Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 7, Issue 2, Article 1 (Dec., 2006)
Shu-Chiu LIU
Historical models and science instruction: A cross-cultural analysis based on students’ views

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Conclusion

Although science educators in general advocate the use of historical materials to enhance science teaching, the “what” and “how” questions are often considered to be problematic. Therefore this paper may make its contribution to the issue of introducing the historical aspect of science into science teaching and learning through suggesting a specific approach which brings together the students and historical views. The central point of this approach is to locate underlying principles of these views and to scrutinize the meanings of these principles to science teaching and learning. In this way, as the present work illustrated, particular examples - the heliocentric and geocentric view, the early flat Earth models, the structural view of nature, the early observations to sky and experiments on the Earth shape - from history of science and their linkage to students’ conceptions can be identified and elaborated for use in the science classroom.    

 


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