Atomic Theories That Preservice Science Teachers Confuse and Underlying Reasons

Students come across with the notion of atom almost every year during their education life. Higher conceptual understandings of atomic theories among science teachers is of crucial importance in their understanding of physics and chemistry courses. In this sense, the purpose of the present study is to investigate which of the atomic theories science teachers often confuse and to discuss the possible reasons behind the confusion of one theory with the other. This study used the phenomenology method of qualitative research. Participants of the study were comprised of 55 first and second year university students attending the Department of Science Teaching during the 2015-2016 academic year. In order to discover the most confusing atomic theories and the reasons of this confusion, students were asked to write down the atomic theories that they often confuse with one another and the reasons why they do so. Using content analysis, two independent coders analyzed the collected data. The result of the analyses revealed that students mostly got confused between Bohr’s Atomic Theory and Modern Atomic Theory. It was also found that the underlying reasons of this confusion were that “In both theory, the protons and neutrons are found together at the center of the atom (the nucleus) surrounded by electrons spinning around it” and “students cannot differentiate between the concepts of layer, orbit and shell”, and some recommendations were offered concerning the instruction of these subjects.

Students come across with the notion of atom almost every year during their education life. Higher conceptual understandings of atomic theories among science teachers is of crucial importance in their understanding of physics and chemistry courses. In this sense, the purpose of the present study is to investigate which of the atomic theories science teachers often confuse and to discuss the possible reasons behind the confusion of one theory with the other. This study used the phenomenology method of qualitative research. Participants of the study were comprised of 55 first and second year university students attending the Department of Science Teaching during the 2015-2016 academic year. In order to discover the most confusing atomic theories and the reasons of this confusion, students were asked to write down the atomic theories that they often confuse with one another and the reasons why they do so. Using content analysis, two independent coders analyzed the collected data. The result of the analyses revealed that students mostly got confused between Bohr’s Atomic Theory and Modern Atomic Theory. It was also found that the underlying reasons of this confusion were that “In both theory, the protons and neutrons are found together at the center of the atom (the nucleus) surrounded by electrons spinning around it” and “students cannot differentiate between the concepts of layer, orbit and shell”, and some recommendations were offered concerning the instruction of these subjects.