Teaching and Learning Electricity
The order we teach things
There are essentially two approaches to teaching electricity.
The bottom-up approach is to let students set up circuits to see what works and then to explain what's going on.
Animations of bulb, motor and speaker to illustrate energy conversions, which is where we start our story about electricity.The top-down approach is to start with a story about electricity and then relate that to real circuits. MORE
The misconceptions students already have about electricity
Electricity is one of the most difficult concepts for students to grasp.
It is invisible and highly conceptual but at the same time all around them. Perhaps this is why students (and even some science teachers) have 'alternative frameworks' about how electricity works.
Activity Counting charges to show that the same number always pass a point in the same time. A common misconception is that charges disappear as they pass through a bulb.Unless these alternative frameworks are identified and confronted we have very little chance of replacing them with the scientific story. MORE
The electricity analogies we use
There are many ways of visualising what's happening in electric circuits.
Water flowing in a pipe, a central-heating system, balls rolling down slopes, horses and sugar lumps, a loop of rope, balls passed around a ring of students.
Animation explaing how the temperature of a wire affects its resistance. The different electron speeds are modelled by a captain walking up a boat.These images can all be used to describe and explain what's going on. Each of them has its strengths and weaknesses. MORE
The language we use when we talk about electricity
There are two main issues surrounding the language we use when talking about electricity.
Certain technical terms, like voltage, are used in everyday speech but often incorrectly. For example, "He had 200 volts pass through him".
The other issue is that to simplify the story we're trying to tell it's sometimes easier if we don't use words in their precise scientific sense. For example, what the layman knows as a "battery" should strictly be called a "cell".
Game You have to shoot the right answer to questions about the concepts of voltage and current. This gives students practice at using the words correctly.As teachers we should at least be aware of the effect our language has on students' understanding. MORE