Determination of university students’ misconceptions about light using concept maps

Abstract

The concept map has evolved, in recent years, as an important teaching and learning tool. It engages students in active learning and assists instructors with their delivery. Thus, we believe that it has the power to be relevant and effective to reflect the design of a poly-functional teaching tool. We argue in favor of renewing didactic tools used in education, in general, and in teaching GO (geometric optics) in particular. The main purpose of this study, however, is to show that the concept mapping is a very effective way in terms of revealing the misconceptions of students, studying GO, during their university year. 52 freshman students (first year) majoring in life science and nature (LSN) were asked to draw a conceptual map about propagation of light; a two-stage experiment: before and after formal teaching sessions. The findings of the qualitative analysis of the students’ maps are in line with the results of other research; students have many misconceptions about light and traditional strategy used for teaching GO is not effective for conceptual change. Also, The approach of scoring tasks, as only one survey is not recommended