Sci & Educ (2012) 21:683–703

DOI 10.1007/s11191-011-9416-6

History of Science in the Physics Curriculum: A Directed

Content Analysis of Historical Sources

Hayati Seker • Burcu G. Guney

Published online: 10 November 2011

 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011

Abstract Although history of science is a potential resource for instructional materials,

teachers do not have a tendency to use historical materials in their lessons. Studies showed
that instructional materials should be adaptable and consistent with curriculum. This study
purports to examine the alignment between history of science and the curriculum in the
light of the facilitator model on the use of history of science in science teaching, and to
expose possible difficulties in preparing historical materials. For this purpose, qualitative
content analysis method was employed. Codes and themes were defined beforehand, with
respect to levels and their sublevels of the model. The analysis revealed several problems
with the alignment of historical sources for the physics curriculum: limited information
about scientists’ personal lives, the difficulty of linking with content knowledge, the lack of
emphasis on scientific process in the physics curriculum, differences between chronology
and sequence of topics, the lack of information about scientists’ reasoning. Based on the
findings of the analysis, it would be difficult to use original historical sources; educators
were needed to simplify historical knowledge within a pedagogical perspective. There is a
need for historical sources, like Harvard Case Histories in Experimental Science, since
appropriate historical information to the curriculum objectives can only be obtained by
simplifying complex information at the origin. The curriculum should leave opportunities
for educators interested in history of science, even historical sources provides legitimate
amount of information for every concepts in the curriculum.

1 Introduction

The history of science is considered as a potential source for teaching and learning science
(Becker 2000; Wang and Cox-Petersen 2002), however science teachers do not use the
history of science in science lessons unless they are personally interested in. Some aspects

H. Seker
B. G. Guney (&)

Ataturk Faculty of Education, Marmara University, Istanbul, Turkey
e-mail: burcugulay.guney@yahoo.com
H. Seker
e-mail: hayatiseker@yahoo.com

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of the main components of education, such as curricular issues and the preferences of
teachers themselves have tended to constrain the use of the history of science in science
lessons. Teachers’ expectations, habits, and perspectives are considered to play a signifi-
cant role in using historical materials in their instruction. Studies with remarkable con-
tributions to science education on the use of the history of science in science teaching have
not convinced science teachers to use historical materials in their science lessons (Ruth-
erford 2001). Initial endeavors (Duschl et al. 1992) were not helpful (Russell 1981;
Wandersee 1992; Welch 1973) for science teachers in connecting knowledge of the history
of science with their experience in the classroom. Teachers have demonstrated persistence
in using their traditional curriculum and they do not want to change it (Rutherford 2001;
Wandersee 1992). One reason for teachers’ persistence is a concern about the extent to
which the adaptability and flexibility of the historical materials into their preexisting
teaching styles. If the instructional materials are not adaptable to their teaching styles,
teachers would not like to benefit from them (Cohen and Ball 1990). Teachers’ lack of
knowledge about the history of science is also an important reason for not using historical
materials because courses on the history of science were not offered in teacher education
programs (Gallagher 1991; Rutherford 2001; Matthews 2000). If teachers do not feel
themselves adequately informed about the history of science, they can find the use of such
material to be challenging.
The curriculum itself is one of the important reasons why new instructional materials
are used or not. The content and the limited time allocated by the curriculum can be
regarded as a reason for teachers not to use historical materials. Time constraints due to the
crowdedness of the curriculum become an obstacle for teachers to the use of historical
materials in their lessons.1 Other reasons with regard to the curriculum can be delineated as
the appropriateness of purposes in using historical materials to the objectives of curricu-
lum. Teachers need to see how materials are linked with the curriculum objectives as well
as how historically informative if they are to be convinced to use them. Hence, instruc-
tional materials should be suited to the objectives of existing curriculum and flexible to
use. Ball and Cohen (1996) highlighted the educative aspects of the curriculum, which
considers teacher-learning, student learning, content, and pedagogy. In keeping with this
emphasis, Cohen and Ball (1999) introduced two terms to design educative curriculum
materials: specification and development. Concerning the term specification, the goals of
the material and the ways of attaining them should be explicit; hence, teachers become
aware about why they are using the material. The term development refers to finding the
ways teachers enact materials in their class contexts. In the same manner, other studies,
assert that not only providing historical information but also connecting such information
with classroom realities is needed. Instructional materials can be employed well when
materials are connected with the content of the curriculum. The need for better alignment
between instructional materials and the curriculum objectives has also been stressed in
previous studies in science education.2

1.1 The Purpose of the Study

This study is one part of a national project on the use of the history of science in science
teaching. A facilitator model with four levels on the use of the history of science in science
teaching (Seker 2007) was used as a framework for the project. Within the scope of this
1
See Gallagher (1991), Irwin (2000), Leach et al. (2003), Matthews (1998).
2
See Duschl (1990), Monk and Osborne (1997), Solomon et al. (1992), Rutherford (2001).

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study, the first step in the project is to conduct a directed content analysis to determine
obstacles to the integration of the history of science into the Turkish physics curriculum.
For this purpose, this study aims to examine the alignment between the history of science
and the curriculum in the light of the facilitator model, and to elicit possible difficulties in
preparing historical materials with regard to pedagogical approaches.

2 The Facilitator Model

The framework of the study is based on the Facilitator Model, which was developed
through a review of the literature on the relationship between the history of science and
science education. The distinction between contexts has been emphasized in the literature
on the history and philosophy of science and science education. The most well-known
distinction is between scientists’ actual thinking processes or the actual process of research
(context of discovery) and the presentation of a theory before the public or the accounts by
which the results of that research are exposed and defended as valid (context of justifi-
cation) (Carnap 1928 cited in Matthews 2004). Reichenbach (1938) was credited with
Carnap’s distinction, and his argument is widely accepted (Matthews 2004). Schickore
(2008) explained the context of discovery and the context of justification with Reichen-
bach’s emphasis on the mismatch between what scientists do and what they present as a
result in scientific publications. Duschl (1990), pointed out that, with regard to Reichen-
bach’s distinction, using knowledge of the history of science in science education con-
structs different education contexts. In the first context, the context of discovery which is
about what we know, scientific ideas are presented as tentative, interpretative and figura-
tive. In the second context, the context of justification which is about how we know, the
situation in which knowledge claims are systematically presented in relation to the data and
termed by Duschl as final form science (Duschl et al. 1992, p. 28). Duschl put more
emphasis on the context of development than the context of justification or context of
discovery since science is recognized by the improvement and refinement of scientific
knowledge (Grandy and Duschl 2008).
Stinner (1995, 2003) also emphasized an inquiry approach and explained his approach
with Large Context Problem (LCP). LCPs consist of three levels of historical and conceptual
development: a foundation level, a research level, and a pedagogical level. The foundation
level is defined as thinking and involves activities when scientific theory is constructed. The
research level is defined as the working out of the consequences of that theory. The peda-
gogical level is defined as the presentation of that theory as content knowledge. Stinner
emphasized that the pedagogical level has little or no connection with the other two levels.
He suggested using the inquiry approach to connect the pedagogical level with foundation
and research levels. The model in this study is based on these arguments and a previous study
by Seker and Welsh (2003, 2006) where the history of science was used in eighth grade
science lessons. In the previous study (2003), four different curriculums were developed to
evaluate the effects of using three types of historical information in science teaching on
student learning, understanding the nature of science, and interest in science: (a) Traditional
curriculum based on School District Science Education Standards, (b) Curriculum integrated
with the information about the development of scientific knowledge throughout history,
(c) Curriculum integrated with the information about scientific methods followed by sci-
entists in history, (d) Curriculum integrated with the information about the personal life
stories of scientists. Comparing the curriculums integrated with the history of science to the
traditional curriculum was resulted with the support of existence of different class contexts

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with regards to the use of the history of science (Seker and Welsh 2003). Therefore, this
study believes in the necessity of contextual differences in the construction and development
of scientific knowledge in using the history of science in classroom environments.
Accordingly, four different levels were defined: Interest Level, Sociocultural Level, Epis-
temological Level, and Conceptual Level. These levels are gradually arranged according to
teachers’ competence in using the history of science in science teaching. The first
level includes information that teachers integrate short stories into their lessons easily,
whereas the fourth level requires that teachers tailor historical information to the content
knowledge.
The levels of the model are gradually arranged according to teachers’ competence in
using the history of science in science teaching. The first level includes information that
teachers integrate short science stories into their lessons easily whereas the fourth level
includes information that teachers tailor pedagogical knowledge and the history of science
to content knowledge. At the Conceptual Level, scientific concepts are connected with
philosophical ideas, so understanding such concepts required more effort than historical
information at other levels; Sociocultural Level and Interest Level. Conceptual Level has
more focal points than other levels. The discovery of a concept linked with other concepts
throughout history. Teachers are expected to understand the context of discovery while
telling historical information in a story form is possible at other levels of the model. At the
Conceptual Level, inquiry methods are expected to be used since students’ prior knowl-
edge is important due to its similarity with scientists’ ideas in the past; but at the Epis-
temological Level, explicit methods were offered for teachers to explain aspects of doing
science. At the Epistemological Level, teachers are expected to be familiar with scientific
methods. Since the backgrounds of most teachers are weak in respect of the nature of
science, teachers are expected to prepare and learn basic conceptions about nature of
science. At the Sociocultural Level and Interest Level, they are expected to know how to
tell stories and create drama in the science classroom.

2.1 The Interest Level

The Interest Level covers information about scientists’ lives. The Interest Level purports
two main educational objectives; to humanize science and scientists, and to catch students’
interest in science lesson. For this purpose, short stories about scientists’ personal lives
without connection to the concepts of science or nature of science were used at the Interest
Level. Such stories were considered interesting because they have a function to entertain
rather than organize cognitive schemata (Hidi and Baird 1986) and refer to salient themes
(e.g., death) (Schank 1979). For example, telling students that Sir Isaac Newton was raised
in the home of his grandmother after his father’s death and his mother abandoned him to
remarry. Such kinds of stories have a potential to humanize the scientist by focusing
students’ attention on the scientist’s experience as a person rather than as a scientist
(Matthews 1994; Hadzigeorgiou 2006). Presenting human aspects of the scientist can help
what Mitchell (1993) described catch component of interest as short-term interest for a
period of lesson. Continual use of these stories may help students generate individual
interest in science (Krapp 2002; Welsh and Seker 2003). This level may consist of three
main sublevels: The lives of scientists is about scientists’ personal lives affecting their
studies in direct or indirect ways; scientists as human beings covers historical information
which emphasize they had a life beside their scientific studies, and magazines which is
about interesting points in scientists’ lives.

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2.2 The Sociocultural Level

The Sociocultural Level covers information about how science interacts with society.
Society in this approach is twofold as formal and informal scientific societies; and people
who live in the era of the discovery. Educational objectives of this type of information are
to improve students’ attitudes towards science and to humanize science by demonstrating
that scientific knowledge is not a product of an individual mind but the product of a science
society, and science interacts with society in direct or indirect ways.3 Additionally, his-
torical information at this level can hold student interest in science by showing how the
subject matter is meaningful and valuable with regard to Mitchell’s description of hold
component of interest as meaningfulness and the value of the material. This level may
consist of three main sublevels: Scientific society, which is about how scientists interact
with scientific society; science and people, which is about how scientists interact with the
public, and the history of technology, which is about the technological outcomes of the
scientific discoveries.

2.3 The Epistemological Level

The Epistemological Level addresses ways of doing science and the nature of science. The
main educative objectives at this level are to show that there is no single way of doing
science (McComas 1996), and to introduce some concepts of scientific processes such as
controlled experiments, dependent and independent variables, direct and indirect obser-
vations, the use of mathematics and modeling, and the role of evidence-based inferences.
For example, Galileo is known as one of the first experimenters. He developed theories
based on his experiments, which were in opposition to the accepted ideas of Aristotle. This
opposition may help students understand the empirical and tentative nature of scientific
knowledge. Two scientists may perceive and interpret in different ways since they have
different backgrounds and minds. The role of different perceptions in producing scientific
knowledge can be used in science teaching to demonstrate the human aspect of science and
subjective elements in the process of science (Kampourakis and McComas 2010).

2.4 The Conceptual Level

The Conceptual Level addresses cognitive domain referring as learning the concepts. The
educational objectives of this level are to help students understand that scientific concepts
and their development throughout the history of science. With this historical information,
students can realize the similarity between their naive ideas and scientists’ ideas (Roach
and Wandersee 1995; Stinner and Williams 1993). For example, the concept of impetus,
used before Isaac Newton’s ideas in physics, is often referenced to discuss the similarity
between students’ alternative concepts and scientific concepts throughout history
(McCloskey 1983). Historical information at the Conceptual Level is expected to promote
students’ awareness to facilitate the construction of new knowledge based on prior
knowledge, and this may help students discuss their own ideas by means of being aware of
the similarities.4 This level may consist of three main sublevels: Historical development of
the concepts which is about developmental process of the concept throughout history,

3
See Becker (2000), Matthews (1994), Wang and Marsh (2002).
4
See Irwin (2000), Roach and Wandersee (1995), Stinner and Williams (1993), Seroglou et al. (1998),
Wandersee (1985).

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discovery of the concepts which is about the discovery context of a specific concept (Niaz
2010) and controversies and opposing ideas which covers concepts that explain the same
phenomena in different ways and controversies between scientists with opposing theories
or paradigms.

3 Method

A qualitative content analysis method, specifically a directed content analysis, was

employed in this study to examine the history of science for the alignment with the physics
curriculum. Directed content analysis, starts with a theory. Codes are developed from
relevant theory, and defined before and during data analysis (Hsieh and Shannon 2005).
Directed content analysis differs from other content analyses because it uses an existing
framework to determine an initial coding scheme and the result of the analysis validates or
extends the theoretical framework (Hsieh and Shannon 2005). This type of content analysis
is also defined as deductive content analysis (Elo and Kyngas 2007). All content analyses
start with selecting the units of analysis (Guthrie et al. 2004 cited in Elo and Kyngas 2007).
The target units of analysis for this study, Force and Motion unit for the 9th grade and
Electricity unit for the 10th grade were selected along with an ongoing project on the use of
the history of science in science teaching.

3.1 Curriculum

The depth of analysis and assumptions are important factors in respect of the analysis
process. Since the focus of the study is the alignment with the physics curriculum, the
objectives of the curriculum play an important role in defining an appropriate framework
for the analysis. There are two main types of objectives in the curriculum: knowledge
objectives and skills objectives. Knowledge objectives are specific for each concept in a
unit and related to the cognitive aspects of learning in the physics curriculum (Milli Eğitim
Bakanlığı [MEB] 2007a, b). Skills objectives are grouped under the following categories:
• Problem Solving Skills include scientific process skills, creative thinking skills,
mathematical process skills, and higher thinking skills. Fostering these skills helps
students to identify a problem; solve the problem by doing simple experiments;
collecting, analyzing and interpreting data.
• Physics-Society-Technology-Environment objectives focus on improving understanding
and interpreting the interaction among physics, society, technology and environment.
• Information and Communication objectives focus on enabling students to search for
information, present their research by using technology, and develop their communi-
cation skills.
• Attitude and Value objectives focus on developing positive attitudes towards students
themselves, other people, world, physics and lifelong learning.
The new Physics Curriculum was developed within a spiral model across all the 9th
through 12th grades. In this model, competence and performance level of knowledge
objectives and skill objectives become more complex, more difficult to achieve, and more
abstract by extending scope the concepts from 9th grade to 12th grade. For instance, all
grade levels cover Force and Motion unit with the same title, however, 9th grade only
includes main concepts such as distance, displacement, acceleration, inertia without using
mathematical operations whereas 10th grade adds basic numerical problems and introduces

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concepts of motion in both one and two dimensions, in a sense, a more detailed content in
each level.

3.2 Building Collection

Keywords related to the concepts in the units of motion and force, and electricity, their
associated knowledge and skills objectives were organized by the levels of the facilitator
model. Historical sources were searched by these keywords. The search was limited by
curriculum constraints. The primary search provided new keywords such as the names of
scientists, the era of discoveries, and additional terms related to the concepts. The refer-
ences of historical sources were also used to enrich proper keywords.
A list of keywords was built to search for historical sources. The search of historical
sources was performed through electronic search engines (scholar.google.com, books.
google.com, eric.ed.gov), websites on the history of science (http://www.imss.fi.it,
http://www.galileo.rice.edu) and by reviewing the references of relevant search results. The
search yielded over one hundred sources including books, articles, conference papers, and
online sources (see ‘‘Appendix’’). Following rules were considered to ensure the credibility
of sources:
• Books should include the author’s name, the publisher, and date of publication,
• Articles should be published in refereed journals,
• Conference papers should be published in a refereed conference proceedings,
• Internet sources should have the similar characteristics to be referred.
The origin of historical sources (books, articles, manuscripts, memoirs) was observed
through the analysis on historical sources. The sources used in the content analysis are
categorized in terms of their authenticity to the origin:
• Primary (original) sources written by scientists and first-hand knowledge of their
subject: These sources are the origin of knowledge and often provide results of their
scientific investigations. The context of discovery is rarely provided by scientists in
these sources (Numbers between 1 and 4 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Translations of original sources in Latin, French, and German into English: These
sources are less authentic than original sources because of the possibility of losing
some information in translation (Numbers between 5 and 9 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Sources written by scientists, who work on the ideas in the original sources: These
sources often compared and contrasted ideas of previous scientists (Numbers between
10 and 12 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Sources written by historians of science to argue a certain point through history: These
sources are mostly biographies, documentaries, narratives, and collection of docu-
ments. Historians often interpret original historical sources in terms of their concerns
(Numbers between 13 and 60 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Sources written to discuss influence of developments throughout the history of science
from other fields of science: These sources are mostly in the field of philosophy,
sociology or technology (Numbers between 61 and 84 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Sources written to argue at certain points in history, which is important for science
education: These sources reconstruct historical context to put more emphasis on the
history of science in science teaching (Numbers between 85 and 96 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).
• Sources written to provide pedagogical knowledge for science teachers to facilitate the
use of history of science in science teaching: These sources are mainly based on

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findings of educational research on the history of science (Numbers between 97 and

103 in the ‘‘Appendix’’).

3.3 Defining Codes

In directed content analysis, the coding process depends on a predetermined categorization

matrix, and data are coded in order to illustrate the categories (Polit and Beck 2004 in Elo
and Kyngas 2007). Therefore, in this study a categorization matrix was developed with
respect to the levels and sublevels of the facilitator model. Categories were defined as
levels and subcategories were defined as sublevels of the facilitator model. Historical
sources were analyzed for each category and subcategory and exemplifying sections of the
sources were coded. Table 1 presents the categorization matrix used in this study and
sample codes for each sub-category. Afterwards, the alignment of historical sources with
physics curriculum was investigated for the purpose of this study.

3.4 Coding Dimensions

The first category includes codes associated with the Interest Level of the facilitator model.
Historical information related to the objectives of the affective domain is coded at the
Interest Level. The extent of the analysis is limited to the content of Force and Motion, and
Electricity units in the Turkish physics curriculum for the 9th and 10th grades. Codes
associated with the Interest Level are organized into three sub-categories: Lives of sci-
entists, scientists as human beings, and magazines. Information about scientists’ personal
lives that affects their studies, such as the influence of Galileo’s father on Galileo’s studies
was coded as Lives of scientists. Information about scientists’ lives beside their scientific
studies, such as Newton’s fight as a schoolboy was coded as Scientists as human beings.

Table 1 Categorization matrix, and examples

Category Sub-category Example

Interest Level Lives of scientists Galileo’s father as a musician, his ability to play instruments, its
influence on his experiments
Scientists as human Newton’s fight with his friends when he was a schoolboy
beings
Magazines Volta’ wish to marry with a singer
Sociocultural Scientific society Newton as head of Royal Society
Level Science and people Effect of the discovery of electric current on life style of people
History of The invention of lightening conductor Franklin’s studies on
technology electric charges
Epistemological Scientific methods Galileo’ experiment and mathematical modeling
Level
Conceptual Historical The historical development of electric current: Gray’s
Level development experiments on transfer of charges, Du Fay and Franklin’s fluid
theories, Ohm’s experiments on wires
Discovery of Leonardo da Vinci’s studies on friction and perpetual motion
concepts
Controversies and Galvani and Volta’s opposing ideas on animal electricity
opposing ideas

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Information related to intriguing points in scientists’ lives such as Volta’s love story was
coded as Magazines.
The second category includes codes associated with the Sociocultural Level of the
facilitator model. The appropriate historical information to the objectives of understanding
the interaction between science and society is coded at the Sociocultural Level. Codes
associated with the Sociocultural Level are organized into three sub-categories: Scientific
society, science and people, and the history of technology. Information about how science,
scientist and the authority within the scientific community, such as Newton as a head of the
Royal Society were coded as Scientific society. Information about interaction between
science and public-life, such as the construction of the Atlantic cable was coded as Science
and people. Information about technological outcomes of the scientific discoveries such as
the invention of the lightening conductor was coded as History of technology.
The third category includes codes associated with the Epistemological Level of the
facilitator model. The appropriate historical information to the educational objectives
related to scientific progress is coded at the Epistemological Level. Information about the
methods of scientists, for example Galileo’s use of experiments was coded in this category.
Methods such as direct and indirect observations, experiments, inferences, mathematics
can also be coded separately.
The fourth category includes codes associated with the Conceptual Level of the facil-
itator model. The appropriate historical information to the objectives of cognitive domain
is coded at the Conceptual Level. Codes associated with the Conceptual Level are orga-
nized into three sub-categories: Historical development of the concepts, discovery of the
concepts, controversies and opposing ideas. Information about conceptual development of
the concept throughout history, such as the development of electric current form Stephan
Gray to Ohm’s studies was coded as historical development of the concept. Information
about context in which scientific studies are conducted, such as Leonardo da Vinci’s
studies on friction within its historical context was coded as discovery of concept. Infor-
mation about controversial ideas on a concept throughout history such as animal electricity
of Galvani and contact potential of Volta was coded as controversies and opposing ideas.

4 Findings

The findings are presented in four levels of the facilitator model. For each level, the
alignment between the history of science and the objectives of physics curriculum, and
obstacles to finding and using appropriate historical information are discussed with
examples, and presented in Table 2.

4.1 Interest Level

The analysis of documents revealed that historical information about scientists’ personal
lives is not easily accessible for every scientist. Historical sources put more focus on
famous scientists such as Newton, Einstein, Galileo but focus less on lesser known sci-
entists like Nicole Oresme who constructed the first motion graphs, Thomas Bradwardine
who defined the concept of velocity, or Guillaume Amontons who studied on friction.
Besides limited historical information about scientists’ personal lives, the interest in this
type of information is subjective and based on teachers and students’ perspectives. Even
though the literature suggests using salient themes to develop interesting instructional
materials, the preparation of historical materials for the Interest Level requires taking into

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Table 2 The alignment problems with the physics curriculum

Level Sublevel Obstacle

Interest Level Lives of scientists Limited information about lives of every scientist
Magazines Perspectives on interestingness of information
Sociocultural Scientific society Link with content knowledge
Level Science and people Cultural differences between scientists and students
History of technology Lack of information related to content knowledge
Epistemological Scientific methods More methods than the curriculum covers
Level The lack of emphasis in the curriculum
Conceptual Historical development Difference between the chronology and sequence of topics
Level of concepts Decision between covering all ideas for a topic or a
pioneering point in history
Discovery of concepts Interdisciplinary concepts and the differences between
curriculums of these disciplines
Lack of information about scientists’ reasoning
Simplifying philosophical information for student level
Use of different phrases for the same terms in physics

consideration the feelings of students. Historical information at this level may not be
interesting for the teacher, or even for the students. For example, a story about Galileo’s
father as a musician and his interest in music may not be interesting for all students and
teachers, so what will help students to humanize the scientist or what can catch students’
interests are left to teachers.

4.2 Sociocultural Level

For the first subcategory, scientific society, historical information was analyzed in order to
find examples to explain the relationship between scientists and authority within the sci-
entific community. Through this purpose, information about scientific communities was
found that related to the historical development of concepts in the physics curriculum. It
was seen that different authorities at different times had ruled the scientific community and
made important decisions on acceptability of scientific endeavors, such as the awards of
Royal Society, Royal Academy or Nobel Committee; and degrees of knighthood appointed
by kings or queens. Such historical information about the interaction between scientist and
the scientific society is available in many historical sources; it is difficult to present this
information and relevant content in the same teaching context. For example, Galileo’s
problems with the Church can be used to explain the interaction between science and
society; however, this information would be more consistent with concepts in celestial
motion than concepts in other units.
The analysis of historical sources on the interaction between science and people, and
history of technology revealed that these sources provided limited information for most of
the objectives of the physics curriculum to address how scientific endeavors affected
people in history. Available sources do not offer reasonable amount of information about
technological outcomes from scientific discoveries related to the target units of this
analysis. For example, historical information about the machines or the further applications
such as transportation helps develop cases to address how the friction concept affected
social life; on the other hand, historical information about the social impacts of inertia is
limited and not accessible directly in the extent of historical sources analyzed in this study.

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Besides these sublevels, one more possible obstacle to the use of historical information
at the Sociocultural Level is the cultural differences between scientists and students.
Scientists and their works are embedded in their culture (Abd-El-Khalick et al. 1998), and
learning starts with the interaction between individuals with and between cultures
(Vygotsky 1978; Langford 2005). The differences in culture between scientists and stu-
dents can be an obstacle to develop meaningful understanding on socio-scientific issues
related to the content. For example, Galileo lived in the seventeenth century when the
Church was the authority of scientific society, which rules scientific endeavors. Galileo’s
affair including his opposition to the Church was a paradigm case of the troubled inter-
action between science and religion (Machamer 1998). Such cultural aspects of science
can be incomprehensible to students who are unfamiliar with Christianity.

4.3 Epistemological Level

Analysis revealed that some scientific methods in history were not addressed explicitly in
textbooks and the curriculum. Curriculum objectives underlines that there is no single
scientific method or a single way of doing science but, on the other hand, they were
restricted with the observations, experiments and mathematics. The analysis showed that
scientist used many other different methods like thought experiments, mathematical
induction, mathematical deduction, and demonstrative induction. Problems at the Episte-
mological Level are due to the lack of emphasis on the variety of scientific methods in the
physics curriculum. Although, historical sources provide information about scientific
methods used for discoveries, objectives for the selected units in the physics curriculum do
not leave room for introducing other ways of doing science.

4.4 Conceptual Level

Analysis revealed that the sequence of topics in the curriculum is not aligned with the
timeline of the concepts throughout history. The difference in the alignment of topics and
the chronology can be considered as a problem in the preparation of instructional materials
with history of science. The physics curriculum is based on a spiral structure in which
concepts are revisited as students’ progress from level to level in 4 years of education
program. The physics curriculum is not in accordance with historical sources. For instance,
the discovery of such concepts as electricity starts with static electricity and then continues
with electrodynamics; but it is clear that concepts of electricity and magnetism were
parallel developed throughout history. For this reason, it is possible to see similar analogies
between electricity and magnetism, such similarity as between the electric field and
magnetic field. Although the history of electricity and magnetism draws a consistent line to
learn how concepts were developed, some concepts need to be removed in order to follow
the objectives of the physics curriculum. In the physics curriculum, electricity unit at the
10th grade level includes subjects such as electric charges, electric force, electric field,
electric potential, electrical energy, current and power in electric circuits. The electricity
unit at the 9th grade level includes subjects such as electric current, potential difference,
resistance and magnetic effect of electric current. This requires that teachers must intro-
duce the concept of electric current before the concept of electrification or electric charges.
The controversy in the order of the subjects makes it difficult to integrate history of science
into the physics curriculum.
Analysis showed that, many pioneering scientific ideas were covered by historical
sources for a topic, which is supposed to take one-or-two lesson periods. All these

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pioneering ideas can be given in a chronological manner or a significant pivot in history

can be stressed more informative in historical materials. A decision about covering all
pioneering ideas or stressing a pivot point depends on the weight of the curriculum which
depends on teachers’ perception. In the case of assigning a major concept as the center of
the story, the value of the assigned concept should be aligned with the objectives of the
curriculum. For example, batteries have a long history that goes back to 250 BC, and
throughout the history of batteries, several strong ideas have stood out. The decision to
focus on only one strong idea or using all the ideas in the development of a concept
throughout history will put teachers in a dilemma in respect of their teaching.
The analysis revealed that some concepts in other fields of science were needed to
elaborate on an investigation of the historical sources on the concepts in the physics
curriculum. Concepts in other fields of science are to be known to present the physics
concepts in the historical materials. For instance, the concept of electrolysis should be
introduced to present the discovery of the concept of electric current since Faraday
explained electric current within the process of electrolysis. Information about the dis-
covery of concepts required by the curriculum differs from the information about the
development of concepts throughout history regarding the contexts provided. The histor-
ical contexts of the scientific discoveries provide information about why a new concept
was discovered and how scientists think and reason their knowledge. Scientists’ way of
reasoning may play an important role for the cognitive objectives of the physics curriculum
in the preparation of historical materials. Historical information for some concepts only
provides information about what, and when the concepts were discovered and overlook
information about scientists’ reasoning through the discovery.
Another obstacle to the integration of historical information into the instructional
materials was the misleading description of the role of mathematics in physics. Introducing
mathematical deductions requires a consideration of the level of students’ abstract and
analytical thinking regarding the grade level. Presenting equations without any justification
may limit to reflect reasoning process behind mathematical representations. For example,
the concept of electric potential is a complex topic to present it in a historical way because
the discovery of the concepts is mathematical based. Although several analogies with water
or heat for the concept of electric potential were found, sufficient explanatory information
about scientists’ reasoning is often not available in historical sources.
Analyses of the historical sources at the Conceptual Level support the strong rela-
tionship between physics and philosophy, which makes it difficult to facilitate and to
encourage the use of the history of science in science lessons. Philosophers made the
important contributions to the field of physics in antiquity. Thus, for most concepts in
physics, it is important for teachers to understand metaphysics to use history of these
concepts. For example, the impetus concept of pre-classical physics and concept of
impressed motion in ancient Greece should be conceptualized by teachers to incorporate
them into the lesson content related to inertia and accelerated motion.
The analysis revealed that the history of science provides a rich source of information
on opposing ideas throughout history. Opposing ideas may exist in the same era or in
different eras of the history of science. It can be seen that scientists interpret the same
evidence and data from experiments or observations differently. For example, Aristotle
defined the motion of the objects by their tendency to move their natural places as smoke
goes up and a rock falls down. He added that a heavier rock tend to move down more than
a lighter rock. Centuries after Aristotle, Galileo advocated that two objects reached the
ground at the same time if both were released from the same height. As another example,
Galvani and Volta, who were contemporary scholars at their times, had different ideas on

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the source of electricity. Galvani believed that animal was the source of electricity and
Volta disproved his idea by showing that it was because of the contact potential. The
physics curriculum also suggests using such controversies from the history of science for
the motion and force unit. Explicitly addressed objectives in physics curriculum to
emphasize history of science facilitate preparing instructional materials.
The analysis also revealed that some concepts were defined in different terms in history
although they refer to the same concept. For instance, the concept of effluvium was used
for the concept of electric current or degree of electrification, and electric tension was used
for the concept of electric potential. The use of different terms for a concept in different
periods of history is an obstacle to finding appropriate historical information, and to
integrating these different terms into the physics curriculum. For example for the concept
of velocity, Bradwardine used the term of density of motion, which defines how quick an
object moves. If the density of motion is higher, an object covers the same distance in less
time. If the density of motion is explained as how velocity of the object changes in a period
of time, it means the concept of acceleration. Duality in the meaning of the density of
motion becomes an obstacle to the integration history of science into science curriculum.

5 Conclusion

This study was conducted to examine the history of science for alignment with the physics
curriculum and to expose possible difficulties in preparing historical materials for physics
lessons. For this purpose, the history of science was analyzed within the frames of the
facilitator model and the curriculum objectives. This study is limited to content knowledge
given in the 9th grade Force and Motion unit and 10th grade Electricity unit in the Turkish
physics curriculum. Some concepts of motion and force, and electricity that are not
included at the related grade level were not considered in the analysis. Therefore, some
historical information was not included in this study because of the limitations of the
physics curriculum. The number of sources related to the history of science is limited to the
sources listed in the ‘‘Appendix’’.
The findings of the analysis support that historical sources are limited to finding
information about the personal lives of every scientist who studied the discovery of con-
cepts taught in the physics curriculum. Educational research on the history of science
should focus on scientists other than the most famous ones. The more research conducted
on the history of science, the further information on the scientists’ personal lives becomes
available and accessible. The need for more information on the history of science should be
stressed in the reports of the research studies; thus more historical sources may be brought
to light by historians. The interestingness of stories at the Interest Level depends on the
perspective of teacher, students, or educators developing historical materials. Literature on
interestingness asserts that salient themes are more interesting than other types of infor-
mation. If instructional materials are supposed to be student-centered and teachers are
closer to students than educators are, teachers’ perspectives on the interestingness of
historical information should be regarded in the development of instructional materials.
At the Sociocultural Level, an obstacle to the use of the history of science in the units
selected for the analysis is to find historical information for most concepts. In particular, it
is more difficult to access information about the relationship between science and the
public for the concepts discovered before the influence of instrumentalism on scientific
research. The historical sources often provide information about how scientists interact
with scientific society or other scientists throughout the discovery of concepts; however,

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they provide very limited information about the interaction of scientific discoveries with
public life.
Historical sources provides information about interaction between science and society,
scientific society and technological innovations however presenting this historical infor-
mation requires to provide a context in which teachers link with content of the physics
curriculum. Daily life examples experienced by students often proposed to use in science
lessons to helps students understand the interaction between science and society. Historical
examples, if a teaching context is constructed, provide more simple examples then today’s
examples. For example, Edison’s invention of parallel circuits interact with lightening and
saving energy with a very simple and direct way as it can be seen in the history of science.
The differences in culture between scientists and students can be an obstacle to the use
of historical materials. Student may fail to understand the issue between the Church and
Galileo. Students were taught about secularism in Turkish education system. Students may
conceptualize the issue between church and state rather than Church and Galileo’s ideas.
Since the issue in literature between science and religion was argued in the perspectives of
western and non-western cultures and the cultural difference would play an important role
in student understanding of socio-scientific issues in history. Initially, the differences may
be observed in terms of words used in the stories. This problem can be characterized as
being as lost in translation. Besides, words such as church, cathedral, chapel, ministry; and
priest, rector, father, cleric in the original sources would be translated into two words
‘kilise (church in Turkish)’ and ‘papaz (priest in Turkish)’ and their meanings would be
lost in translation when the story is formed in an instructional material in Turkish. The
essence of the story about interaction between science and society linked with the
objectives of curriculum should be emphasized even though meanings of the words may
not reflect what really happened in the origin of stories.
Educational research on the history of science suggests short-story form for 5–10 min in
a class period since it is hard to place them in a material since they are crowding out the
physics curriculum. Still, teachers may not give 5 min of class-time because of the
inelasticity of curriculum even though they find historical materials useful. One perspective
may suggest curriculum makers to build elastic curriculum to integrate extracurricular
information into science curriculum, another perspective may suggest science educators to
develop instructional materials based on content and skill objectives of curriculum. In the
literature, more studies offer pedagogical solutions for further research; however, curric-
ulum objectives often were underestimated and not discussed enough. Teachers’ potential
expectation may be to see the link between historical materials and their lesson plan
required by curriculum makers. Historical materials should indicate explicitly how they are
related to the curriculum objectives to facilitate using history of science in science
teaching. Based on the findings, it can be seen that the history of science provides a rich
context and content knowledge for teachers, but some potential difficulties were identified
in the integration of the history of science into the physics curriculum. Most difficulties lie
behind both the complexity of the history of science itself and the curriculum constraints.
The complexity of the history of science arises from the difficulty experienced in accessing
original historical sources, the lack of knowledge about scientists’ reasoning in their dis-
coveries, and the interpretations of original historical sources within the perspectives of
other fields rather than education. The first steps to developing historical materials are to
find faithful historical sources to the origin and simplify historical information to the
comprehensive level of the science lesson. Even though most educators suggest adding
history of science courses into teacher education programs this may not help simplify
complexities of historical sources. Historical sources, like Conant’s (1957) Harvard Case

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Histories in Experimental Science, play an important role in developing instructional

materials since appropriate historical information to the curriculum objectives can only be
obtained by simplifying complex information at the origin. There is a need for more
historical sources focusing scientific concepts.
Since philosophical arguments were part of the development of the concept in history,
such information should be simplified to the grade level when preparing instructional
materials. Educators need to simplify philosophical arguments to the grade level because
teachers mainly occupied with preparation for their lessons. Educators should keep
metaphysical knowledge in historical material; since scientific ideas from earlier ages are
similar to students’ preconceptions and similarity arise from students’ intuitive knowledge.
The similarity between intuitive knowledge and historical concepts may help teachers to
create a discussion session in classrooms by using scientists’ ideas in past. For example, a
discussion session on the relationship between mass of an object and falling time from
certain height can be triggered with students’ intuitive knowledge rather than scientific
ideas in textbooks. Students’ ideas with their intuitive knowledge may work for better
discussion sessions because of their ill-structured nature. Hence, teacher may use the
similarity between students’ preconception and ideas in the history. To develop instruc-
tional materials, as discussed above, it would be difficult to use original historical source,
educators were needed to simplify historical knowledge within a pedagogical perspective.
The findings of this study support that the facilitator model may serve to discuss the
relationship between the history of science and science education. Stories about scientists’
personal lives may facilitate the preparation of instructional materials to achieve the
affective objectives of the physics curriculum. Historical information about the relationship
between science and society may serve to achieve the curriculum objectives promoting
scientific literacy. Scientists’ ways of doing science in history may serve to prepare
instructional materials for the nature of science. The information about the development of
scientific concepts throughout history may serve to prepare instructional materials for the
cognitive objectives of the physics curriculum. In conclusion, a curriculum should leave
opportunities for educators interested in using the history of science in science teaching,
even historical sources provides a considerable amount of information for every concepts
in the curriculum.

Appendix

Historical sources consulted for the study

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Contaktelektricität leiten: Nebst einem Entwurfe zur einer Theorie des Voltaischen
Apparates und des Schweiggerschen Multiplicators. Nuremberg: Journal für Chemie
und Physik.
3. Ohm, G. S. (1989). Die galvanische Kette. Berlin: VEB Deutscher Verlag der
Wissenschaften.
4. Ohm, G. S. (1825). Vorläufige Anzeige des Gesetzes, nach welchem Metalle die
Contaktelectricität leiten. Leipzig: Barth.
5. Newton, I., Motte, A., Cajori, F., Thompson, S. P., Newton, I., & Huygens, C. (1952).
Mathematical principles of natural philosophy. Chicago, Encyclopædia Britannica.

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6. Frost, P. (1854). Newton’s Principia, sections 1. 2. 3. with notes and illus. Also a
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Its history, production, and applications. New York: D. Appleton and Co.
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