A technique for exploring students' views of the world

In a recent paper Shaw and Thomas (1979) suggest that to an external observer learning may appear to be the achievement of certain behavioural objectives. However, for the learner, learning is the revision of his or her own cognitive structure, that is a shift in the way he or she perceives and construes events and behaves in situations. This view of learning implies that an appreciation of the student's view of the world, and the student's meanings for words, needs to be fully appreciated if teaching is to be successful. Physics teachers need to be aware of the various concept understandings that pupils bring to physics classrooms and thereby appreciate the difficulties pupils may have with understanding physics concepts. It is our view that the information gained using an interview-about-instances method can contribute to this teacher awareness and in doing so can contribute to the improvement of physics teaching.