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The History and Philosophy of Science in Physics Teaching: A Research Synthesis of Didactic Interventions

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Abstract

This work is a systematic review of studies that investigate teaching experiences applying History and Philosophy of Science (HPS) in physics classrooms, with the aim of obtaining critical and reliable information on this subject. After a careful process of selection and exclusion of studies compiled from a variety of databases, an in-depth review (general description, analysis of quality and summary of the results) of those considered to be of high quality was undertaken. The results indicate positive effects in the didactic use of HPS in relation to the learning of physics concepts, although there was no consensus regarding this. A stronger divergence was found regarding the occurrence of change in students’ attitudes towards science. However, HPS may in fact foster a more mature vision in students in respect of their understanding of the Nature of Science (NOS). Moreover, potentially favourable results were found regarding the effects of the didactic use of HPS on the quality of argumentation and metacognition, although further research in this area would appear necessary.

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Notes

  1. Articles such as Cooley and Klopfer (1963), Welch and Walberg (1968) or Aikenhead (1974), although approaching the evaluation of specific teaching strategies using history of science (History of Science Cases in the first study and Harvard Project Physics in the others), did not appear in this research database as their main focus was to analyze the evaluation methodology used.

  2. The same type of systematic review (using the same criteria) is being undertaken by the authors in the five main Brazilian journals in the area of science teaching (and of physics teaching), as well as an important Spanish-language journal. Of the 117 works selected, 11 meet the exclusion criteria for in-depth analysis, which is quantitatively similar to the number found in the present study. This, allied to the fact that many studies presented at local and international congresses are not converted into published articles, suggests that a greater number of studies on this subject are being undertaken than the international community is aware of.

  3. This study has been published in two articles: (a) Galili and Hazan (2000); (b) Galili and Hazan (2001).

  4. Even though the strategy presented by Egan is located, according to Matthews (1994), in the Storyline Approach, representing a middle road between the “add-on” and integrated approaches, the authors of Study E explicitly used scientists’ life stories (in one of the didactic strategies) in a way that was disconnected from scientific concepts and NOS.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Física, Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana, av. Transnordestina, s/n, Feira de Santana, Bahia, Brazil, 44036-900

    Elder Sales Teixeira

  2. Departamento de Física, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad de Burgos, Burgos, Spain

    Ileana Maria Greca

  3. Instituto de Física, Universidade Federal da Bahia, Bahia, Brazil

    Olival Freire Jr

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  1. Elder Sales Teixeira
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  2. Ileana Maria Greca
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  3. Olival Freire Jr
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Correspondence to Olival Freire Jr.

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Teixeira, E.S., Greca, I.M. & Freire, O. The History and Philosophy of Science in Physics Teaching: A Research Synthesis of Didactic Interventions. Sci & Educ 21, 771–796 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11191-009-9217-3

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