Research findings on conceptual change suggest that putting middle school learners in an experimental environment resulted in cognitive gains. Work with elementary school learners suggests that reasoning and arguing collaboratively and writing to express and reflect on conceptualizations are useful tools in the knowledge revision process.

Teaching for Conceptual Change

Teachers help their students build understanding of complex scientific concepts by disassembling the concept into component parts according to the level of intellectual development of their students. This process, however, is only half of what needs to be done to facilitate students' correct understanding. Students come to school with their own explanations of natural phenomena. The teacher must ascertain students' prior knowledge and naïve or inaccurate conceptual understanding must be addressed at the same time as new concepts are being taught in the science classroom. For purposes of brevity and at the risk of oversimplification, we use the term "misconception" to mean a student's belief that is incorrect from the perspective of the scientific community. The process of replacing a misconception with a scientifically acceptable concept is called "conceptual change".

Steadfastly students hold on to their own ideas about the way the world works, may be very reluctant to change these ideas, and may be little influenced by instruction with a contrary perspective. In the well-known production, A Private Universe, selected Harvard graduates, despite their many years of schooling, provide inaccurate explanations of the cause of Earth's seasons. Even after intensive re-teaching of the accurate, scientific concepts, these subjects still persisted in their own uninformed explanations.

How do teachers go about ascertaining their students' misconceptions? Communication - both oral and written - is essential. Use questions to elicit students' prior knowledge in the lesson's engagement before an exploration takes place (see Learning Cycle as a best teaching practice). Listen to students' explanations of their conjectures when they are working collaboratively with their peers. Ask questions, such as how do you explain what you observed? when students are explaining the results of their investigations. Interview students in formal and informal ways.

According to Smith (1991), four conditions must be present to bring about conceptual change:

• The student must be dissatisfied with the current understanding.
• The student must have an available intelligible alternative.
• The alternative must seem plausible to the student.
• The alternative must seem fruitful (useable) to the student.

How do teachers go about teaching for conceptual change? Use teaching methods that emphasize constructivist philosophies. That is, de-emphasize cookbook-like activities in favor of open-ended investigations that engage students in discussions of scientific ideas in cooperative group work. Provide opportunities for students to confront their own beliefs with ways to resolve any conflicts between their ideas and what they are now experiencing in a laboratory activity and/or discussion, thereby helping them accommodate this new concept with what they already know. Make connections between the concepts learned in the classroom with everyday life. Have students make concept maps as both a teaching/learning strategy and also an assessment tool.