Teaching electric current entails more than just passing on physical knowledge (knowledge about physics). The teacher's role no longer consists of only the transmission of knowledge, but also the organization of work in the classroom. The teacher provides the students with instructions, carefully prepared materials and tools, while the students independently, with the help of their peers, conduct experiments and write down their observations.
Students as well as teachers often encounter feelings of fear and discomfort when handling the elements in the electrical circuit. In the process of learning about those elements and the ammeter, they often have problems when they have to connect the later to an electric circuit, with setting the measuring range and reading and comparing the obtained results. Students often also have wrong ideas about the electric current and they lack background knowledge that would help them understand this abstract concept.
With the introduction of a didactic aid called "blinker" (»utripač«), we enable the visualization of an abstract concept and implement it into the lessons. linker allows us to infer and semi-quantitatively monitor the magnitude of electric current through the frequency of the blinking of the light-emitting diodes. As part of my master's thesis, I observed the effect of the didactic aid in a group of students. I focused on how it contributed to their understanding of concepts relating to the topic of electric current, and to what extent the students achieved the set learning objectives when using it.
In the empirical part of my master's thesis, I wanted to check the progress that the students of the 6th and 9th grades of secondary school achieved in the subject of natural science and technology as well as physics, while using the blinker didactic aid. I was also interested in finding out how both the students and teachers evaluated the tool and where they saw it could be of most practical use.
I used the descriptive method, combining both quantitative and qualitative research approaches. I used non-probability sampling, namely purposive, including three classes of sixth graders and four classes of ninth graders in the research. With individual groups of students from the 6th and 9th grades of secondary school, I carried out an activity relating to electricity with the help of blinker. Before and after the lesson, the students took a test, which was used to determine their progress. After that I asked the teachers, who taught the selected classes, to fill out a short survey so I could gather their opinion on the importance of the blinker didactic aid. I was also interested in finding out where they believed that blinker could be most useful when teaching about electric current.
The results of my research show that the didactic aid contributes to a better understanding of concepts related to electric current and electrical resistance. Using it, the students can more easily understand abstract concepts through their own activity. At the same time, the results also show that the tool helps the teachers explain the content related to electric current more easily, vividly and effectively.
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