Experimentos projetados para construção e mudança de modelo mentais no ensino de eletromagnetismo

Abstract

The study of Electromagnetism, due to its extensive content that involves abstract concepts difficult to understand, reveals a high degree of disinterest on the part of the majority of the students within the discipline of Physics. In addition to the abstract nature of the concepts involved, there is added to this difficulty the strategy used in teaching this subject, which privileges, almost exclusively, lectures on the subject, which are limited to a brief theoretical explanation of the phenomena and laws of Electromagnetism, followed by resolution of exercises. However, the adoption of experimental activities in the classroom can significantly mitigate the problems mentioned above, since allow the application of the content in practical situations. In this way, this work proposes the use of didactic-pedagogical material in the classroom, which allows students to investigate the contents of Electromagnetism in an interactive way, giving them subsidies so that they are able to understand, question and, finally, acquire the scientific knowledge. This work contributes by providing a sequence of experiments made with materials of low cost and easy access, obeying the order in which the topics on Electromagnetism appear in the history of Physics as well as in the sequence of some didactic works. In addition, the "Mental Models of Johnson-Laird" was used as a theoretical basis, due to the theoretical versatility of this theory, so that we can understand a way of individual construction of scientific knowledge by the students, subjects of the process.