Categorization intermediate conception of the third year students’ of physics education program in electromagnetism wave sub-concepts

Abstract

Some results on the conceptual change, indicated a discriminate between alternative and scientific conceptions. This could be represented as a medium conceptions, called the intermediate conceptions. Researches on the electromagnetic wave sub-concept generally assessed based on modern physics conceptions, on the other hand it needs to be assessed based on the concept of electricity and magnetism. This research aims to identify and describe category of intermediate conception of third year physics education students in electromagnetic wave sub-concepts. This research used descriptive method. The subjects of this research were 73 third year students in a University of Teacher Training at Bandung. Data collection have been done by essay test and interview. The analyzed data shows that 77% of the students are on ‘lateral intermediate conception’category and none of them were on ‘naïve physics’. Other results showed that the students have difficulty on describing, explaining, interpreting qualitatively about electromagnetic wave sub-concepts.