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Session 4. Misconceptions in Science and Maths
Objective. Recognise common science and maths misconceptions, find them with two-part diagnostic questions before teaching, and address them with predict-observe-explain and careful language.
Every teacher has met the pupil who says the right sentence in class and gives a wrong answer on the test. The idea underneath did not change. This lesson helps you find those hidden ideas early and work with them. It goes beyond the key ideas: how to tell a slip from a real misconception, and how to run predict-observe-explain so pupils commit to a prediction, face the result and rebuild the explanation themselves.
Key ideas
Pupils arrive with ideas that make sense to them
- Examples: the Sun goes round the Earth; heavier things fall faster; plants eat the soil; summer is hot because Earth is closer to the Sun; a bulb uses up current; multiplying always makes bigger.
- These ideas come from everyday sight, language and earlier lessons. They are not a sign of a weak pupil; they are the best explanation the pupil has so far (see course 5.1).
- Telling the right answer once often changes the words pupils use in class but not what they believe at home. Plan to change the idea, not only to correct the answer.
Find them before you teach
- Ask a two-part question: pick an answer, then pick or write the reason. Build the wrong options from the real misconceptions above, so wrong ideas have somewhere to land.
- Use A, B, C, D cards held up at once, or a show of hands, and look at the reasons, not only the answers. A right answer with a wrong reason is still a misconception.
- It takes one minute at the start of a topic. Tally the answers on the board. Do not grade it: you are collecting information to plan the lesson.
Change them: Predict, Observe, Explain
- Predict: every pupil writes a prediction and a reason before seeing anything. Observe: show the result, with the same safe materials every time. Explain: pairs explain why the result differs from the prediction.
- Only after pupils struggle with the conflict do you give the scientific explanation, and link it to a model or a second example, for example paper against stone to bring in air.
- Ideas change in steps. Ask a similar question the next lesson and a week later. If the old idea returns, that is information, not failure.
Watch the words, and your own knowledge
- Everyday words have different meanings in science: work, force, power, heat, theory, model. In Uzbek and Russian the same happens (ish and rabota in daily life are not physical work). Define the science meaning with an example.
- Maths has its own traps: multiplying by a number below 1 makes smaller; dividing can make bigger; a longer decimal is not always a bigger number (0.25 against 0.3).
- Check your own ideas and the textbook too. Many adults believe the seasons come from distance. If you are not sure, say so and look it up with the class.
Working with a misconception
A slip or a misconception?
A slip is a one-off mistake: a wrong sign, a misread scale. A misconception is a consistent wrong idea that appears again in a new situation. To tell them apart, ask the same idea in a different form. A pupil who says that a stone and a leaf fall at the same speed in a vacuum, but then says the heavier of two stones falls faster, holds a misconception about weight.
Ideas come from everyday experience ('heavy things drop harder'), from language, from analogies and sometimes from a simplified model taught earlier. Seeing the source helps you respond with respect: 'many people think that' is better than 'wrong'. Ask pupils how sure they are (1 to 3); a confident wrong answer needs a stronger experience than a guess.
Running predict-observe-explain well
Make the prediction private and written before anything is shown, so pupils commit and cannot say afterwards 'I knew it'. Tally the predictions on the board. Show the result without comment. Then ask pairs to explain the difference between prediction and result before you speak. If the surprise is large, add a bridging example (for the stones, a sheet of paper flat and then crumpled) so the new idea is built in steps.
Do not turn it into a trick. Choose a result that is clear and repeatable, repeat it twice, and say that your own first guess was also often wrong. End by naming the idea in a sentence the class writes down. Ask a similar question the next lesson and one week later; if the old idea comes back, you have learned what to teach again.
Examples from the classroom
The watermelon and the stone
Scene. Jasur in Samarkand has a basin of water, a small stone and, in season, a watermelon. Before he shows anything, 28 of his 35 Grade 5 pupils write that the big watermelon will sink and the small stone will float, 'because heavy things sink'. The watermelon floats and the stone sinks. The room is quiet, then pairs begin arguing about why.
Insight. A surprising, safe result gives the explanation a job to do.
Which decimal is bigger?
Scene. Malika in Tashkent gives Grade 6 a two-part question: 'Which is bigger, 0.25 or 0.3? Because ...'. Twelve of 30 pick 0.25 'because 25 is bigger than 3'. She hands each pair a metre stick: 0.3 m is 30 cm and 0.25 m is 25 cm. Most pairs correct themselves. She asks a similar question a week later with money.
Insight. Linking a decimal to a measure pupils can see breaks the whole-number habit.
Two meanings of work
Scene. Aziz in Fergana asks Grade 8: 'A man holds a heavy bag still for one hour. Does he do physical work on the bag?' Most say yes, 'he gets tired'. Aziz makes two columns, everyday 'ish' and physics work (force times distance moved). The class sees that holding still means no distance, so no work in the physics sense, even though the man gets tired.
Insight. A word with an everyday meaning needs its science meaning defined with an example.
Common pitfalls
- Telling the right answer and moving on without checking what pupils believe.
- Using diagnostic questions that have only one plausible option.
- Treating a right answer as understanding without looking at the reason.
- Making a surprising result into a 'gotcha' that embarrasses the pupil.
Diagnose Six Ideas and Plan a Predict-Observe-Explain
- Open the Activity Kit: six SAMPLE pupil statements (A to F) and sample class results for a stone-dropping question. Facilitator reads the statements aloud (5 min).
- Pairs (10 min): take three statements. For each, write the correct idea, where the pupil's idea may come from, and a two-part diagnostic question with the misconception as an option.
- Pairs (10 min): read the class results for the stone question. What do they show? Plan a three-step predict-observe-explain with safe materials and say what you will do in the following week.
- Groups (10 min): swap plans with another pair and predict what pupils will say at the Explain step.
- Alone (5 min): write your classroom action task from the Kit.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Which statement did you recognise from your own pupils?
- What did the right answers with weak reasons tell you?
- What is the first diagnostic question you will write for your next topic?
Reflect
- Which idea do your pupils hold so strongly that telling them has never worked?
- Which everyday word in your subject means something different in science?
- Is there an idea in your own head you should check?
Try it tomorrow
- Write a two-part diagnostic question for your next topic and ask it before teaching.
- Tally the answers and choose one misconception for a short predict-observe-explain.
- Ask a similar question one week later and compare the tallies.
Further reading and links
Diagnose the idea first with a two-part question, let evidence create a conflict, then explain and re-check later.