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Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case

Received: 16 February 2022     Accepted: 22 April 2022     Published: 31 January 2023
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Abstract

Students’ alternative frameworks and prior conceptions about interactions forces and/or Newton’s motion laws have been largely investigated. The various investigations clearly show that students very often fail to apply Newton’s laws of motion in general to everyday situations and third law in particular. Using a conventional notation for representing forces on diagrams, students were presented with questions on the interaction between two objects. and asked to represent in terms of Newton’s third law the two interacting forces in a variety of situations. The results show that complete understanding of Newton’s Third Law of motion is quite rare, and that some problems related to misunderstanding which force acts on each body. The use of the terms ‘action’ and ‘reaction’ in this specific context, compared with their general use, was also found to be misleading... This study highlights some of the serious difficulties students undergo with reciprocal interaction. It suggests that we should be more anxious about the teaching/learning process and the students overall understanding of this principle and that this understanding is underpinned by an understanding of the force concept. Suggestions were proposed for promoting conceptual change based on Posner et al proposal (1982). For this purpose, we propose in our work to analyse the difficulties of high school students in learning the reciprocal interaction principle, locate and identify the obstacles to overcome when dealing with real physical situations. To achieve this task, we have elaborated a questionnaire used to locate the fields of students' difficulties and identify possible causes. We carried by means of this questionnaire a survey (paper-pencil) by requesting a samples of (102) students in different high schools through the country. The analysis and the exploitation of investigation results have shown that students encounter serious difficulties in in dealing with this law.

Published in Science Journal of Education (Volume 11, Issue 1)
DOI 10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17
Page(s) 43-50
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Force, Notation, Conceptions, Interactions, Representations

References
[1] Brown, D. E. (1989) Students’ concept of force: the importance of understanding Newton’s third law. Physics Education, 24, 353–358.
[2] Cajas, F. (1999) Public understanding of science: using technology to enhance school science in everyday life. International Journal of Science Education, 21, 765–773.
[3] Caldas, H. and Saltiel, E. (1995) Static friction: analysis of students’ ways of reasoning. Didaskalia Review, (6), 55–71.
[4] Galili, I. and Hazan, A. (2000) Learners’ knowledge in optics: interpretation, structure and analysis. International Journal of Science Education, 22, 57–88.
[5] Gauld, C. (1998) Solutions to the problem of impact in the 17th and 18th centuries and teaching Newton’s third law today. Science and Education, 7, 49–67.
[6] Gopal, H., Kleinsmidt, J., Case, J. and Musonge, P. (2004) An investigation of tertiary students’ understanding of evaporation, condensation and vapor pressure. International journal of Science Education, 26, 1597–1620.
[7] Hellingman, C. (1992) Newton’s third law revisited. Physics Education, 27, 112–115. Hestenes, D., Wells, M. and Swachamer, G. (1992) Force concept inventory. The Physics Teacher, 30, 141–153.
[8] Kruger, C. J., Summers, M. K. and Palacio, D. J. (1990) An investigation of some English primary school teachers’ understanding of the concepts force and gravity. British Educational Research Journal, 16, 383–397.
[9] Maloney, D. P. (1984) Rule-governed approaches to physics – Newton’s third law. Physics Education, 19, 37–42.
[10] Mayer, R. E. and Gallini, J. K. (1990) When is an illustration worth ten thousand words? Journal of Educational Psychology, 82, 715–726.
[11] Mayoh, H. and Knutton, S. (1997) Using out-of-school experience in science lessons: reality or rhetoric? International Journal of Science Education, 19, 849–867.
[12] Montanero, M., Suero, M. I., Perez, A. L. and Pardo, P. J. (2002) Implicit theories of static interactions between two bodies. Physics Education, 37, 318–323.
[13] Paivio, A. (1986) Mental Representations: A Dual Coding Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
[14] Palmer, H. D. (2001) Investigating the relationship between students’ multiple conceptions of action and reaction in cases of static equilibrium. Research in Science and Technological Education, 19 (2), 193–204.
[15] Pozzer, L. L. and Roth, W. M. (2003) Prevalance, function, and structure of photographs in high school biology textbooks. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 40, 1089–1114.
[16] Suzuki, M. (2005) Social metaphorical mapping of the concept of force ‘CHI-KA-RA’ in Japanese. International Journal of Science Education, 27, 1773–1804.
[17] Tao, P. K. and Gunstone, R. F. (1999) The process of conceptual change in force and motion during computersupported physics instruction. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 36 (859–882).
[18] Terry, C., Jones, G. and Hurford, W. (1985) Children’s conceptual understanding of forces and equilibrium. Physics Education, 20, 162–165.
[19] Trumper, R. and Gorsky, P. (1996) A cross-college age study about physics students’ conceptions of force in pre-service training for high school teachers. Physics Education, 31, 227–236. (Viennot, L. Raisonner en physique: la part de sens commun, Ed De Boeck, Louvain la neuve, 19.
[20] Vygotsky, L. S. (1934/1986) Thought and Language. Newly revised, translated and edited by Alex Kozulin. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
[21] Warren, J. W. (1979) Understanding Force. London: John Murray.
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  • APA Style

    Ahcene Serhane, Mahdi Debiache, Karima Boudhar, Abdelhamid Zeghdaoui. (2023). Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case. Science Journal of Education, 11(1), 43-50. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17

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    ACS Style

    Ahcene Serhane; Mahdi Debiache; Karima Boudhar; Abdelhamid Zeghdaoui. Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case. Sci. J. Educ. 2023, 11(1), 43-50. doi: 10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17

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    AMA Style

    Ahcene Serhane, Mahdi Debiache, Karima Boudhar, Abdelhamid Zeghdaoui. Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case. Sci J Educ. 2023;11(1):43-50. doi: 10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17

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  • @article{10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17,
      author = {Ahcene Serhane and Mahdi Debiache and Karima Boudhar and Abdelhamid Zeghdaoui},
      title = {Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case},
      journal = {Science Journal of Education},
      volume = {11},
      number = {1},
      pages = {43-50},
      doi = {10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.sjedu.20231101.17},
      eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.sjedu.20231101.17},
      abstract = {Students’ alternative frameworks and prior conceptions about interactions forces and/or Newton’s motion laws have been largely investigated. The various investigations clearly show that students very often fail to apply Newton’s laws of motion in general to everyday situations and third law in particular. Using a conventional notation for representing forces on diagrams, students were presented with questions on the interaction between two objects. and asked to represent in terms of Newton’s third law the two interacting forces in a variety of situations. The results show that complete understanding of Newton’s Third Law of motion is quite rare, and that some problems related to misunderstanding which force acts on each body. The use of the terms ‘action’ and ‘reaction’ in this specific context, compared with their general use, was also found to be misleading... This study highlights some of the serious difficulties students undergo with reciprocal interaction. It suggests that we should be more anxious about the teaching/learning process and the students overall understanding of this principle and that this understanding is underpinned by an understanding of the force concept. Suggestions were proposed for promoting conceptual change based on Posner et al proposal (1982). For this purpose, we propose in our work to analyse the difficulties of high school students in learning the reciprocal interaction principle, locate and identify the obstacles to overcome when dealing with real physical situations. To achieve this task, we have elaborated a questionnaire used to locate the fields of students' difficulties and identify possible causes. We carried by means of this questionnaire a survey (paper-pencil) by requesting a samples of (102) students in different high schools through the country. The analysis and the exploitation of investigation results have shown that students encounter serious difficulties in in dealing with this law.},
     year = {2023}
    }
    

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  • TY  - JOUR
    T1  - Difficulties Facing Students in Transition to Newtonian Viewpoint: Newton’s Third Law Case
    AU  - Ahcene Serhane
    AU  - Mahdi Debiache
    AU  - Karima Boudhar
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    AB  - Students’ alternative frameworks and prior conceptions about interactions forces and/or Newton’s motion laws have been largely investigated. The various investigations clearly show that students very often fail to apply Newton’s laws of motion in general to everyday situations and third law in particular. Using a conventional notation for representing forces on diagrams, students were presented with questions on the interaction between two objects. and asked to represent in terms of Newton’s third law the two interacting forces in a variety of situations. The results show that complete understanding of Newton’s Third Law of motion is quite rare, and that some problems related to misunderstanding which force acts on each body. The use of the terms ‘action’ and ‘reaction’ in this specific context, compared with their general use, was also found to be misleading... This study highlights some of the serious difficulties students undergo with reciprocal interaction. It suggests that we should be more anxious about the teaching/learning process and the students overall understanding of this principle and that this understanding is underpinned by an understanding of the force concept. Suggestions were proposed for promoting conceptual change based on Posner et al proposal (1982). For this purpose, we propose in our work to analyse the difficulties of high school students in learning the reciprocal interaction principle, locate and identify the obstacles to overcome when dealing with real physical situations. To achieve this task, we have elaborated a questionnaire used to locate the fields of students' difficulties and identify possible causes. We carried by means of this questionnaire a survey (paper-pencil) by requesting a samples of (102) students in different high schools through the country. The analysis and the exploitation of investigation results have shown that students encounter serious difficulties in in dealing with this law.
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Author Information
  • Physics Department, école Normale Supériure, Algiers, Algeria

  • Physics Department, école Normale Supériure, Algiers, Algeria

  • Physics Department, école Normale Supériure, Algiers, Algeria

  • Chemistry Department, école Normale Supériure, Algiers, Algeria

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