MENTAL REPRESENTATIONS OF NINTH GRADE STUDENTS: THE CASE OF THE PROPERTIES OF THE MAGNETIC FIELD

The study of students' mental representations of Natural Sciences concepts and phenomena constitutes a central part of Science Education research, as they play a decisive role in teaching. In the study presented here, we investigate 157 ninth grade students' mental representations of the magnetic field, after they were taught about it in school. The empirical data was gathered through an interview using 4 tasks which involved the evaluation of actual or hypothetical situations. The research data included mental representations that cause difficulty in the comprehension of the properties of the magnetic field.