MENTAL MODEL BUILDING IN ASTRONOMY EDUCATION 1207
Three arguments for a mental model-building approach to astronomy
education
This section argues that mental model building is a fundamental (and hitherto
under-emphasized) skill in astronomy education. In this discussion, mental models
are defined as human cognitive constructions (Ritchie et al. 1997), which are used
to describe and explain phenomena that cannot be experienced directly. These
personal constructions are attempts both to understand the world (Judson 1980)
and to articulate their conceptions to others (Harrison and Treagust 1996). Mental
models may be personal and highly idiosyncratic through to consensual and
pervasive. Mental models are not to be confused with the models which are often
used to represent them (Wheeler and Hill 1990). Models, usually miniatures or
enlargements, are simplified representations of mental models (Gobert 2000). They
concentrate attention on specific aspects of the mental model (Ingham and Gilbert
1991) to explain something that is not familiar in terms of something that is familiar
(Dyche et al. 1993). A well-known physical model in astronomy is the orrery, which
represents the Moon in orbit around Earth, which is itself in orbit around the
Sun.
Mental model building is an essential process in astronomy itself
Astronomers have always used mental models and models (Sutter et al. 1993) to
understand phenomena and to transmit that understanding to others (Weller 1970).
For example, attempts to understand the place of Earth within the universe have
been articulated by a series of mental models beginning with a flat Earth on a sea
enclosed within a solid celestial firmament, progressing to Ptolemy’s and then
Copernicus’ concentric spheres (Black and Solomon 1987). The concentric spheres
mental models required a force to drive them, which led to Boyle in the 17th
century envisaging the universe as a machine (Poole 1995). This view was accepted
by Kepler, who then developed his mental model of planetary motion as being
similar to the workings of a clock (Bronowski 1973). Kepler’s mental model was
itself later superseded by Newton’s ideas of gravitational forces acting at a distance.
That is, mental models undergo constant evolution (Glynn 1997). If today’s
learners are to begin thinking more like astronomers, then education needs to
become a process in which learners construct and validate mental models that bind
individual knowledge and conceptions into a coherent whole.
Model building can promote an understanding of some crucial aspects of the
nature of science
In common with British (Department for Education and Employment 1999),
Australian (Board of Studies 1998), North American (National Research Council
1996) and other science curricula, Science in the New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry
of Education 1993) requires, mainly through its integrating strand, ‘Making sense
of the nature of science and its relationship to technology’, that pupils understand
aspects of the nature of science. Rather than being taught in stand-alone mode,
these understandings are to be ‘interwoven with the four contextual strands’
(Ministry of Education 1993: 14) including ‘Making sense of planet Earth and
beyond’. The latter strand includes, for example, that pupils are to be able to