing M, it is best to mention the expression of the moment and the energy of a moving body”
(quoted by Okum, 1989).
It should be mentioned that around 50% of the post-visit reports, in one or in all
of the three aspects considered, do not use the new data which the exhibition provides;
maybe because both the theory itself, and the data that support it were not well
understood by students.
Also, about 50% of post-visit reports, in one or all of the aspects, do not contain
the main characteristic elements of argumentation, as cited in TAP (Toulmin 1958). A
great difference is seen in the use of scientific argumentation (see figure 2). The
difficulty students have in arguing from a scientific stand point is also seen in the results
from Brickhouse et al. (2006) with university students studying in the second year of an
astronomy degree. They also found that students had more difficulties in justifying their
explanations and using data to support their arguments when dealing with relativity than
other subject areas in the course.
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0
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Pre-visit Post-visit
percentages of reports
Scientific arguments applied
Figure 2. The columns indicate the proportion of the students’ reports in which at least 2 or 3
aspects considered in the exhibition are argued scientifically, before and after visiting the Museums.
Although the students on the first year engineering course have not received
prior instruction on STR, they have greater scientific knowledge than the average
citizen. However, scientific argument was rarely used in the pre-visit questionnaire to
support the statements they made. Also, in Spanish University classes, it is not usual for
students to have the opportunity to argue and justify their ideas scientifically (Guisasola
et al. 2003). However, in this piece of research, it has been shown that when the
students are given information and appropriate questions to discuss, there is a
significant increase in the use of scientific reasoning to defend their ideas.
Whilst student understanding clearly appears to have improved, the students do
not always use the information they are given to develop the knowledge targeted by the
exhibition designers. In the simulations and the panels which explained Einstein’s
famous equation, the students identify the equivalency between mass and energy:
The formula E = mc2 tells us that the mass and the energy are the same. (Group 6)
The formula E = mc2 permits us to obtain nuclear energy as the mass and energy are equal. (Group 7)
In other panels and simulations which the recounted Einstein’s thought
experiment on clocks and measuring time in different reference systems, the students
had to understand the counteraction or lengthening of the time in different reference
systems. However, many students concluded:
It seems that the clocks at rest and in the train measure different times for the same fact, but this is only
one explanation; I don’t think it really happened…
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Einstein’s formula of time equivalence gives, as a result, different time measurements, but this is difficult
to believe. I do not think that the time ‘really’ gets longer or shorter…
These answers correlate with other studies where it is shown that students do not
reason effectively in terms of space-time properties; their minds requiring fixed
properties (the distances measured are independent of the reference system, Villani &
Pacca, 1987) and three-dimensional bodies, rather than points, for a realistic vision of
nature (Gil and Solbes, 1993). The student admits that different observers “seem” to
obtain different measurements, but “really” there is only one measurement of space,
time or the speed of light. Hewson (1982) showed how even the teachers themselves
found it difficult to change this inaccurate concept of absolute space and time.
These erroneous answers, and other unexpected answers, show that inviting
visitors to the exhibition, with the aim of getting them to integrate the information from
the panels and simulations and thus form their own opinion and conclusions, does not
always have the desired effect. In this research, due to the chosen theoretical
framework, it was clear that the students’ preconceptions on relativity would influence
their interpretation of the exhibition. Also, the last two examples show that students
incorporate the new scientific knowledge along with other types of knowledge, on
epistemological and moral values, to form an opinion on a scientific theory and it
relationship with society. So, the students take on and use the scientific explanation that
the clocks can mark different times in different reference systems: “It seems that the clocks
at rest and in the train measure different times for the same fact,” “Einstein's formula of time equivalence
gives different time measurements as a result and the “muon” simulation provided evidence for the
theory.”
The students made the claim that clocks at rest and in movement measure
different time for the same event and they provide data from “the muon” simulation.
Einstein’ formula is used to backup the supporting argument. However, they do not
incorporate the explanation into their system of beliefs: “I do not think that it really happens,”
“I don’t believe that the time ‘really’ gets longer or shorter…”
In order to investigate the effects of the Seminar on students’ attitude and
interest to STR we analysed the last question of the sequence: What did you learn from
the seminar? Many students gave more than one explanation, but the vast majority of
students believed that they were now (more) aware of the practical applications of the
STR and they noticed that this theory was interesting for human development and the
every day life. We scored the students’ perception of the usefulness of the Seminar and
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their interest in the STR, measuring the percentage of reports which included 3 or more
applications of the Special Theory of Relativity; before and after the visit respectively.
The results are shown in figure 3.
0
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80
100
Pre-visit Post-visit
percentages of reports
Applications
Figure 3. The columns indicate the proportion of reports which mention 3 or more scientific-
technical applications, with social implications, of the Special Theory of Relativity, before and after the
visit respectively.
We also gathered information from informal talks to students after the visit to
museum. Some students said that it was nice to have this type of Seminar as a
complement of their learning. They also asked for more of this type of activity, even in
place of regular teaching.
Educational Implications
The results obtained have a number of practical implications for designing
teaching sequences which use visits to science museums as a part of the teaching
approach.
A teaching sequence has been designed for this study in order to integrate the
visit to an exhibition on STR into what is happening in the classroom. In accordance
with the theoretical framework proposed by Falk and Dierking (1992, 2000) the
teaching sequence consists of three phases ('before', 'during' and 'after'). It should be
noted that the pre-visit design, which includes activities and 'situations' that tie into the
contents and objectives of the exhibition, requires a profound knowledge of the same on
the part of the sequence designers. In the case that we present, the designers of the
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teaching unit had participated in organising the exhibition, which provided a natural
take-off point for designing the different sequential phases.
Likewise, the school session activities have a dual objective; both informing the
students of the content and objectives of the exhibition, and stimulating the students
into scientifically arguing their explanations and to thinking about the problems related
to scientific knowledge. This starting point has been shown to be useful when ‘guiding’
the search for information in the exhibition and analysing the information.
Another important element in the organisation of information in the teaching
sequence has been the knowledge of the difficulties that students have in learning about
the STR. Research into misunderstandings in physics has shown that these
misunderstandings are similar in different countries and throughout the school age
range. Museum education specialists, teachers and designers of sequences of school
visits to museums must find out visitors’ possible misunderstandings in relation to the
topics covered in their exhibitions, as these can interfere in the information transmission
process and the process of building scientific knowledge, which they aim to achieve.
The results show that the teaching sequence and exhibition visit have increased
the students’ interest, knowledge and understanding of the Special Theory of Relativity
and its applications. Likewise, after the plenary session the majority of students can
adequately prove that the speed of light is constant and that it has a limit. However,
meaningful learning of other aspects of STR, such as that the same phenomenon can last
different times depending on the reference system, or the qualitative relation between
mass and energy at high speeds, has presented more difficulties and only a minority of
students show a correct understanding. This may be due to the fact that a deeper
knowledge of the concepts of the STR could require a sequence having more
discussion, more sessions, and that would include a second visit to the exhibition.
It should be highlighted that only around half the students involved in this study
have shown the ability to argue and scientifically justify their ideas and their
assessments of STR. This could be due to the students not being used to arguing their
ideas from a scientific standpoint and justifying their opinions within science classes.
Providing students with experience, along with information, so that they can express
their reasoned opinions on scientific theories and their corresponding applications, is
one of the main components of scientific education. When school visit programmes are
designed for museums, special care must be taken with the aspects which relate
information on scientific concepts with scientific argumentation.
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In this research, the teacher who took part in the experiment participated in
designing and developing the exhibition, and so the designers of the teaching unit had a
deep knowledge of the content and objectives of the exhibition. This is a great help in
designing and implementing a teaching sequence to integrate a museum visit into
classroom study. However, this will not usually be the case, but we think it is necessary
for teachers or teams of teachers to be informed about the contents and objectives of the
exhibitions prior to designing their teaching sequences. It is necessary to take into
account the objectives of the exhibition and those of the curricula, in designing teaching
sequences as a bridge between the exhibition and school-based learning.
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Annexe. PRE-VISIT QUESTIONNAIRE FROM THE TEACHING UNIT
1. The possibilities provided by communication at increasing speeds are growing and we are already
talking about a 'global world' and the enormous efficiency of new information technologies. Do you
believe that it is possible that the time will come when communications occur instantaneously?
2. This year, World Physics Year is being held to coincide with the Centenary of Albert Einstein
publishing the “Special Theory of Relativity” in 1905. What benefits has this theory brought to
society? Give three practical applications.
3. One of the most famous statements of Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity is that two clocks
situated in reference systems which move at different speeds mark different times. How would you
explain this to your little brother or sister with an example?
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4. According to the American magazine TIME, the most famous equation of the 20th century is: “E=
mc2” Could you explain in words, not formula, what this equation means? Give an example of the
application of this equation.
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