Overcoming Students' Misconceptions in Science: Strategies and Perspectives from Malaysia

This book discusses the importance of identifying and addressing misconceptions for the successful teaching and learning of science across all levels of science education from elementary school to high school. It suggests teaching approaches based on research data to address students’ common misconceptions. Detailed descriptions of how these instructional approaches can be incorporated into teaching and learning science are also included. 

The science education literature extensively documents the findings of studies about students’ misconceptions or alternative conceptions about various science concepts. Furthermore, some of the studies involve systematic approaches to not only creating but also implementing instructional programs to reduce the incidence of these misconceptions among high school science students. These studies, however, are largely unavailable to classroom practitioners, partly because they are usually found in various science education journals that teachers have no time to refer to or are not readily available to them. In response, this book offers an essential and easily accessible guide.

Dr. Mageswary Karpudewan, co-editor and contributor, is an Associate Professor at the School of Educational Studies, USM. She began her career in education as a chemistry teacher in 1996. Subsequently, she joined USM as a chemistry educator in 2011. Her research interests include integrating green chemistry into teaching and learning of secondary-school science and chemistry and teacher education programs. Dr. Mageswary is an active Editorial Board member for the International Journal of Science and Environmental Education (SCOPUS indexed) and Eurasian Journal of Physics and Chemistry Education.  She is also an active reviewer for various science education journals. Her works have been published in national and international journals, and she has written chapters in books and monographs that have been published at both the national and international level. 

Dr. Ahmad Nurulazam Md. Zain, co-editor, is a Professor at the School of Educational Studies, USM.  He has more than 25 years of teaching and research experience at USM including a short stint at King’s College London. He was Director of the National Higher Education Research Institute, Deputy Dean of the School of Educational Studies, USM and Program Manager at the Centre of Education and Training in Renewable Energy. His research areas include science education, higher education and computer education. His works have been published in national and international journals. He has also written chapters in books and monographs that have been published at boththe national and international level.

Dr. A. L. Chandrasegaran, co-editor, is a Research Associate at the STEM Education Research Group, part of the School of Education at Curtin University in Perth, Australia. After obtaining a BSc (Hons) from the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, NZ and a Teaching Diploma from the Christchurch Teachers’ College on a Colombo Plan scholarship, he began his career in education as a chemistry teacher at English College, Johor Bahru in 1966, then was Johor State Science Supervisor before retiring as Principal of Sultan Ibrahim Secondary School in Kulai. He subsequently taught general science and chemistry in Singapore and Perth before joining Curtin University in 2005 after obtaining an MSc (Sc.Ed.) and PhD from Curtin University. His research interests include evaluating students’ understanding of science concepts and developing two-tier multiple-choice diagnostic assessments in science.