Applying Conceptual Conflict Strategies in the Learning of the Energy Concept

Abstract This paper reports on a study which deals with implications of instructional strategies through which it was attempted to creak cognitive disequilibrations in order to achieve conceptual change, while learning the energy concept. Different responses to disequilibration were observed, pointing out several difficulties in the application of such conceptual conflict strategies. This study is naturalistic and is intended to characterise problematic situations, not to assess their relative frequency.