Education Sciences | Free Full-Text | How Crosscutting Is the Energy Concept within Physics Teaching and Learning
Much of the attention on the crosscutting concepts within the Next-Generation Science Standards (NGSSs) have gone to their coherence across different STEM disciplines. In this paper, we raise the question of the coherence of the energy concept within the teaching and learning of physics itself. Our investigations of teachers’ and students’ approach to solving problems, where both mechanical and thermal energy play equally important roles, indicate that the separation of energy studies in different units (mechanics, thermodynamics, etc.) leads to a cognitive disconnect of the unders...
Source: mdpi.com