Primary Physical Science Education

Front matter

Primary Physical Science Education

An Imaginative Approach to Encounters with Nature

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Preface

This is a textbook on Primary Physical Science Education (PPSE) for student teachers of kindergarten and primary school levels. The term primary is used here in a dual sense. It means early in the sense of education addressed to children when they build their primary understanding of the world. It also refers to the understanding of concepts of physical science that may rightly be called primary, i.e., the concepts that form the roots of scientific thought. These elements of understanding are important not only for children but for everyone, at any age, for a meaningful approach to aspects of physical reality.

In this book, we create a narrative account of how Primary Forces of Nature (FoN) such as Wind, Rain, Fire, Light, and Heat and Cold are understood (Fuchs et al., 2019; Fuchs, Corni, & Dumont, 2021; see References); and we outline an equally imaginative approach to the handful of Basic FoN (Fluids, Electricity & Magnetism, Heat, Chemicals, Gravitation, and Rotational and Linear Motion) that populate macroscopic physics (Fuchs, 2010[1996], 2015; Fuchs, d’Anna, & Corni, 2022). In it, we show how children and their teachers can start their encounters with nature by engaging with what are colloquially called the elements. These encounters will let young children connect to and converse with nature in a manner that is the prerogative of youth during their phase of mythic consciousness, before the cognitive tools of literacy have become dominant (Egan, 1997).

Analysis of human experience of nature (Dewey, 1925) can set us free from a belief that we need to take a scientific approach to nature education for children. Children should not be taught science per se, which, for young learners, often comes as a watered-down version of ,,true” science. We believe that, in contrast, we should ask how people in general and children in particular experience and interact with nature, and how they communicate about it with their teachers and their peers. The point of origin of our approach to nature pedagogy is the child or, even more radically, the nature-child relationship, rather than science. Science will emerge dialectically from the interaction of mythic experience and a scientific attitude that becomes available to learners during their adolescence.

If high-quality direct (physical) experience of nature and artifacts is fostered and joined with narrative experience made possible by stories of Forces of Nature and other imaginative forms of participatory sense-making (De Jaegher & Di Paolo, 2007; Hutto, 2007), the foundations for later understanding of science will be laid. In a nutshell, by emphasizing the role of imagination for our understanding, we are putting human nature back into the scientific exploration of the world around us. Where certain practices of science and philosophy—at least since René Descartes—have undoubtedly alienated us from nature, we want to build upon an approach to physical systems and processes that can help bridge the divide that was created between humans and nature.

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Two volumes. The book is divided into two volumes. The first of these, Primary Physical Science Education: An Imaginative Approach to Encounters with Nature, outlines a primary form of engaging with physical processes. This will be particularly suited for children during kindergarten and the first few years of primary school (Corni, 2013, Corni & Fuchs, 2020, 2021; Fuchs, Corni, & Pahl, 2021). In Chapter 1, we introduce readers to early, mythic forms of consciousness and culture, and to Kieran Egan’s scheme of recapitulation of cultural forms of understanding that make use of cognitive tools of mythic, romantic, and philosophical phases of development (Egan, 1988, 1990, 1997). The first chapter clarifies the role of imagination and cognitive tools such as metaphor, story, and visual art, and charts a course towards the very first encounters with Forces of Nature. Moreover, we briefly describe important differences between mythic and scientific attitudes toward engagements with physical processes and then show in what sense modern macroscopic physics is a collection of theories of Forces of Nature.

In Chapter 2, we introduce Primary Forces and explain how experiencing them leads to imaginative forms of communication and understanding. Stories included here and in later chapters demonstrate how narrative experiencing of Forces can arise. Chapters 3 and 4 serve a somewhat more formal description of the imaginative structures underlying the Basic Forces of Fluids (represented by Water and Air), Gravity, and Heat. Importantly, the discussion of interactions between these Forces leads to the notions of power and energy.

Visual metaphors and mimetic (embodied) plays, introduced in Chapter 5, will help teachers deal with Forces productively at various levels. Process Diagrams allow us to imaginatively represent our qualitative, yet formally and scientifically compelling, understanding of the interaction of Forces in chains of processes. Such diagrams resemble storyboards used in designing Forces-of-Nature Theater performances suitable for learners in primary school. Finally, in Chapter 6, we sketch an example of how different forms of experience and expression—physical, narrative, and mimetic—can be brought together for creating a unified imaginative approach to nature studies for young learners that is not yet scientific but can lay the foundations for later scientific engagement with physical systems and processes.

In Volume 2, Primary Physical Science Education: Experiencing Forces of Nature in Natural and Technical Systems, we continue the description of (1) the Basic FoN with chapters on Electricity and Magnetism, Substances, and linear and rotational Motion, and (2) imaginative education centered on schematic, metaphorical, analogical, and narrative uses of oral and written language (there, we briefly introduce important elements of modern cognitive linguistics and narratology). Moreover, several of the topics in physical science will be used to demonstrate how, with the help of simple-to-use software, dynamical models of physical systems and processes can be created—these models and their simulations represent a scientific analog to story-worlds and storytelling (Fuchs, 2015). We shall conclude Volume 2 in a manner paralleling the final chapter of Volume 1; however, in Volume 2, we shall choose examples of nature pedagogy that make a gentle move towards scientific forms of engaging with nature and machines.

Studying real life complex systems. Engaging with FoN allows us to account for the role of physical phenomena in our natural environment. When outlining properties and functions of Forces, we make physics part of the study of real-life systems—we involve it in fields such as earth and environmental science, physiology, astronomy, and energy engineering. Examples include the role of sunlight for our planet, the production of wind, the global cycle of electricity and the

Preface ix role of thunderstorms, global cycles of water and carbon, the blood circulatory system and water transport in trees, and our planet’s place in the solar system and the universe. Moreover, we show how Forces are active in technical artifacts, particularly in renewable energy systems.

And finally, the form of presentation is meant to demonstrate to teachers how elements of our understanding of the Forces around us can be gently nurtured in learners, starting with a mythic approach to encounters with physical phenomena and, during the later years of primary school, by joining the cognitive tools of beginning literacy with those of scientific practices such as experimenting, measuring, and simple calculating; collecting, categorizing, graphing, and mapping; and, generally, organizing and documenting. Formal and theoretical forms of understanding must be left to middle and high school.

Winterthur and Bressanone, 2023 Hans Fuchs and Federico Corni

Notes and Materials

We present issues relating to physical and cognitive sciences that are important for teachers who want to take a look at physical phenomena from an imaginative and narrative perspective. The book is not a manual of day-to-day teaching. Nevertheless, the approach taken here suggests pedagogical and didactic ideas and activities. In the first volume, we present a number of stories of Forces of Nature suitable for teaching, and in Chapter 6, we outline a concrete example of early nature pedagogy where we discuss design principles for stories and Forces-of- Nature Theater performances. In the second volume, we shall develop cases that show how children’s minds can be nurtured to evolve from mythic understanding of Forces towards scientific forms of collecting, creating, and organizing knowledge of important processes in natural and technical systems.

A note for instructors of student teachers. As instructors of student teachers and in-service teachers, we have made it our goal to explore the roots of human engagement with physical phenomena. For us, trying to become aware, and encouraging our students to become aware, of the origin of abstract elements of thought arising in the experience of Forces of Nature, has been truly revealing. Putting oneself in the shoes of children—to the extent that this is possible—is worth the effort: we are rewarded with an understanding of the origin of concepts in physical science, and we can discover physics from a new perspective.

The references listed here will hopefully help instructors to embark on this journey. See, in particular, Corni (2013), Corni & Fuchs (2020, 2021), Fuchs et al. (2019), Fuchs, Corni, & Pahl (2021). For the science of Forces of Nature, see Fuchs (2010[1996]) and Job & Riiffler (2016). For a wide-ranging coverage of topics for physics courses at middle and high school levels, see Herrmann (1990-2021).

Above all, we should mention Kieran Egan’s work on the philosophy of primary education that can be of profound help if we wish to see the issues of science and children’s learning with new eyes (Egan, 1988, 1990, 1997).

Additional materials on the science of Forces of Nature. There are three books on the subject of physics and one on chemistry that take the perspective of what we have called Forces of Nature. Two of these are for middle and high school, the third and fourth are for university level courses.

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The first of these is the Karlsruhe Physics Course KPK (Karlsruhe Physikkurs, KPK) by F. Herrmann (1990-2021) and co-workers (see References at the end of the book). In several volumes for middle and high school (available in several languages, including German, English, Italian, and French), it covers a wide range of classical and modern topics in physics using language and imagery that is similar to (but slightly more formal than) what we do in this book. The form of presentation makes the KPK eminently readable, and eminently useful as a companion text to our course.

The second (Borer et al., 2010) presents a very short outline, suitable for high school, of the basic phenomena of classical physics. It includes an introduction to how to create dynamical models of physical systems and processes employing system dynamics modeling software with graphical user interfaces that make use of visual metaphoric building blocks.

The third of these (Fuchs, 2010[1996]) is devoted to a modern theory of the dynamics of thermal systems and processes; it includes a short introduction to other fields of classical physics using the perspective of Forces of Nature and their interactions, and develops the generalized approach to the energy principle how we apply it here. Finally, the book on chemistry by Job & Rüffler (2016) develops a theory of chemical processes from a unifying perspective by making use of chemical potential and amount of substance as primitives—a form that parallels that of a science of Forces of Nature.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the individuals and institutions who have helped us in our endeavor. The Faculty of Education at the Free University of Bolzano in Italy has generously supported us by financing the Open Access publication of this volume. Two anonymous reviewers have helped us strengthen our argument for PPSE. Angelika Pahl and Alessandro Gelmi have given us valuable feedback relating to Chapters 1 and 6. Robin Fuchs is co-author of several of the stories of FoN presented here, and she did the language editing of the entire text.

Then there are all those who have made their artwork and photos available to us: Pei An, Arthur Baumann, Marion Deichmann (MD), Robin Fuchs (RF), Michela Guidetti, Dario Lepitschnik (DL), Magnus Lepitschnik (ML), Peter Lepitschnik (PL), and Margherita Rosi. The book is dedicated to the two youngest of these artists, DL and ML.

Last but not least, we are very grateful to Robin Fuchs and Gigliola Menabue, without whose unwavering and loving support this book would not exist.

Attributions for figures. Attributions for figures have been added directly to the figure captions. Where this was not possible, we list the attributions in the table below. If no attributions have been given, the photographs, diagrams, and artwork were created by the authors.

Attributions for figures xi

Attributions for figures

Figure Attribution

2.3 (left) Detail from the Greenfield Papyrus, photographed by the British Museum; original artist unknown

2.4 (right) Graham Crumb/Imagicity.com (https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Devastation_after_ Cyclone Pam _14 March 2015.jpg), „Devastation after Cyclone Pam 14 March 2015“, https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode

2.8 (right) Artwork by a 4th grade student as part of the FCHgo Horizon 2020

EU Project (fchgo.eu - Fuel Cell HydroGen educatiOnal model for schools, Call H2020-JTI-FCH-2018-1 n. 826246).

(https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Akhenaten, Nefertiti, _ and_three_daughters_beneath_the_ Aten; from _Amarna; 18th_dynasty;_ca._ 1345 BCE; Pergamon_Museum, Berlin _ (2) _(26350816948).jpg), „Akhenaten, Nefertiti, and three daughters beneath the Aten; from Amarna; 18th dynasty; ca. 1345 BCE; Pergamon Museum, Berlin (2) (26350816948)“,

https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by /2.0/legalcode

2.13

(center)

JoshuaDavisPhotography (https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Power_of_Water_-

_Flickr_-_ JoshuaDavisPhotography.jpg), „The Power of Water - Flickr - JoshuaDavisPhotography“, https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode

PUBLIC DOMAIN Unknown author (https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PSM_ V88_D110_

Ancient _syrian water _wheel_ pump_for_irrigation.png), „PSM

V88 D110 Ancient syrian water wheel pump for irrigation‘, marked as public domain, more details on Wikimedia Commons:

https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-US

2.15 Detail from the Greenfield Papyrus, photographed by the British Museum; original artist unknown.

3.16 (left) Jérémy Toma (https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Barrage_de_la_Grande- Dixence.jpg), https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode

4.1 (right) kallerna (https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Andasol_5.jpg), https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode

Margin Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division.

4.4 (left) Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division.

4.20 PUBLIC DOMAIN Meyers Konversationslexikon 1890

(https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Newcomens _ Dampfmaschine_aus_Meyers_ 1890.png), „Newcomens Dampfmaschine aus Meyers 1890“, marked as public domain, more details on Wikimedia Commons:

https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-old

Continued on next page.

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Attributions for figures

Attributions for figures (continued)

Figure Attribution

Margin Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division. (page 229)

(https: //commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Face_or_vase__ ata_Ol.svg), „Face or vase ata 01“, https: //creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode

Contents

4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6

Experience, Myth, and Imagination. . .

The Development of Myth and Orality .