Prospective Primary School Teachers' Understanding on States of Matter and Their Changes

Abstract

This study investigated Prospective Primary School Teachers (PPST)' conceptual understandings on states of matter and their changes. Data were collected from 37 students Primary School Teacher Education Program. The students were given open-ended questions that explored their understandings on states of matter and their changes divided into macroscopic, submicroscopic and symbolic levels. Their understandings were divided into categories: understand, partial understand, misconception, and do not understand. The results showed that almost all students understood that matters are composed of particles. But most of them did not understand that between the particles exists "particle-free space". Almost all students knew most of phenomena (macroscopic level) related to states of matter and their changes. However, most of them could not explain the phenomena at submicroscopic and symbolic levels. At these levels, their understandings were still largely in the categories of partial understanding, misconception, or do not understand. Given these results it can be concluded that most of the students did not have fully understandings on states of matter and their changes. These results imply the need for improving the teaching and learning quality on states of matter and their changes for PPST in Indonesia.