A CASE STUDY ON THE ALTERNATIVE FRAMEWORKS CONCERNING THE CONCEPT OF FORCE - USING INTERVIEWS TO SIXTH GRADERS-

Abstract

Thirty-three pupils in the sixth grade were interviewed individually with the following two aspects for identifying the features of their concepts of force. And we got some findings as follows:(1) About pupils' concrete empirical props concerning force The authors investigated what situations they connected with the word force by questions when they heard the word force. About 67% of them were found to have a physical experience as concrete empirical props concerningforce. (2) About the connection of force with how things happen We investigated the connection of force with how things happened by asking them to manipulate toys, and identified alternative frameworks of their concepts of force. As the standard, we used 8 frameworks which Watts described and the other one that we called interacted force. Consequently we found that some of the pupils used the 'designated force' framework very obstinately in different states, and so on. Then, according to the history of science, we considered the development of pupils' concepts of force when they had explained about events after manipulating toys.