Recognizing misconceptions of electricity

    One of the best indicators that electrical misconceptions exist is to listen to the language being used by a student. There are many ways a student may not understand electricity. Recently in my Webquest presentation I stumbled upon an electrical misconception held by my student. We were trying to form electromagnets and my student theorized that the nail needed to be closer to the battery to make the magnet stronger. I asked him why he thought that. He told me that electricity slows down the farther it has to go. I followed up with the question: "Does that mean our lights would turn on faster if we lived closer to the power plant?". His reply was  "Yes". 

    One very effective way of exploring misconceptions of electricity is to give a student a sheet showing different battery, light, and wire configurations containing configurations that work and one that do not. Have the students select which diagrams will work and then their misconceptions can then be explored. Another avenue of exposing misconceptions can be done through this website. Have students answer each of the true false questions before checking their answers or reading any of the information on the page. This page is appropriate to use with students grades 9-12. Another way to detect misconceptions would be by posing questions from information at this website. Misconceptions of electricity and magnetism are listed and can be used for teaching lessons or simply monitoring a classes' understanding of a topic.

Developers of this page

Current group members (first names only): Shelley (spring '09)

All editors and writers (first names only): Amanda, Shelley, Loree and Jason (Spring '09)

All editors and writers (first names only): David, Rachel, and Jason (Spring '08)

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