New Perspectives in Science Education

From the perspective of civilian control of science and technology, citizens need to overcome various epistemological barriers that hinder the development of scientific literacy, which are caused by shared beliefs based on oversimplified models inherent in academic fields [1]. To achieve this, structuring science education based on reliable fundamental scientific laws and a microscopic perspective and reducing discrepancies between the four fields (physics, chemistry, biology, and earth science) are needed. However, the current secondary science curriculum does not adequately address the transport phenomena of mass, heat, and momentum that connect the four fields. Although the “disaster triangle (matter, energy, and motion)” [2] proposed as a core conceptual device for disaster science education is expected to function as a tool for comprehensively understanding the mechanisms of climate change and fire extinguishing [3], the concept is too abstract. This study develops disaster model teaching materials that allow students to visually grasp the connections between the three core concepts of mass, heat, and momentum. Focusing on the “shishi-odoshi” used to explain the mechanism of landslides, a literature review was conducted to assess its versatility as a disaster model. The “shishi-odoshi” has been used to explain the mechanisms of various phenomena from the perspective of the balance between the functions that maintain the initial state and those that change the state. An observational experiment using the “shishi-odoshi” was developed for students to learn that the threshold for transitions between states is governed by the interaction between the system and the environment. Furthermore, an observation experiment on convective heat transfer that focuses on the momentum of heated water rising was developed.